AbstractsPolitical Science

This report explores EU environmental integration and europeanisation through quantitative data. Data on Member States, the Parliament and the Commission's position in environmental policy negotiations is analysed and reflected against data on implementation of directives, as well as data on the citizens of Europe's opinion on environmental issues and EU integration. The actors level of ambition is categorized and explained with the use of Europeanisation theory through concepts such as: Upload and download of policies, goodness of fit and Pace-setters, Fence-sitters, and Foot-draggers. European Integration theory is employed to help understand and analyse these positions from different angles. The objective is to analyse who pushes environmental integration forward in the EU, and to investigate how the integration dynamics are reflected in environmental infringements and the citizens' opinions. While this is done the included theories will be questioned and debated against each other in terms of their ability to offer explanations to the empirical data.