When Economy Strengthens Sustainability : How Does Economic Integration Stimulate the Development of Progressive Environmental Regulations?

Abstract

The interaction between economic integration and environmental policy has become an important issue in the last few years. Despite the considerable scholarly attention this topic attracted, actual government responses in terms of environmental policy outputs remain largely untouched by both theoretical and empirical work. To fill this gap, we suggest a theory-based disaggregation of the compound variable economic integration for deriving more precise expectations on its differential impact on environmental policy arrangements. In doing so, we show that economic integration may indeed trigger an upward movement at least regarding the level of environmental policy setting. To illustrate our arguments empirically, we present evidence from Turkey. The analysis of the development of Turkish clean air policy from 1975 to 2005 highlights a regulatory expansion. At the same time, however, the emission of air pollutants increased as well. Consequently, we offer a differential interpretation of how environmental policy setting and enforcement are related to sustainable development.