Sharing uncertainty and responsibility? Voluntary environmental agreements in developing countries: the case of South Africa
(2004)The International Institute for Industrial Environmental Economics
- Abstract
- Developing countries are particularly new to the usage of voluntary environmental agreements and they have not fully explored the opportunity to take advantage of companies that are willing to regulate themselves voluntarily. Their formal regulative environment is often hampered by the absence of clear and enforced environmental standards, lack of human and financial resources.
This paper provides a discussion and some first empirical data on the determinants for a future wider usage of voluntary environmental agreements in poor regulatory environments, where voluntary agreements can be seen, also, as means to enhance regulatory and enforcement capacity of both the private and the public sectors. The analysis, based on the regulatory... (More) - Developing countries are particularly new to the usage of voluntary environmental agreements and they have not fully explored the opportunity to take advantage of companies that are willing to regulate themselves voluntarily. Their formal regulative environment is often hampered by the absence of clear and enforced environmental standards, lack of human and financial resources.
This paper provides a discussion and some first empirical data on the determinants for a future wider usage of voluntary environmental agreements in poor regulatory environments, where voluntary agreements can be seen, also, as means to enhance regulatory and enforcement capacity of both the private and the public sectors. The analysis, based on the regulatory reality of South Africa, explores the preconditions for the promotion of a voluntary agreement on energy efficiency in the Province of Western Cape. It also proposes how to intervene in the system to make these conditions more supportive for the development of co-regulation. Among external sources of pressure, it emerged a confusion generated by a plurality of regulators, the sibylline role of NGOs and the necessity of a promoter and a coordination body that should not be necessary provided by the government.
The results show that there are potentials to make the cooperation works and dynamic when the parties recognize uncertainty about regulation enforcement and future regulation. The research also reveals that the idea to use voluntary agreements is welcomed even if it appears very novel to most companies, government officials and NGOs. Therefore action has to be taken at different level to explain voluntary environmental agreements as participative policy tools to local authorities and NGO members. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
http://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/1329214
- author
- Cristofaro, Dania
- supervisor
- organization
- year
- 2004
- type
- H1 - Master's Degree (One Year)
- subject
- keywords
- voluntary environmental agreements, energy efficiency, participative policy, Environmental studies, Miljöstudier
- language
- English
- id
- 1329214
- date added to LUP
- 2006-09-07 00:00:00
- date last changed
- 2007-04-12 00:00:00
@misc{1329214,
abstract = {{Developing countries are particularly new to the usage of voluntary environmental agreements and they have not fully explored the opportunity to take advantage of companies that are willing to regulate themselves voluntarily. Their formal regulative environment is often hampered by the absence of clear and enforced environmental standards, lack of human and financial resources.
This paper provides a discussion and some first empirical data on the determinants for a future wider usage of voluntary environmental agreements in poor regulatory environments, where voluntary agreements can be seen, also, as means to enhance regulatory and enforcement capacity of both the private and the public sectors. The analysis, based on the regulatory reality of South Africa, explores the preconditions for the promotion of a voluntary agreement on energy efficiency in the Province of Western Cape. It also proposes how to intervene in the system to make these conditions more supportive for the development of co-regulation. Among external sources of pressure, it emerged a confusion generated by a plurality of regulators, the sibylline role of NGOs and the necessity of a promoter and a coordination body that should not be necessary provided by the government.
The results show that there are potentials to make the cooperation works and dynamic when the parties recognize uncertainty about regulation enforcement and future regulation. The research also reveals that the idea to use voluntary agreements is welcomed even if it appears very novel to most companies, government officials and NGOs. Therefore action has to be taken at different level to explain voluntary environmental agreements as participative policy tools to local authorities and NGO members.}},
author = {{Cristofaro, Dania}},
language = {{eng}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
title = {{Sharing uncertainty and responsibility? Voluntary environmental agreements in developing countries: the case of South Africa}},
year = {{2004}},
}