Environmental Issues In Political Discourse In Britain And Ireland

This book examines the political response to current environmental concerns in the context of the British Isles. How have the issues been assimilated by political parties? Which ones have been given priority? Who are the main actors and what is the role of ecologists? Answers to questions such as these are provided in this collective work, not only through valuable insights into the theories and concepts found in political ecology, but also with specific examination of present political debates, such as the Liberal Democrats’ stance, the question of nuclear energy or the salient issue of climate change. A recurring theme is the link between landscape and identity, explored in the contexts of Welsh, Scottish and Irish nationalisms. While this volume reveals some cases of genuine commitment and effective action, it also highlights discrepancies between statements of intent on the one hand and implemented policies on the other. The authors’ aim is to promote dialogue among politicians, experts and academics in the field of environmental issues, political and social sciences, linguistics and discourse.

This collection of essays highlights the different dimensions of the contemporary British environmentalist movement from a multidisciplinary viewpoint. Beginning with an historical overview of the movement, the reader is then presented with an analysis of the politics of climate change from a political science perspective. This is followed by a sociological examination of climate change protesters and environmental activism among young people. The volume also includes an analysis of the ideological relationship between political ecology and the British Left, as well as a case study of environmentalism in Wales against the backdrop of devolution. The book is based on two distinct, yet complementary, perspectives: environmentalism and political ecology. What is this distinction and what is its significance? Answers to these questions and others can be found in these essays which are a must-read for both students and researchers interested in environmental politics in Britain and British area studies.

Half a century ago, many democratic states started to respond to environmental pressures that had arisen in the wake of rapid industrialization. They set up environmental ministries and agencies and issued legislation to control the pollution of air and water and to manage industrial processes, wastes and toxic substances. This was the birth of the environmental state. With planetary ecological challenges like climate change spiraling out of control and dwarfing the environmental state’s classical tasks of environmental management, new questions about the transformative capacities of the state are becoming acute today. How large is the state’s capability to transform enhanced industrial societies into sustainable post-carbon societies? Do its new environmental functions empower the state to prioritise ecological goals over economic growth? Can the state’s environmental management capabilities be radicalised to turn it into a ‘sustainability state’? Can democracies be enhanced to enlarge the state’s transformative capacities? The Political Prospects of a Sustainability Transformation: Moving Beyond the Environmental State explores these and other questions from a variety of theoretical and empirical angles, covering the fields of democratic theory, theories of the state, political economy, political sociology, rhetoric and political philosophy. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of the journal Environmental Politics.

The UK Climate Change Act was the first case of a country implementing blanket legally binding long-term emissions reduction targets in order to combat climate change. This book provides the first accessible and in-depth analysis of the UK’s complex Climate Change Act framework, presenting the discussion in a clear and interdisciplinary manner designed to open the workings of the challenging framework to a broad audience. It discusses the political ‘story’ surrounding the framework, and its treatment in scholarly environmental literature; analyses the technical content of the Act; explores the framework’s international significance, and its internal ‘subnational’ dimensions and impact, engaging the UK’s devolved jurisdictions of Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. This first, much-needed interdisciplinary treatment of the framework is both introductory and analytical in nature and will be of interest to scholars, practitioners and general readers of environmental studies, policy and governance.

This groundbreaking book collects contributions from many of the world's leading climate and energy law scholars and provides the first major study of national Climate Change Acts. This cutting-edge type of legislation originated with the first Climate Change Act framework which was passed in the United Kingdom in 2008, and is intended to enable the law to grapple effectively with one of the great problems of our times, anthropogenic climate change. Since 2008, national framework climate legislation has been slowly but steadily emerging in countries across the world. This trailblazing collection employs a comparative analytical legal methodology and offers the first comprehensive study of this new, innovative form of legislative regime. In addition to containing broad internationalist chapters, deep-dive national case study chapters are included that focus on individual countries and provide analytical depth. A final chapter draws together the threads of the book's foregoing contributions to deduce generalisable conceptual insights based on current knowledge and experience. Uniquely, the book provides a conceptual model for Climate Change Acts that can usefully inform the development of national framework climate legislation in all countries.

During the last two decades, the European Union has come under increasing existential threat. Successive historic crises have called into question the EU’s ability to meet the needs of its citizens, and effectively navigate the emerging challenges of the 21st century. From sovereign debt, Mediterranean migration, and Brexit to climate change, the Covid-19 pandemic, and spiralling conflicts just beyond its borders, the EU has struggled to carve out a meaningful path forward. Worse, through action or inaction, it has often failed to live up to the lofty ideals of its foundation. In response, the EU has faced a growing tide of Europhobic dissent, driven by insurgent populism and nationalism. Left unanswered, this tide promises to overwhelm the EU and irretrievably damage the legitimacy of its institutions—or see them coopted into the chauvinist projects of a new and emboldened ‘authoritarian international’. In light of this, progressive forces who value the positive role the EU can play in the world face a stark and urgent choice. They can give the EU a new fundamental vision, centred on elevating the situation of the worst-off in all corners of European society. Or they must reconcile themselves to losing it permanently as a force for freedom and equality, justice, solidarity, and pluralism across the European continent and beyond. A Radical Bargain for Europe makes an impassioned case for the first of these two choices. It argues that social policy is the site where this new vision must be developed, as the live frontier of the latest debates over the course of European integration. And it presents the concept of a basic income as a concrete step towards fulfilling the promise of a ‘social Europe’—folding in one of the greatest questions of modern social policy debates in many national contexts. This book presents an outline of what a European basic income (EUBI) would look like. It argues that, in its fundamental form, an EUBI has its attractions to a wide range of progressive ideologies, from the far left, greens, and social democracy to liberalism and Christian democracy. Each of these ideologies adds its own unique colour to the shape an EUBI could take, in principle and in practice. Yet all of them must work together in a broad ‘agenda coalition’ to take the next step towards European social integration, embrace an EUBI, and realise the EU’s radical potential.

This book will equip the reader with the expertise and confidence to manage an organization’s strategies with regards to conflict management in the construction industry. Students may expand their knowledge of conflict management and control in an area of their current responsibility, or in an area that will suit their career ambitions. With the creative approach to teaching, they will learn and develop innovative methods for dealing with legislative challenges when managing conflict issues in organization.

Environmental history, the author argues, is ultimately the history of human hopes and fears.