Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
permeate all aspects of the EIA process, with the
public having difficulty in making known those
concerns that they believe the EIA should address.
However, while it is not obligatory for EIAs to be
defended publicly, it is possible for citizens to
petition for it.
Finally, although the idea of an interdisciplinary
approach to EIAs is mandated by the legislation,
there has been a notable reluctance on the part of
natural scientists and social scientists to work
together, something that training programmes for
those who service EIAs has as yet failed to address
(Fowler and Dias de Aguiar 1993).
The lack of an interdisciplinary approach to the
realisation of EIAs is the main theme in the next
case study, but here the discussion is put into a
comparative context to illustrate the problems that
the countries of Eastern Europe, because of their
Communist heritage, have in bringing their
practice into line with their Western European
neighbours.
Estonia represents one of the more advanced
of the ex-Communist countries now seeking to
conform with the EU approach to EIA as a
prelude to joining the Union in the near future.
Norway has moved in the same direction but is
motivated by its membership of the European
Economic Area. Both had two decades of
experience of involvement with attempts to
reconcile economic development with
environmental concerns, and although they are
each moving towards a common approach, their
separate socio-economic histories mean that
notable differences still remain. In this respect, it is
Estonia's socialist heritage that plays an important
role, as it does in other Eastern European
countries. There, engineers still remain the
backbone of the educated classes. Political
development—in which the citizenry are
encouraged to take part in decision-making
processes and in the public debate—remain new
features of life, as does the development of the
social or the human sciences. Thus any problem is
reduced to that in which solutions are largely
technical ones. This permeates thinking in the
sphere of environmental protection in a way that
is perhaps stronger than in many other spheres,
because it is an area where technicians, engineers
and natural scientists feel most at home. But the
contrast here with Norway is particularly strong
because of its multi-disciplinary approach to such
matters. As the tabular comparison in the case
study shows, herein lie perhaps the major
differences in the approach to EIA in the two
countries.
As for the EU approach to EIA (Box 17.3), the
decision taken to provide a basic system and to
remit the implementation of its component parts
to the individual member states under the banner
of subsidiarity has, in retrospect, left much to be
desired. Indeed, the Commission itself has
recognised that its implementation had been very
uneven with, at worst, some examples of the
flagrant disregard of its intent. Spain, for example,
blatantly reduced many attempts to profile the
impact of a project on the environment merely to
an account of that project's economic benefits
(Pardo 1998).
It is not surprising, therefore, that the
Commission should have sought, in due course,
to review the process as set out in its original
Directive in order to bring it into line with best
practice worldwide. But this was made more
compelling by the new imperative of sustainable
development that followed from the Rio Earth
Summit in 1992. What has been achieved as a
result of the review, however, has not been
without considerable compromise, necessitated
by attempts to seek common ground among the
member states, some of which, not least the UK,
have been largely hostile to its intentions. Thus,
while the key changes described in Box 17.3 do
offer very positive improvements, the
Amendment Directive of 1997 falls short of what
might be recognised from the previous section as
what was really needed. An important failure has
been the inability of the Commission to insist
on formal scoping, together with post-project
monitoring and enhanced public participation.
These should be common to any system put in
place by advanced economies such as those of
the EU as part of a desire to produce EIAs that
offer something to the quest for sustainable
development.
