A Comparison of Green 10 and the European Union’s Environmental Policies

Abstract

Environmental problems, especially climate change, are one of the biggest concerns that humanity has to deal with in the 21st century. In addition to the international negotiations, the regional and local efforts play a key role to implement the environmental objectives on the field. In that term, the European Union is an important actor because of its long-lasting and leading policy developments in environmental issues. The multi-level governance of the EU creates opportunities for individual citizens as well as NGOs to be involved in the policy-making process. Because of all, Europe is the focus of leading environmental NGOs (ENGOs). This study aims to analyse and compare the EU environmental policies and recommendations of Green 10 which is the coalition of ten leading ENGOs across Europe.

The study asks two main questions which are ‘what was the political and social context to push ten leading ENGOs to act collectively?’ and ‘what are the similarities and differences between Green 10’s views and the EU’s environmental policies?’. In order to give answers to these questions, it firstly develops the conceptual perspective to define the Green 10 as an advocacy network and to illustrate the structure of EU multi-level governance. Then, it investigates the historical background and political development of the environmental policies in Europe. The study compares the documents for each environmental policy subject from climate change to environmental liability to reveal the Green 10’s and its member ENGOs’ political impact over the EU environmental policies. It also analyses the causes to act in a coalition, degree of criticism over the EU environmental policies and the future of Green 10.