Environmental Law In a Connected World

What do you get when 300 environmentalists, policy-makers and business representatives come together to talk about the future of regulation? And what if the leaders of that group are from different countries and different states with wide-ranging experiences on how to deal with the world?

You get energy, doubt, excitement, questions and ideas. That was what happened on Monday, Jan. 31 2005 in Madison, Wisconsin, during a conference called "Environmental Law in a Connected World." The conference highlighted international efforts at innovation in environmental protection that encompass state government, business and private partnerships. Experts from Germany , the United Kingdom, Australia, the Netherlands, China and the United States presented.

Some of the conference focused on Wisconsin’s new results-based environmental policy called Green Tier, which rewards superior environmental performance that improves the quality of air, water, land or natural resources beyond the minimum standard required by law. Green Tier allows the state to differentiate among good environmental actors and those performing at or near the regulatory minimum.

"Third generation environmentalists are people at all levels in all organizations who are for solutions rather than against problems. They work with anyone, anywhere who has something better to offer the environment." ~Thomas Burke, United Kingdom

Participants also contrasted traditional environmental policy models that focus on minimum compliance as a goal with those that promote exceeding minimal expectations while providing businesses with flexibility to better compete in times of changing technology and markets.

The conference was a follow-up to last year's passage and signing of Green Tier and a related fact-finding mission to Germany, where a Wisconsin delegation examined innovative technologies, "green building" practices and new directions in environmental governance. The broad-based Wisconsin group explored how the Green Tier law (modeled, in part, after the Environmental Pacts of Bavaria) could encourage companies to improve environmental performance while boosting productivity and cutting costs.

The conference also kicked off a three-year study of environmental regulatory innovations in Wisconsin and elsewhere as signs of a trend toward innovative and entrepreneurial forms of environmental governance that engage all parts of civil society in protecting the environment, not just government regulators and targeted businesses.

The research project, “Wisconsin Style: New Approaches to Regulatory Innovation,” is led by Graham Wilson of the La Follette School of Public Affairs and chair of the Department of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The project will work with legislators, state agencies, environmental groups, business organizations and others to re-invent and create approaches to regulatory reform that draw upon best practices from nations around the world. The goal is to produce higher levels of environmental performance by businesses through collaboration and cooperation, rather than through the top-down adoption of rigid laws, regulations and taxes.

The conference was sponsored by the La Follette School, with the cooperation of Gov. Jim Doyle and an advisory board that includes state Sens. Neal Kedzie and Mark Miller, Pat Schillinger of the Wisconsin Paper Council and Steve Hiniker of 1,000 Friends of Wisconsin.

Funding and sponsorship support were provided by the Ira and Ineva Reilly Baldwin Wisconsin Idea Endowment; the UW-Madison Center for World Affairs and the Global Economy; the American Transmission Co.; the European Union Center; the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources through its Dairy Gateway Cooperative, which is funded by the Joyce Foundation; and the Multi-State Working Group on Environmental Performance and its Policy Academy on Environmental Management Tools.

For additional information on this conference, including related speaker materials, please see the Robert M. La Follette School of Public Affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Madison or WAGE Research Resources.