1 Globalizing European Union Environmental Policy

This article explores the EU’s efforts to ‘globalize ’ EU environmental regulation. EU leadership on global environmental governance emerged as the result of the combined effects of domestic politics and international regulatory competition. The growing power of environmental interests in Europe from the late 1980s, coupled with dynamics of EU policy-making led the EU to be committed to ambitious environmental policies. Given this commitment, it was in the international competitive interests of the EU to support international agreements that would pressure other jurisdictions to adopt similar environmental regulations. Promoting treaties that spread EU environmental norms internationally also served to legitimize EU rules and to shield them against legal challenges before world trade bodies