Evaluating environmental mediation : results from a waste management conflict in germany

Abstract

Little empirically based research has been carried out with the aim of evaluating mediation procedures in the area of environmental policy. Generally, such procedures are evaluated retrospectively and on the basis of general atteria. The Social Science Research Center Berlin (WZB) conducted a research project into mediation procedures in the field of environmental protection, the central object of study being the mediation procedure undertaken to resolve a dispute over the waste management program of Neuss County in Germany This paper presents some results of the accompanying social scientific research, with the aim of evaluating the success of the mediation. It begin by describing the problems underlying the mediation procedure in NeuSS the procedure itself, and the results achieved. Then follows an evaluation of this procedure, based on eighteen key procedural and results-related criteria for evaluating the success of the mediation. The analysis shows that evalual ing mediation procedures is a highly complex affair, and that this is reflected in the evaluations made by the participants themselves.