Environmental Enforcement in Decentralised Governance Systems

This report analyses approaches to managing environmental compliance monitoring and enforcement inseveral OECD countries with decentralised systems of environmental governance. It focuses principally onstrategies and instruments for promoting consistency in the implementation of national environmental law.The report reviews in detail the experience of Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United States and drawson examples from several other countries.Three programmatic elements of environmental enforcement are key to ensuring its consistency: thetargeting of compliance monitoring the selection of an enforcement instrument and the timeliness of noncomplianceresponse and the size of monetary penalties for non-compliance. Accurate and completeinformation on the performance of sub-national and local competent authorities is an important prerequisitefor the evaluation of nationwide consistency of enforcement.To address these issues, OECD countries employ a range of mechanisms of institutional interaction:“vertical” (between different administrative levels) as well as “horizontal” (between competent authoritiesat the same level). The report presents multiple examples of the application of each mechanism in differentdecentralised systems. It analyses these good practices and suggests several ways to use them to ensureconsistency in the implementation of the main elements of enforcement programmes.

OECD Environment Working Papers

Environmental Enforcement in Decentralised Governance Systems

Toward a Nationwide Level Playing Field