No chance for incentive-oriented environmental policies in representative democracies? A Public Choice analysis

Using the Public Choice approach, this paper gives an explanation as to why in representative democracies, in which political entrepreneurs attempt to maximize utility, an incentive-oriented environmental policy has hardly any chance of being implemented. We discuss two main aspects: first, the reasons which make it difficult to enforce any kind of environmental policy in the competitive political environment. And second, why such a policy-if it can be implemented at all-is very often enacted with inefficient instruments. In order to give a satisfactory explanation of these 'execution deficits', we differentiate between voters', politicians', interest groups', and bureaucracies' behavior to show that there are conflicts with other policies, and that individual rationality may be the greatest obstacle in implementing most incentive-oriented environmental policies. In the final section we provide five suggestions for overcoming these difficulties. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.