ABSTRACT
Between 1977 and 1980, ‘Brussels watchers’ amongst the environmental impact assessment (EIA) fraternity could gauge their standing in the hierarchy by whether they were privy to the most recent version of the proposed EIA directive as these documents diffused out only slowly from an inner circle of luminaries. Indeed, there were so many drafts of the directive over this period that even the pundits seemed to lose count. Estimates of how many were produced ranged from ‘over twenty drafts’ (Haigh 1983) to ‘no fewer than 50’ (Milne 1986). Not only was there a long gestation period before the draft directive was formally published in 1980, but there were also protracted deliberations before a final text was agreed by the constituent member states of the European Community (EC) in July 1985. In all, a decade elapsed between the initial discussions on EIA as an element of EC environmental policy and its realization.
