Module Code - Title:
PA4008
-
PUBLIC POLICY AND THE ENVIRONMENT
Year Last Offered:
2025/6
Hours Per Week:
Grading Type:
N
Prerequisite Modules:
Rationale and Purpose of the Module:
This module focuses on environmental policy and the policy processes, outputs, and outcomes related to it, thus addressing public policy responses to some of today's most significant societal challenges. It focuses on explaining differences in environmental policies across political systems and over time, with particular attention given to Europe and Ireland. It uses environmental policies as a lens through which broader concepts and theories in comparative public policy can be understood, including the conceptualisation and measurement of public policy, the influence of institutions, ideas, interests, and international factors, and the role of key actors in public administration, representative politics, and the broader economy and society. The module is centred on regular reading and participation in class. It places a strong emphasis on recent research literature that uses a range of methods of data collection and analysis.
Syllabus:
Environmental policy issues; global, EU, and Irish environmental policy; the social sciences and environmental policy; describing policy processes, outputs, and outcomes; environmental leadership and laggardship; international factors and environmental policy; institutions; representative politics; individual leadership and environmental policy; environmental NGOs and economic interests; public administration and environmental policy; the courts and environmental policy.
Learning Outcomes:
Cognitive (Knowledge, Understanding, Application, Analysis, Evaluation, Synthesis)
On successful completion of this module, students will be able to:
identify the main environmental issues on the policy agenda, putting them in historical and institutional context;
conceptualise and identify leadership and laggardship on environmental policy;
demonstrate that they can describe policy-making on environmental policy issues in Ireland, the EU, and in comparative, cross-national perspective;
demonstrate that they can assess competing explanations of variation in environmental policy outputs and outcomes.
Affective (Attitudes and Values)
On successful completion of this module, students will be able to:
demonstrate an appreciation of the value of using theory and evidence to explain objectively environmental policy outputs and outcomes;
demonstrate an appreciation of the potential for political science to contribute to addressing environmental policy problems.
Psychomotor (Physical Skills)
N/A
How the Module will be Taught and what will be the Learning Experiences of the Students:
Active class sessions, with frequent pair and small-group work (Graduate attribute: Collaborative). Analyses of the research designs and methods used in published research articles (Graduate attribute: Knowledgeable). Term paper development sessions, including peer feedback sessions (Graduate attributes: Creative, Collaborative). Data collection and analysis sessions, in which students will have opportunities to develop their knowledge of the sources of data and case-study information available to them (Graduate attributes: Knowledgeable, Creative). Guest speakers, depending on availability. The module is centred on regular reading and participation in class and it places an emphasis on recent research findings and the state of the art across the topics covered (Graduate attribute: Knowledgeable).
Research Findings Incorporated in to the Syllabus (If Relevant):
Prime Texts:
Neil Carter (2018)
The Politics of the Environment: Ideas, Activism, Policy. Third edition.
, Cambridge University Press.
Other Relevant Texts:
Bernadette Connaughton (2019)
The Implementation of Environmental Policy in Ireland: Lessons from Translating EU Directives into Action.
, Manchester University Press.
Detlef Jahn (2016)
The politics of environmental performance, institutions and preferences in industrialized democracies.
, Cambridge University Press.
Matto Mildenberger (2020)
Carbon Captured: How Business and Labor Control Climate Politics.
, MIT Press.
David Robbins, Diarmuid Torney and Pat Brereton (eds) (2020)
Ireland and the Climate Crisis.
, Palgrave Macmillan.
Programme(s) in which this Module is Offered:
BLLAPLUFA - (LAW PLUS)
BAEUSTUFA - EUROPEAN STUDIES
BAULARUFA - ARTS
BACRJUUFA - CRIMINAL JUSTICE
BSSOSCUFA - SOCIAL SCIENCES
Semester(s) Module is Offered:
Autumn
Spring
Module Leader:
conor.little@ul.ie