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Since the security of energy supply in Europe is at stake, the debate on energy sources prominently took hold on the agenda of European countries. Nuclear energy is one of the issues on this agenda. However, nuclear energy is discussed quite differently in Germany and France, although the two countries both experienced strong public protest in the 1970s and are similar in size, economy, industry and culture. By comparing the two, this article analyses the reasons for the different debates on nuclear energy existent in Germany and France. It argues that stances on nuclear energy form the core of social identities that prevent members of these groups to deviate from the group norm. The relevance of certain types of identities is a function of the institutions of the political system. To change the way energy sources are discussed, it is necessary to create or make salient different group identities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What states can and cannot do under conditions of globalization remains an important question in current studies of public policy. Some stress that states are increasingly limited in the types of policies they can deploy, while others argue that states remain active and important players, but in different ways. This article argues that 'transformative capacity' rooted in links between the state and societal actors will be crucial for determining what options are available to governments. This argument is addressed by examining the evolution of agricultural structural policy in France over the past forty years. Globalization, regional economic integration, as well as environmental and social issues posed new challenges for policy-makers in agriculture beginning in the early 1980s, forcing a reconstitution of state-society relations, first vertically and then horizontally, as a basis for transformative capacity. In the process, the state has shifted from a reliance on rather closed bipartite corporatist policy networks to more open multipartite corporatism. These reconstructed relations with the agri-food sector are now permitting the French state to pursue a new approach to agricultural structural policy that adjusts to globalization on its own terms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the impact of Europeanization on French politics. More specifically, three theories, two belonging to international relations and one to comparative public policy, are tested against the contribution of Europe to the development of an environmental policy for agriculture in France. This sector was selected because of the difficulties that French policy - makers face in addressing environmental problems related to agricultural practices. The article shows that Europe helped French policymakers to meet the challenge of adopting stringent environmental regulations for agriculture. However, it also shows that the domestic corporatist setting prevailing in agriculture had a significant impact on the policy outcome. Therefore, it is argued that international relations theories and comparative public policy theories are more powerful when combined. Ways of achieving such a combination are proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]