David Benson

What have we Learned from Policy Transfer Research? Dolowitz and Marsh Revisited

Over the last decade, policy transfer has emerged as an important concept within public policy analysis, guiding both theoretical and empirical research spanning many venues and issue areas. Using Dolowitz and Marshs 1996 stocktake as its starting point, this article reviews what has been learned by whom and for what purpose. It finds that the literature has evolved from its rather narrow, state-centred roots to cover many more actors and venues. While policy transfer still represents a niche topic for some researchers, an increasing number have successfully assimilated it into wider debates on topics such as globalisation, Europeanisation and policy innovation. This article assesses the concepts position in the overall ‘tool-kit’ of policy analysis, examines some possible future directions and reflects on their associated risks and opportunities.

Evaluating IWRM implementation success: are water policies in Bangladesh enhancing adaptive capacity to climate change impacts?

Optimizing the capacity to adapt to climate change impacts has become a critical challenge for human societies. This article therefore evaluates how integrated water resource management (IWRM) approaches help enhance adaptive capacity to climate change impacts on water resources. An evaluative framework is derived from key IWRM principles and their roles in modulating adaptive capacity. This framework is then used to evaluate IWRM implementation in Bangladesh. The analysis draws on policy documents, interviews and a survey of policy makers. Results suggest that policy principles and implementation in favour of IWRM can be a source of success but also of failure for adaptive capacity. Recommendations for amending the concept with the aim of increasing adaptive capacity are outlined.

Is Environmental Management Really More Collaborative? A Comparative Analysis of Putative ‘Paradigm Shifts’ in Europe, Australia, and the United States

It is a truism that environmental management has experienced a significant change in the locus of governing, in which centralised forms of steering have been gradually replaced by more collaborative management approaches organised at the ecosystem scale. Whereas much research capital has been expended on informing their design and promoting their uptake, surprisingly little systematic comparative empirical research exists on the precise nature and extent of what is often described as a ‘paradigm shift’ in governing. We address this gap by examining how one issue often deemed to require deeper ‘collaboration’, namely, catchment management, has been addressed in three comparable federal political systems: the European Union; the USA; and Australia. On the basis of a fresh and more comparable account of the forms and modalities of collaboration, we reveal that, although collaboration has undoubtedly grown in recent decades, its depth and extent remains highly variable both across and within the three cases. We also examine what these subtly different geographical ‘contours of collaboration’ imply for future research and practice.

The scaling of water governance tasks: a comparative federal analysis of the European Union and Australia.

Conflicts over how to “scale” policy-making tasks have characterized environmental governance since time immemorial. They are particularly evident in the area of water policy and raise important questions over the democratic legitimacy, economic efficiency and effectiveness of allocating (or “scaling”) tasks to some administrative levels as opposed to others. This article adopts a comparative federalism perspective to assess the “optimality” of scaling—either upward or downward—in one issue area, namely coastal recreational water quality. It does so by comparing the scaling of recreational water quality tasks in the European Union (EU) and Australia. It reveals that the two systems have adopted rather different approaches to scaling and that this difference can partly be accounted for in federal theoretical terms. However, a much greater awareness of the inescapably political nature of scaling processes is nonetheless required. Finally, some words of caution are offered with regard to transferring policy lessons between these two jurisdictions.

Understanding task allocation in the European Union: exploring the value of federal theory

After a long period in the doldrums, in recent years the use of federalism to understand the European Union (EU) has undergone something of a renaissance. However, some of its core claims remain ambiguous and many have not been tested empirically. This paper argues that amongst a number of truth claims made by federal theorists, potentially the most illuminating is that relating to the allocation of decision-making powers (or tasks) across different levels of governance. In testing the value of what appears to be an increasingly distinct ‘turn’ in EU scholarship, it subjects this particular claim to empirical testing within the area of environmental governance – a policy area which is especially well suited to federal theory. Drawing on three relevant federal theories, this paper concludes that each one sheds new light on task allocation, but all have their blind spots, suggesting the need for further refinement, empirical testing and possibly synthesis with other theoretical approaches.

Policy Transfer Research: Still Evolving, Not Yet Through?

We are very grateful to Mauricio Dussauge-Laguna, Eugene McCann and Kevin Ward for their constructive and insightful responses to our original article (Benson and Jordan, 2011). Our original intention was to return to David Dolowitz and David Marsh’s 1996 review article to chart the development of policy transfer as a concept and to examine some possible future directions for research, ranging from continuing evolution through to greater assimilation and possibly even eventual decay.At the time, we openly posed the question as to whether the heat had started to go out of the debate on policy transfer and, by implication, that conceptual ‘decay’ was just a stone’s throw away. How wrong we were! The answer, on the basis of these responses and others that we have received is that, as a research topic, policy transfer is very much alive and kicking. Indeed, in their very different ways, both responses powerfully reveal that not only is the literature on transfer broader and more dynamic than we seemed to imply, but it is also evolving in ways and in directions that we did not originally discuss and, we suspect, that even Dolowitz and Marsh did not originally intend.To adapt Charles Lindblom’s (1979) well-known phrase, the debate about policy transfer is evidently still evolving, and is far from through.

Green budgeting in an age of austerity: a transatlantic comparative perspective

The integration of environmental concerns into government fiscal cycles, or green budgeting, is an increasingly popular means of pursuing environmental policy, but the global spread of green budgeting norms has been uneven. However, recent stimulus packages employed by advanced economies to promote economic growth integrate a strong green element. This raises questions about how the current desire for fiscal austerity interacts with existing factors that constrain or facilitate environmental policy via budgeting. By drawing on theoretical arguments that argue that macro ‘politics matters’ in budget composition, we develop an analytical framework for explaining budgeting practices. This framework is employed to examine green budgeting in two leading but otherwise contrasting industrialised economies: the United States and the United Kingdom. Our analysis suggests that key veto players have often set the green budgeting agenda in the current age of austerity.

Resolving issues with environmental impact assessment of marine renewable energy installations

Growing concerns about climate change and energy security have fuelled a rapid increase in the development of offshore and marine renewable energy installations (OMREIs). The potential ecological consequences of increased use of these devices emphasises the need for high quality environmental impact assessment (EIA). We demonstrate that these processes are hampered severely, primarily because legislation does not ensure that the significance of impacts and cumulative effects are properly assessed. We highlight why the regulatory framework leads to conceptual ambiguities and propose changes which, for the most part, do not require major adjustments to standard practice. We emphasise the importance of determining the degree of confidence in impacts to permit the likelihood as well as magnitude of impacts to be quantified and propose ways in which assessment of population-level impacts could be incorporated into the EIA process. Overall, however, we argue that, instead of trying to ascertain which particular developments are responsible for tipping an already heavily degraded marine environment into an undesirable state, emphasis should be placed on better strategic assessment.

Sustainability appraisal in local land‐use planning: patterns of current performance

The UK government has identified the land‐use planning system, and development plans in particular, as potentially powerful instruments for integrating national sustainability objectives into strategic decision making at local levels. One method for achieving this is through the use of so‐called ‘sustainability appraisals’, which are an extension of the established system of environmental appraisal used by planners since the early 1990s. A national framework is outlined in Planning Policy Guidance Note 12. Local authorities are now expected to conduct an environmental appraisal of their development plans which covers sustainable development issues. However, little research has been conducted on the effectiveness of current guidance in meeting this aim. By evaluating the implementation of sustainability appraisals nationally, this paper suggests that while government advice to appraise is generally being applied, the actual use of key sustainability principles in practice is rather variable. It then discusses these findings in relation to the changing context of appraisals in the UK and other national planning systems.

Integrating the Principles of Integrated Water Resources Management? River Basin Planning in England and Wales

Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) is now a globally generic concept encompassing a multitude of environmental governance approaches in different national contexts. However, conspicuous gaps in the IWRM literature concerning the application of this concept in practice are still evident suggesting a need for further theoretically driven comparative research. In view of these gaps, this article examines IWRM in one leading national context with a long established tradition of holistically managing water resources, namely England and Wales.