IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jcmkts/v58y2020i3p527-544.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Crisis, Climate Change and Comitology: Policy Dismantling Via the Backdoor?

Author

Listed:
  • Charlotte Burns
  • Paul Tobin

Abstract

The EU is reputed to be a climate pioneer. However, the EU has been beset by crises, with potentially negative consequences for climate ambitions. The coding and analysis of EU climate legislation between 1998 and 2015 reveal that while the rate of creating climate policy has increased since the onset of the crisis, the ambition of these policies has waned. Technical policy instruments (comitology) at the EU level, namely delegated and implementing acts (DIA), are analysed alongside the legislation adopted under the ordinary legislative procedure (OLP). If they were applied as indicated in the treaties, the technical DIA measures should not influence the EU's policy ambitions, but in fact, during the crisis era, DIA measures were used more frequently than during the pre‐crisis era, and used in three out of the four cases that weaken policy, suggesting that a minor dismantling of climate policy is taking place at EU level, but via the back door.

Suggested Citation

  • Charlotte Burns & Paul Tobin, 2020. "Crisis, Climate Change and Comitology: Policy Dismantling Via the Backdoor?," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 58(3), pages 527-544, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jcmkts:v:58:y:2020:i:3:p:527-544
    DOI: 10.1111/jcms.12996
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/jcms.12996
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/jcms.12996?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Stefano F. Verde & Jordi Teixidó & Claudio Marcantonini & Xavier Labandeira, 2019. "Free allocation rules in the EU emissions trading system: what does the empirical literature show?," Climate Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 19(4), pages 439-452, April.
    2. Adam,Christian & Hurka,Steffen & Knill,Christoph & Steinebach,Yves, 2019. "Policy Accumulation and the Democratic Responsiveness Trap," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781108481199, January.
    3. Charles F. Parker & Christer Karlsson, 2010. "Climate Change and the European Union's Leadership Moment: An Inconvenient Truth?," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48(4), pages 923-943, September.
    4. Giandomenico Majone, 2001. "Two Logics of Delegation," European Union Politics, , vol. 2(1), pages 103-122, February.
    5. Charlotte Burns & Neil Carter & Nicholas Worsfold, 2012. "Enlargement and the Environment: The Changing Behaviour of the European Parliament," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(1), pages 54-70, January.
    6. Paul Tobin, 2017. "Leaders and Laggards: Climate Policy Ambition in Developed States," Global Environmental Politics, MIT Press, vol. 17(4), pages 28-47, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Ana Mar Fernández Pasarín & Nuria Font, 2022. "Unveiling Inconsistency: Consensus and Contestation along the Council–Comitology Cycle of EU Policy‐Making," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(2), pages 427-444, March.
    2. Diego Badell & Jordi Rosell, 2021. "Are EU Institutions Still Green Actors? An Empirical Study of Green Public Procurement," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 59(6), pages 1555-1572, November.
    3. Katharina Rietig & Claire Dupont, 2021. "Presidential leadership styles and institutional capacity for climate policy integration in the European Commission [Climate policy integration: A case of déjà vu?]," Policy and Society, Darryl S. Jarvis and M. Ramesh, vol. 40(1), pages 19-36.
    4. Jan Pollex, 2022. "Simultaneous Policy Expansion and Reduction? Tracing Dismantling in the Context of Experimentalist Governance in European Union Environmental Policy," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(3), pages 604-633, May.
    5. Jeffrey Rosamond & Claire Dupont, 2021. "The European Council, the Council, and the European Green Deal," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 9(3), pages 348-359.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. repec:bla:jcmkts:v:47:y:2009:i::p:483-506 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Bartle, Ian & Vass, Peter, 2007. "Independent economic regulation: A reassessment of its role in sustainable development," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 15(4), pages 261-269, December.
    3. Timothy Fraser & Lily Cunningham & Amos Nasongo, 2021. "Build Back Better? Effects of Crisis on Climate Change Adaptation Through Solar Power in Japan and the United States," Global Environmental Politics, MIT Press, vol. 21(1), pages 54-75, Winter.
    4. Seikel, Daniel, 2011. "Wie die Europäische Kommission Liberalisierung durchsetzt: Der Konflikt um das öffentlich-rechtliche Bankenwesen in Deutschland," MPIfG Discussion Paper 11/16, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
    5. Zhang, Jiekuan, 2023. "Emissions trading scheme and energy consumption and output structure: Evidence from China," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 219(P1).
    6. Eckert, Sandra, 2020. "EU agencies in banking and energy between institutional and policy centralisation," SAFE Working Paper Series 278, Leibniz Institute for Financial Research SAFE.
    7. Sjef Ederveen & George Gelauff & Jacques Pelkmans, 2008. "Assessing Subsidiarity," Springer Books, in: George Gelauff & Isabel Grilo & Arjan Lejour (ed.), Subsidiarity and Economic Reform in Europe, chapter 2, pages 19-40, Springer.
    8. Mauricio I. Dussauge-Laguna, 2022. "The promises and perils of populism for democratic policymaking: the case of Mexico," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 55(4), pages 777-803, December.
    9. Nazli Aziz, 2005. "Power delegation and the European Central Bank's democratic deficit," Asia Europe Journal, Springer, vol. 3(4), pages 537-550, December.
    10. Charles F. Parker & Christer Karlsson, 2017. "The European Union as a global climate leader: confronting aspiration with evidence," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 17(4), pages 445-461, August.
    11. Sarel, Roee & Demirtas, Melanie, 2021. "Delegation in a multi-tier court system: Are remands in the U.S. federal courts driven by moral hazard?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    12. Iwona Bąk & Anna Barwińska-Małajowicz & Grażyna Wolska & Paweł Walawender & Paweł Hydzik, 2021. "Is the European Union Making Progress on Energy Decarbonisation While Moving towards Sustainable Development?," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(13), pages 1-18, June.
    13. Christine Neuhold & Andreea Năstase, 2017. "Transparency Watchdog: Guarding the Law and Independent from Politics? The Relationship between the European Ombudsman and the European Parliament," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 5(3), pages 40-50.
    14. Trym N. Fjørtoft, 2022. "More power, more control: The legitimizing role of expertise in Frontex after the refugee crisis," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 16(2), pages 557-571, April.
    15. Thomann, Eva & Gómez Díaz, Jana & Dieterich, Jonas & Suhner, Dominik & Selensky, Michelle & Griem, Jannis, 2024. "Ausmaß, Ursachen und Folgen der Überlastung der öffentlichen Verwaltung in Baden-Württemberg und Rheinland-Pfalz," Working Papers 40, University of Konstanz, Cluster of Excellence "The Politics of Inequality. Perceptions, Participation and Policies".
    16. Clément Fontan & David Howarth, 2021. "The European Central Bank and the German Constitutional Court: Police Patrols and Fire Alarms," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 9(2), pages 241-251.
    17. Yanbin Li & Dan Nie & Bingkang Li & Xiyu Li, 2020. "The Spillover Effect between Carbon Emission Trading (CET) Price and Power Company Stock Price in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(16), pages 1-17, August.
    18. William T. Daniel, 2013. "When the Agent Knows Better than the Principal: The Effect of Education and Seniority on European Parliament Rapporteur Assignment," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 51(5), pages 832-848, September.
    19. Giuseppe Zaccaria, 2022. "You’re Fired! International Courts, Re‐contracting, and the WTO Appellate Body during the Trump Presidency," Global Policy, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 13(3), pages 322-333, June.
    20. Yaning Zhang, 2022. "Limits of Law in the Multilevel System: Explaining the European Commission's Toleration of Noncompliance Concerning Pharmaceutical Parallel Trade," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(4), pages 1001-1018, July.
    21. Paul Schure & Amy Verdun, 2008. "Legislative Bargaining in the European Union," European Union Politics, , vol. 9(4), pages 459-486, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:jcmkts:v:58:y:2020:i:3:p:527-544. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0021-9886 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.