The Government and Environmental Policy
The purpose of the United States' public policy law is to implement restrictions in an effort to solve problems, which can be seen with the Clean Water Act.
Public policy has also been employed to reform the Endangered Species Act of
1973. Although the United States government is noble in it's efforts to preserve the environment through these acts, the internal structure of public policy often retards these acts' effectiveness. This paper will explore the many ways in which factors such as horizontal implementation, divided government, and other forms of public policy affect the environmental legislation involved with the aforementioned acts. The main factors involved with the Endangered
Species Act of 1973 involve horizontal implementation structure and divided government. Before one can discuss how these policies affect environmental legislation, a brief description of each must first be lucidly explained. When our government was founded, a system of checks and balances was implemented between the executive, judicial, and legislative branches to ensure that no one part of government gets too much power. Although this limits the power of any one person in government, it often slows down the ability of government because a consensus can be difficult with so many people working together. Another problem is that there are many subgovernments affecting the legislation as well, such as interest groups like the Sierra Club, Administrative Agents like the
Environmental Protection Agency, and Congressional Committees. Because these groups add to the total number of people working on the legislation, the original noble ideology of making policy for the good of the nation is voided.
Also because there are so many differences of opinion, few drastic changes are made, instead small incremental changes are made which take up lots of time and retard the effectiveness and enforcement of the legislation. In addition to this chaotic turmoil, four steps must be implemented in order to pass a bill.
These are initiation & definition, formulation & enactment (legitimation), implementation, and evaluation.
The most relevant one of these steps is horizontal implementation when one considers the Endangered Species Act and Clean Water Act. This policy is the process that puts a law into effect after it has been legitimized. Congres...
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...ne." (Adler, pg. 1)
The Act's goals as set forth by Congress was to eliminate toxic discharge into significant bodies of water by 1985, improve water quality for marine and freshwater life by 1983, and for all "toxic pollutants in toxic amounts" into water. Of course that act has had mediocre success, and only through continued cooperation of the government's branches will further progress be made. In conclusion, it has been shown how different branches of government, different administrations, and different policies all worked together to retard the implementation of the Endangered Species Act and the Clean Water Act of the early 1970's. Although these processes do act in a system of governmental checks and balances as the founders of this country wished, the effectiveness of the acts take many years of careful compromising to become significant.
REFERENCES
1. Adler, Robert W., et. al. The Clean Water Act 20 Years Later
Island Press Washington, D.C. 1993
2. Horton, Tom "The Endangered Species Act: Too tough, too weak, too late." (1992) Audubon Vol. 94 pgs. 68-74
Without multi-state agreements concerning changes in usage patterns, this could bring about intervention by the Federal courts that would effectively halt Atlanta’s development until the usage disputes were resolved. By comparison, some western states water lawsuits have lasted for decades, typically freezing usage patterns “as is”. (Barr, 1999) The southeast can ill afford to have Atlanta – the region’s single largest engine of economic growth – brought to a standstill because of this issue.
The Environmental Protection Agency, or EPA is the result of a 1970 executive order by President Richard Nixon for the purpose of protecting the environment of the United States through regulation on business and citizens. Public opinion on the Environmental Protection Agency has been divided fairly evenly across the population of the United States as of recently, as compared to the widespread public concern of the 50’s and 60’s that led to the agency’s creation. Recently the agency has come under scrutiny for its contributions of millions of dollars in grants to researchers in order to hide the potential trade off of its actions in order to further the agency’s agenda. The EPA’s ever-expanding regulation could end up harming more than it actually
Farmers and ranchers who own water rights should have their water amount filled earlier in order to facilitate themselves with the proper amount of water. They should not be restricted to a smaller prearranged amount of water each year. Water us...
The environment and the health of the surrounding population go hand in hand. The Environmental Protection Agency takes on this ever so important mission of protecting them both. The mission statement of the EPA states, “The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Office of Small Business Programs is to support the protection of human health and the environment by advocating and advancing the business, regulatory, and environmental compliance concerns of small and socio-economically disadvantaged businesses, and minority academic institutions (US Enviromental Protection Agency, 2010).” The impact of its mission can be defined clearly as it examines the impact of contamination in the air, the water, and the land on human health.
... on the economy, environment and society. Everyone should judiciously use water in a sustainable community. Not everyone has the wherewithal to implement a home water filtration system which can remove hazardous chemicals such as chlorine, lead, asbestos, pharmaceuticals and pathogens from our drinking water. Industries and public should take it seriously and not consider profit alone as it goals. They should have ethical responsibility to reduce water pollution and conserve it. EPA and other water utilities board should strictly monitor and take action against violators. Water pollution abatement plans should be made and implemented.
Congress enacted legislation now known as the Clean Water Act. During the Truman era, originally called the Federal Water Pollution Control Act. The bill Congress passed in 1972 was an overhaul of the original act. The Clean Water Act set limits on the amount of pollutants industries and cities could discharge and gave the Environmental Protection Agency the power to sue and penalize polluters that exceeded those limits. Congress banned DDT, reduced emissions and sued major cities.
that we have to start watching where we drain our polluted water, and start to
---. “The Clean Water Act—Is it Successfully Reducing Water Pollution?- Draft 1.” UTSA: WRC 1023, 31 Mar 2014. Print.
China has approximately 20% of the world’s population, which is around 1.3 billion people (Morris, 2009, p. 111). Also, China has become one of the worlds biggest manufacturing countries within 30 years (Fawssett, 2009, p. 27). However, such rapid development has come at a cost, which has created various environmental problems. Coincidentally, China has 16 cities on a list of the 20 worst polluted cities in the world (Fawssett, 2009, p. 15). Therefore, this essay will explain the reasons for China’s environmental problems, then evaluate the claim that the Chinese government and people, are tackling these environmental problems. First, crop farming techniques over the last hundred years, and their consequences will be explained. Followed by, how peoples choice in food has changed over the last hundred years, and how this indirectly affects the environment. Then, how a capitalist economy is linked to agriculture, and finally what the Chinese government and people are doing to tackle these problems.
Our Congress created the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) in 1969 in order to establish an environmental foundation for mankind. This policy endorses harmony between humans and the vast ecosystems surrounding them. To obtain this goal and provide our future with resources as well, NEPA is separated into two titles. The first title declares the policy in detail while the second title focuses on the Council on Environmental Quality. The CEQ oversees the effectiveness of current methods, the reactions of the environment to those methods, and implements revisions as necessary.
...l forms of life, and the continued observance and regulation of water treatment by the government and independent companies to help create safer techniques for waste water treatment.
Growing concerns about the environment’s well-being has become a focal point for many governments all over the world. Governments have allocated a substantial amount of resources and capital in an attempt to reduce pollution. Air pollution has led to harmful health effects and a depletion of the ozone layer. The depletion of the ozone layer results in higher levels of UVB reaching the Earth’s surface. This added UVB has been linked with increased cases of cataracts and melanoma development (epa.gov). Government regulations on pollution are costly to the tax payers and to the companies that must abide by these regulations. To reduce the expense of pollution reduction, Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein suggest a different governmental approach to improve upon the standard already in place. In Chapter 12 on saving the planet, Thaler and Sunstein use the ideas of choice architecture and gentle nudges to expand the effort of protecting the environment by creating better incentives and feedback.
For Nestlé Corporation during such crisis, water was still a commodity to be sold in the open market. Nestlé drained 80 million gallons of water a year from Sacramento aquifers during the time of crisis of record drought. The mayor of Sacramento city gave the rights to Nestlé for significantly less amount to bottle the water and sell it for outrageous profits while the people of California suffered tragic draught situation. Nestlé Water Company paid 65 cents per 750 gallons of water to the city of Sacramento. This means, for 215,000 gallons of water the company paid $186. This water is sold for $2.1 million USD, resulting in a difference of 10,000% of what it should cost and what people paid. People were upset because of the lack of regulation and control when a giant corporation is taking their water for minting money. There were rallies organized in Sacramento and other parts of California. The mayor of Sacramento should have been more concerned about managing the public water resources properly rather than giving corporations the opportunity to bottle it, in fact the corporations should understand the responsibility to manage water wisely. Nestlé was even given a tax break and wasn’t required to pay the commercial rate for the water which it sold back to people at humungous
Water is essential for humanity’s survival, and even though the world is largely covered by water, only a small percentage is only usable for human consumption. Approximately, on average, 120,000 gallons of water are used annually for a single-family household (Galbraith). This alarming number could be reduced dramatically for the efforts of water conserving and lower water bill prices for families and subsequently saving money that could be used for other expenses. Thus, conserving water would prove beneficial and advantageous to not just Texas, but for everyone else as well. Although environmental policies have been not as popular with Congress and the state legislature, it is still an important problem to consider since there are only a limited amount of resources for public use, such as water.
There has been a tremendous attention from EU scholars about environmental policy. Since the 1970’s there has been numerous environmental crises and the emergency of an environmental, social movement in several European countries, but even after green politics in Europe quietened and environmental policy gained a ‘normal’ status in the “acquis communautaire”, this attention never subsided.