Why Has Technical Standardization Become a Tool for Environmental Policy?

Christian Frankel, Copenhagen Business School

9/19/2008
(Original Publish Date: 9/1/2004)

Why is it that, during the last decade, EU environmental policy has focused on realising technical standards? This question becomes the more interesting as technical standardization organisations do not have a history of environmental awareness, but rather of technical awareness and of being a forum in which the interests of industry dominate. One could ask: Why has EU environmental policy been put into a forum in which technical and industry interests dominate? The answer to this question is sought by inquiring into the history of the internal market. This analysis shows a more fundamental policy change: EU policy objectives cannot be realised by the EU institutions alone, but require cooperation with private institutions, and this has consequences for environmental policy.