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This article presents the results of a comparative study of environmental policy making in Toronto and Los Angeles. The study was intended to explain how social formations at the urban scale play an increasingly important role in constructing environmental policy and practice as articulated in documents, rhetoric and political actions. It is suggested that environmental policy is embedded in broader and more long-term political goals, and that ecological discourse is not only about the environment but also brings together various social projects under the environmental protection flag. The four case studies— in Toronto, contaminated soil and the Don River were examined, and in Los Angeles air pollution and the Los Angeles River—revealed considerable variation but all reflected an agenda of ecological modernisation. In particular it was found that demands for maintaining or improving environmental integrity and coherence have lost legitimacy to concerns for efficiency, competitiveness, marketability, flexibility and development. Similarly, market driven regulation and an openness to civil society have played a major role in transforming policy making apparatuses. In contrast, the cases revealed that relationships between nature and society go beyond those expected in ecological modernisation theory and include both social ecology and urban ecology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]