The Environmental Case: Translating Values Into Policy

by Judith A. Layzer, Sara R. Rinfret

Overview

Answers to environmental issues are not black and white. Debates around policy are often among those with fundamentally different values, and the way that problems and solutions are defined plays a central role in shaping how those values are translated into policy. The Environmental Case captures the real-world complexity of creating environmental policy, and this much-anticipated Sixth Edition contains 14 carefully constructed cases, including a new study of the Salton Sea crisis. Through her analysis, Sara Rinfret continues the work of Judith Layzer and explores the background, players, contributing factors, and outcomes of each case, and gives readers insight into some of the most interesting and controversial issues in U.S. environmental policymaking.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781071870242
Publisher:	SAGE Publications
Publication date:	06/06/2023
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	560
File size:	5 MB

About the Author

Judith A. Layzer was professor of environmental policy in the Department of Urban Studies and Planning at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) until her death in 2015. She earned a Ph.D. in political science at MIT. After four years at Middlebury College in Vermont she returned to MIT, where she taught courses in science and politics in environmental policymaking, ecosystem-based management, food systems and the environment, urban sustainability, energy and environmental politics, and public policy.

Layzer’s research focused on several aspects of U.S. environmental politics, including the roles of science, values, and storytelling in environmental politics, as well as on the effectiveness of different approaches to environmental planning and management. A recent project asked: Do urban sustainability initiatives significantly reduce cities’ ecological footprints? And which aspects of “green cities” are most effective at reducing cities’ environmental impacts? In addition to The Environmental Case, Layzer was the author of Natural Experiments: Ecosystem-Based Management and the Environment (2008) and Open for Business: Conservatives’ Opposition to Environmental Regulation (2012).

Layzer was an athlete as well as a scholar. In addition to having finished five Boston marathons, she shared nine national championship titles and one world championship trophy with her teammates on Lady Godiva, formerly Boston’s premier women’s Ultimate Frisbee team.

Judith A. Layzer

1961–2015

Dr. Sara R. Rinfret is currently a Professor of Public Administration and Associate Vice Provost of Faculty Affairs at Northern Arizona University. She has more than a decade of higher education administrative experience and is a nationally recognized scholar in regulatory policy, environmental policy, and public administration. She previously served as the Acting Dean for the Alexander Blewett School of Law, Chair of the Department of Public Administration and Policy, and the Director of Master of Public Administration at the University of Montana. To date, she has published 8 books and more than 40 peer reviewed articles, and several book chapters. She is the recipient of the Fulbright Specialist Program in public administration and studied with scholars at the University of Aarhus (Denmark, 2016). She holds an MPA from the John Glenn College of Public Affairs (Ohio State), and PhD in political science from Northern Arizona University. 

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 • A Policymaking Framework: Defining Problems and Portraying Solutions in U.S. Environmental Politics
Two Critical Features of U.S. Environmental Policymaking
Major Actors in Environmental Policymaking
The Environmental Policymaking Process
Case Selection
Getting the Most Out of the Cases
Part I • Regulating Polluters
Chapter 2 • The Nation Tackles Air and Water Pollution: The Environmental Protection Agency and the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts
Background
The Case
Outcomes
Conclusion
Challenge Questions
Chapter 3 • Love Canal: Hazardous Waste and the Politics of Fear
Background
The Case
Outcomes
Conclusions
Challenge Questions
Chapter 4 • Ecosystem-Based Management in the Chesapeake Bay
Background
The Case
Outcomes
Conclusions
Challenge Questions
Chapter 5 • Market-Based Solutions: A Forgotten Success Story
Background
The Case
Outcomes
Conclusions
Challenge Questions
Part II • History, Changing Values, and Natural Resource Management
Chapter 6 • Oil Versus Wilderness in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge
Background
The Case
Obama Legacy
Outcomes
Conclusions
Challenge Questions
Chapter 7 • Federal Grazing Policy: Some Things Never Change
Background
The Case
Conclusions
Challenge Questions
Chapter 8 • Jobs Versus the Environment: Saving the Northern Spotted Owl
Background
The Case
Outcomes
Conclusions
Challenge Questions
Chapter 9 • Playground or Paradise? Snowmobiles in Yellowstone National Park
Background
The Case
Outcomes
Conclusions
Challenge Questions
Chapter 10 • Lessons from the Fish: Crisis and Recovery in New England
Background
The Case
Outcomes
Conclusions
Challenge Questions
Part III • New Issues, New Politics
Chapter 11 • Climate Change: The Crisis of our Time
Background
The Case
Outcomes
Conclusions
Challenge Questions
Chapter 12 • Cape Wind: If Not Here, Where? If Not Now, When?
Background
The Case
Outcomes
Conclusions
Challenge Questions
Chapter 13 • Fracking Wars: Local and State Responses to Unconventional Shale Gas Development
Background
The Case
Outcomes
Conclusions
Challenge Questions
Chapter 14 • Making Trade-Offs: Urban Sprawl and the Evolving System of Growth Management in Portland, Oregon
Background
The Case
Outcomes
Conclusions
Challenge Questions
Chapter 15 • The Salton Sea: A Desert Mirage
Background
The Case
Outcomes
Conclusions
Challenge Questions
Chapter 16 • Conclusions: Politics, Values, and Environmental Policy Change
The Strength of the Status Quo
Legislative Policy Change
Administrative Policy Change
Acknowledging the Role of Values

Editorial Reviews

This book has an excellent thematic framework and fine coverage of U.S. environmental politics over time. The case studies are superb and a great teaching resource. The Environmental Case is a wonderful resource of high and consistent quality.”

Daniel Fiorino

Layzer’s analysis is objective and thorough, providing valuable context and content for students to better understand environmental problems. Her reliance on a rich variety of data and sources provides students with a springboard for further analysis and research.”

Melinda A. Mueller

The book’s primary strength lies in how well the author is able to link academic theory and discussion to real-life cases. The cases offer a thorough and interesting perspective on current environmental issues. [Students] often say in class that they enjoy reading the cases and find them very thorough and clear. They have specifically mentioned the level of detail and that it is helpful to them.”

Rebecca Bromley-Trujillo

The Environmental Case continues to lead the field of undergraduate-friendly texts, providing theoretical frameworks and detailed case studies of domestic and international environmental events. The cases, which include Love Canal, environmental justice, fishing practices, and urban sprawl, include data from a variety of sources, questions for discussion, recommended readings, and relevant web sites. The book facilitates environmental politics courses by providing multiple cases in a single, affordable text, and I believe it will continue to serve as a standard for the future

Daniel P. Aldrich

Judith Layzer’s The Environmental Case is an indispensable book for my environmental policy and politics course. The introduction develops the guiding framework, namely that divergent problem definitions — stemming from intractable value conflicts — remain at the heart of U.S. environmental battles. Layzer’s fascinating and well chosen case studies are so versatile and valuable that her book now serves as a replacement for — rather than a supplement to — the leading textbook in my course

Daniel Lipson