Mapping Institutional Linkages in European Air Pollution Politics

摘要

Scholars interested in international cooperation have demonstrated increased attention to various linkages among the growing number of international institutions associated with environmental politics. Analytical interest in these linkages stem from observations that as the density of human activities with transnational environmental effects continues to grow in conjunction with a growth in the number and scope of international institutions that fully or partly address environmental issues, the formation and operation of these institutions increasingly intersect. Documented examples of environmental areas where institutional linkages have important effects on activities and outcomes across institutions include fisheries, regional seas, hazardous chemicals, transboundary air pollution, as well as linkages between environmental institutions and economic and trade institutions. While earlier work highlighted the growing importance of institutional linkages, the literature on linkages remains littered with proposed taxonomies of linkages and little agreement regarding their utility for advancing understanding of the implications of such linkages. Furthermore, most of these taxonomies remain too broad and vague to offer useful guidance for empirical research regarding linkages as possible avenues of influence across institutions. This article stresses the function of linkages as potential causal pathways of influence within policy making and implementation across institutions―pathways often neglected in research on environmental politics.