Britain, France, and the European Union - Comparing Environmental Policies in 16 Countries - page 122

and WWF have French affiliates. In Brussels, European Environmental
Bureau and Climate Network Europe join more general groups. In Britain,
France, and the EU, interest groups often receive money from the govern-
ment and supply personnel to staff official agencies. This does not happen
in the United States.
Both the United Kingdom and France have parliaments elected on the
first-past-the-post rule that makes it hard for small parties like Greens to
win seats. They have never won any in Westminster. They have, however,
occasionally won in France, holding 12 out of 577 recently. The situation is
different in the European Parliament, which uses proportional representa-
tion. The Green Group (Party) routinely has about 50 seats.
The French constitution provides for a strong president, modeled in part
on the United States. On the other hand, it also has a prime minister who
sits in the assembly, and ministers appointed from the assembly or the sen-
ate. In the United Kingdom, the prime minister and his or her ministers
sit in parliament. Both France and Britain are unitary, unlike the federa-
tions of the United States and Germany. Implementation of national laws
is not filtered through a lower level. The effect of these differences of struc-
ture on environmental laws and regulations is not apparent. The European
Union, of course, is not a single country (at least yet). Nevertheless, it does
have a strong bureaucracy with directorates that impose their will directly
on citizens and business firms.
Britain and France often lead the diplomatic agenda, with sponsorship
of conferences and strong ties to the United Nations. Across the spectrum,
both countries have dominated diplomacy for centuries. Furthermore, the
talent and strength of British and French scientists allow them to lead.
For example, the first empirical measurements of the Ozone Hole came
from the British Antarctic expedition, and Sir John Houghton chaired
the technical portion of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
The European Union, itself an evolving form of diplomacy, diffuses air
pollution standards such as the harmonization of auto exhaust emissions.
France and Britain have been fully aware of events elsewhere. The
Environmental Decade affected them throughout the 1970s. EU pro-
grams like standards on air and water spread across the continent.
Although in the 1970s the United Kingdom was tarred with the label of
“laggard,” that was too harsh. British laws on air and water pollution were
copied by the United States. Its scientists led by discovering the Ozone
Hole and in chairing the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
French science has been influential for two centuries. Sixty years ago,