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Does the number, ideological congruence, and/or individual cohesion of veto actors influence policy making to be incremental or drastic? Rather than compare veto actors across different states as is already extensively addressed, this article compares the different veto actors involved in Australia's 2011 Carbon Tax Policy and its 2014 "Carbon Tax Repeal" policy. It uses quantitative data to measure the number, ideological congruence, and individual cohesion of the different veto actors. The results show that, because of the smaller number of veto actors, their higher ideological congruence, and lower individual cohesion, policy making was rather drastic than incremental for the 2014 repeal policy compared to the 2011 Carbon Tax Policy. The results, however, challenge the assumption that many veto actors hinder effective policy change and suggest that because a single or few veto actors can easily execute drastic policy making, they can likewise easily halt effective policy. These have implications for policy making. Related Articles: Båtstrand, Sondre. 2015. "More than Markets: A Comparative Study of Nine Conservative Parties on Climate Change." Politics & Policy 43 (4): 538‐561. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12122 Fisher, Sarah. 2015. "Federalism's Fractured Decision Making in the Kyoto Protocol." Politics & Policy 43 (1): 1‐29. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12110 Kwon, Sung‐Wook, and Sylvia Gonzalez‐Gorman. 2019. "Influence of Local Political Institutions on Policy Punctuation in Three Policy Areas." Politics & Policy 47 (2): 300‐325. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12295 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Regulatory failure occurs in diverse and complex circumstances, especially in environmental regulation. The response of policy-makers and regulators to regulatory failure often follows a predictable pattern, with the imposition of increased prescriptive regulatory approaches. This phenomenon has been described as regulatory pendulum swing. If the regulatory failure causes immediate and obvious harm to people or the environment such an approach may be appropriate. However, where the community loses trust in regulatory regimes where harm is less evident, a response of this nature may do little to restore trust. This research examined a case study of coal seam gas regulation in New South Wales, Australia, using a regulatory trust typology. The typology's dimensions of expertise, stewardship and transparency provided a useful framework to understand regulatory failure and regulatory trust, and for evaluating the responses of policy-makers and regulators to public concerns over coal seam gas development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Deforestation threatens the earth's biodiversity and the ecosystem services upon which humans depend. Formal regulation is a key mechanism by which governments seek to protect forests. However, whether regulation can effectively protect remaining areas of the most threatened and most heavily cleared forests is unknown. We addressed this question using forest loss data for Queensland, Australia between 2000 and 2014 under existing vegetation clearing regulation ( Vegetation Management Act 1999 ). This regulation is specifically designed to provide the greatest protection for threatened forest types that have already lost the greatest amount of their original extent. Importantly, enforcement and governance of this regulation is relatively strong allowing an assessment of regulation design. We applied path analysis to model the direct and indirect effects (mediated by variables representing deforestation pressure) of forest protection level on clearing rates. There was strong evidence for a decline in clearing rates over time, except of clearing for non-agricultural purposes. However, threatened forest types, which have already lost > 70% of their original extent and should have the greatest level of protection under the regulation, continue to be cleared 2.7–2.9 times faster than non-threatened forest types. There was also little evidence that the regulation has driven greater reductions over time in the clearing rates of threatened versus non-threatened forests types. There was much greater support for the indirect than direct effect of protection level. This is because protection level was correlated with variables associated with deforestation pressure, resulting in higher clearing rates for threatened compared to non-threatened forest types. We hypothesise that this arises because the additional protection afforded to threatened relative to non-threatened forests is insufficient to counter the continuing higher level of deforestation pressure on threatened forests. We argue that a potential solution is to build explicit targets for forest retention into regulation, below which no further forest loss is permitted. This could be combined with spatially targeted enforcement and incentive strategies where threats are highest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In many parts of the world the combined pressures of population growth and a drying climate have resulted in the proliferation of water focused policies which aim to increase the resilience of socio-ecological systems. Until recently, these policies often reflected surface water centric views of water resources, with groundwater receiving scant attention. In this paper we provide an introduction to the importance of groundwater for water-dependent socio-ecological systems and why it needs to be better incorporated into environmental water management policies. Specifically we highlight the key role of groundwater in buffering the environment and socio-economic activities against drought. We also outline some of the key challenges that face policy-makers and managers implementing groundwater management policies. These include dealing with groundwater resources that are spatially and temporally mismatched with surface water resources; transboundary governance issues; challenges between focusing on either preventative or restorative actions and most importantly limited knowledge about groundwater resources and groundwater–ecology relationships. We hope that the information in this paper will assist in the development of sustainable surface-groundwater water management policies, as well as highlight important challenges that should be considered before implementing groundwater related policies. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper outlines the rationale for a research focus on how meaning emerges from the interfaces between research, policy, and practice. In exploring where different constructions of risk, resilience, and landscape occur in the policy and practice discourses surrounding current developments in Victorian bushfire policy, this paper goes beyond simply advocating better science–policy–practice relationships by demonstrating the challenges of operationalising adaptive governance principles. Our findings stress that change can arise from interacting discourses on the policy–practice interface. Yet, although this may be the most adaptive moment in the policy process, producing multiple insights and alternative options, it is vulnerable to institutionalised discourses that obstruct flexible practice. Complex socioecological issues such as bushfire, we argue, require more explicit engagement with the processes of practice inherent in policy formulation. The paper offers coproductive research strategies as contributing to more flexible governance arrangements to improve adaptive policy design. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The widely held view is that effective action on climate change requires commitment by national governments to international agreements. Developed nations like Canada and Australia continue to fall short in their commitments to emissions reduction targets established under the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. Australia refused to ratify its Kyoto commitments until 2008 and Canada withdrew its commitment in 2011. Subnational governments in both countries have been active in developing policy responses to climate change yet remain largely excluded as serious policy partners in national mitigation and adaptation initiatives. This paper utilizes Kingdon’s Multiple Streams Framework to consider why subnational governments address climate change and the main factors shaping their policy choices. The experiences of the Australian state of Victoria and the Canadian province of Ontario provide examples through which to explore the factors contributing to climate policy opportunities and constraints faced by subnational governments in these countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Australia is one of the largest coal exporting nations in the world and its economy is underpinned by the availability of cheap fossil fuels. It is well documented that it has failed to act on climate change, and that the conservative Howard government was particularly hostile to international action. It is also well documented that 2007 was an agenda-setting period when climate change was elevated to national prominence. This paper details and interrogates the ultimately successful Labor national governments' efforts to establish an Australian carbon pricing mechanism. It considers whether irresistible normative forces for climate policy change overcame the previously immovable object of economic and political self-interest, and the power of the carbon lobby. In explaining complex climate policy dynamics, temporal scales and politics, it finds great utility in John Kingdon's pragmatic 'policy window'1 as an explanation for Australia's climate policy change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Technological innovation is the most politically palatable avenue for governments to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. It avoids less palatable alternatives, such as regulating social behaviour. However, technological innovation in advanced, liberal capitalist states such as Australia is the product of the interaction of science possibilities with market demands, and is primarily reliant on the choices of profit-seeking corporations. Therefore, interviews were conducted with key office-holders in Australia's most carbon-intensive industry sectors. The perspectives they offered challenge the conventional wisdom that Australian business desires less government intervention. Instead, corporate representatives expressed a desire for stronger, clearer and more strategic long-term government support. This is because a liberal economic basis for capitalism in Australia means government, more than the market, is central for climate innovation as opposed to normal market innovation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper develops the concepts of the climate discourse complex, and national climate policy regime, in order to analyse significant patterns in Australian national climate politics over the twenty-five years from 1988 to 2013. Six major discursive fields - scientific, ethical, economic, technological, political/legal, and 'everyday life'- contribute to the ensemble of discourses that constitute a climate discourse complex. The climate discourse complex in turn serves to frame and discipline climate debate and the articulation of a national climate policy regime. The composition of Australia's climate discourse complex has been dominated by the economic discursive field. Debates over 'old' and 'new' economic discourses have been the key drivers of and constraints on the trajectory of Australia's climate policy regime for much of the period under consideration. These debates have diminished and sometimes marginalized the influence of scientific, ethical and other discourses, contributing to Australia's weak mitigation ambition. The paper also suggests that significant changes in Australian climate discourses and Australia's climate discourse complex have largely been initiated by factors external to Australia, with the major shift occurring in the period 2006/2007. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In his work on policy development, John Kingdon discusses the role of 'policy entrepreneurs' in advocating particular solutions to policy problems. This article discusses a group of policy entrepreneurs in the US who have been actively seeking to shift drought policy away from a crisis response towards an approach based on risk management. The case is discussed by comparison with the development of Australian drought policy which has taken a risk management approach since 1992. Drought policy in Australia has largely been developed in a top-down fashion while in the US policy advocacy has been more bottom-up. This case highlights a key point that Kingdon and others have made, that policy entrepreneurs cannot succeed alone in achieving policy change, and raises the question as to whether the concept of 'policy entrepreneurs' is useful beyond being an appealing descriptor of influential but not decisive agents in the policy process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Local governments (LGs) have provided a range of essential services. Initially this did not include specific consideration of the bio-physical environment, however, their role in environmental management has become more prominent since the 1980s. This article argues that LGs have an increasingly important role in environmental and sustainability implementation, and, through an international context, identifies the variety of policy responses LGs in Australia have adopted to engage with environmental and sustainability issues. The literature based review demonstrates the richness of this engagement and that while there is information about the range of engagement, there is little to indicate the effectiveness of these policies. This gap points to some key directions for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The seemingly rapid growth of the market for socially responsible investment ('SRI') in Australia and other jurisdictions promises to make financing decisions more accountable to social and environmental criteria. Indeed, the ability of financiers to withhold funds and thereby hinder development, such as the decision of the Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Ltd in 2008 to shun financing a Tasmanian pulp mill planned by Gunns Ltd, raises hopes that financial institutions could act as surrogate environmental regulators. The long-standing SRI movement arose partly as an answer to the lacunae or weaknesses of official regulation, providing a means by which ethical investors could challenge corporations partaking in socially egregious or environmentally irresponsible practices condoned by authorities. Yet, these aspirations appear to have been too ambitious. Lacking sufficient market leverage, and reliant on relatively tame voluntary codes of conduct, paradoxically the success of the SRI movement increasingly relies on the state itself. SRI depends on weightier public policy reforms in such areas as economic incentives and fiduciary duties, although considerable uncertainty persists concerning which policy reforms could most effectively advance SRI. Concomitantly, reformers must justify why investment institutions should be held legally accountable to a higher standard than those firms they finance. Unless these barriers to SRI and its regulation are resolved, it is doubtful whether SRI in Australia or elsewhere can contribute significantly to environmental governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the problematic aspects of carbon dioxide emissions trading schemes (ETS) in Australia. ETS have become a popular method for governments to use to try to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from power and energy stations. Because ETS was adopted by the Kyoto Protocol as a primary means of combating climate change, the government of Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has made ETS a policy priority. The author argues that any potential environmental gains made by using ETS are undermined by regulatory loopholes promoted by the energy industry and because ETS does not address the underlying cause of greenhouse gas emissions.

Abstract: The conservation of biodiversity is an important issue world wide and in Australia the maintenance of native biodiversity on farms makes an important contribution to overall conservation objectives. This paper seeks to explain Australian farmers'' rationale for maintaining biodiversity on their farms for personal as opposed to business reasons by developing a decision-systems theory from in-depth interviews. This difference has implications for policy development. The decision-systems theory is divided into two main sections. The first section contains five parts. (1) A hierarchy of motivation stories, (2) the concept of suitability and availability of opportunities, (3) a hierarchy of three decision-systems, (4) the concept of personal career paths, (5) the concept of Lenses. The second section contains one part, a policy classification system called ‘boxes of influence’ that suggests how policy developers can use the information in the first section to develop new biodiversity conservation policy. The paper suggests that decision-systems theory could be used to shed new light on current trends in agriculture and become an important investigative tool for policy development concerning the conservation of biodiversity on farms. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The intensity of conflict over water and water management has been increasing. Focusing on the recent federalist compact, the National Water Initiative (NWI), the use of market and property rights instruments in water governance in Australia are explored. Does the use of such instruments imply a reduced role for the state, as new instruments displace previous top down or regulatory modes of governance? The view that the new market-based system of governance can be self-managing is challenged. It is argued instead that the market requires substantial meta-governance, which challenges approaches to governance that assume a reduced role for the state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While Australia has signed both the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, and the Kyoto Protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, it has failed to ratify the latter. It is nevertheless committed to meeting its +8% Kyoto target for greenhouse gas emissions, and argues that it is on track to doing so. This paper examines Australia's non-ratification politics and greenhouse policy efforts in an attempt to explain its contrary position of resisting Kyoto, yet embracing and pursuing its emission reduction targets. Australia's behavior as a carbon-intensive nation is highly significant in the global context, and this paper focuses on the domestic factors of interests, ideas and institutions, while also considering international factors in trying to explain Australia's non-ratification of Kyoto and climate change policy development. It finds that while ideas and institutions have been modifying influences in the domestic context, political and economic interests have dominated Australia's greenhouse policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the mid-1990s, Australia embarked on a program of reforms including the introduction of private property rights in water; the allocation of water for the environment, and increased public participation where new initiatives are proposed. Many of the water allocation and management practices adopted in the country have originated from states in the Murray-Darling Basin. This article considers the different approaches taken in NSW, Queensland and Victoria. In each of these states public participation has been an evolving process, giving rise to difficulties of a slightly different nature. The article outlines the policy and theory behind public participation, and sets out the legal provisions for its inclusion in water planning. It explores the main issues in the implementation of the legislation. The Australian experience suggests that policy makers and legislators did not initially draw upon the extensive research that was in existence on effective public participation. However, changes were made to make the processes more inclusive. Capacity building of participants, independent scientific support, and access to data were some of the most critical factors in effective public participation. Because the public had the opportunity to participate and influence decision-making in water allocation, some potential legal conflict was avoided. Of the states examined, Queensland had the best legislative template for public participation, although improvements could be made in many areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An overview is presented of recent work on the environmental changes impacting on Australia and the policy responses of the State and Commonwealth governments, especially over the last ten years. This period has seen a remarkably stable phase of conservative government administration in Canberra and consistent resistance to a strong environmental policy agenda, both domestically and internationally. Attention is focused particularly on rural and regional Australia, rather than on urban areas. The paper discusses the role of environmental issues in recent elections and also details the results of relevant opinion polls charting changes in environmental attitudes. The problems posed by the federal system of administration are outlined as are recent analyses and counter-analyses of the state of the Australian environment. A more fundamental problem with liberal democracy and environmental values is also addressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reflects on the initiative of the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) not to include greenhouse gases on its revised National Pollutant Inventory. The inclusion was proposed at the Environment Protection and Heritage Council meeting, which was held on June. During the meeting, COAG agreed that the National Pollutant Inventory (NPI) would not be used as a means for reporting greenhouse gas emissions and that no further research be undertaken by the Environment Protection and Heritage Council on incorporating greenhouse gas emission reporting in the NPI.

The article reports on the environmental project participated by most city councils in Australia. The Local Government Sustainability Health Check promotes sustainable and environmental practices and also includes training and workshops for awareness on sustainable development. Director-General of the Department of Environment and Conservation Lisa Corbyn recognizes the environmental leadership of the communities who participated and supported the project. It is also mentioned that the project aids national movement towards sustainable living.

Discusses how the United Nation's International Maritime Organization (IMO) has adopted a new convention to regulate ballast water carried by merchant ships. How the treaty will rid of the spread of alien aquatic species which could be potentially harmful; Consideration of how ships discharge water at their arrival point as well as nonnative organisms such as kelp and zebra mushrooms; Efforts of countries such as Australia and Canada to bring their concerns to the attention of IMO's Maritime Environment Protection Agency (MEPC).

Notes that Australia will lead a bloc of south Pacific countries who oppose legally binding targets for greenhouse gas emissions at the United Nations climate convention, December, 1997. Australia's call for each country to set its own goals; Australia's arguments.