Integrative regulation: A principle-based approach to environmental policy

This article builds on recent field research to articulate a principle-base d approach to environmental regulatory design that is applicable to a wide variety of circumstances, irrespective of political and social particularit ies. At its core, this approach recognizes that an excessive reliance on "s ingle-instrument" policies is misguided, because all instruments have stren gths and weaknesses, and none is sufficiently flexible and resilient to suc cessfully address all environmental problems in all contexts, A better stra tegy is to harness the strengths of individual mechanisms while compensatin g for their weaknesses by the use of additional instruments. That is, in th e large majority of circumstances, a mix of regulatory instruments is requi red, tailored to specific policy goals. The article identifies a series of regulatory design principles that sequentially address the problems and opp ortunities arising from the application of multi-instrument mixes and engag ing a variety of first-, second-, and third-Party participants in the regul atory process. The importance of choosing inherently complementary instrume nt combinations is also highlighted, with practical guidance provided to po licymakers. Although the focus of the article is on environmental regulatio n, the general principles articulated should also be applicable to other ar eas of social regulation.