ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY
force.The decision of the Australian Labor Party to reject an Antarctic min-
erals treaty and push for a moratorium on minerals extraction was a result
of its pro-green stance at the 1987 election aimed at winning the support
of environmentally concerned voters (Elliott 1994 ).
Another consideration is the availability of salient solutions (Young 1994 :
110–11). Some problems have identifiable and feasible solutions, such as the
bans on whale-hunting, the ivory trade and the exploitation of Antarctic
mineral resources. Technological progress can make political co-operation
more likely: the availability of substitutes helped achieve co-operation on
phasing out CFC production, and agreement to reduce acid precipitation was
eased by the development of catalytic converters and flue-gas desulphurisa-
tion equipment to cut emissions from cars and coal-fired power stations.
By contrast, one of the continuing obstacles to progress on climate change
has been the absence of viable and affordable alternatives to fossil fuels in
energy production and road transport.
Regime formation may be hastened by exogenous shocks such as ecolog-
ical disasters. Within six months of the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear
power-station in 1986 an international agreement on dealing with nuclear
accidents was signed. The discovery of the hole in the ozone layer gave a mas-
sive boost to the negotiations that led to the Montreal Protocol. In contrast,
the absence of any similar disaster or dramatic discovery has probably ham-
pered the progress of climate change diplomacy. Scientists may play a vital
role in regime formation because the uncertainty surrounding each new
environmental issue increases the dependency of governments on expert
advice throughout the policy process. Scientists are critical in identifying
problems, evaluating their significance, developing solutions and monitor-
ing the effectiveness of remedial action. Consensus within the scientific
community about a particular problem is likely to be a catalyst for inter-
national co-operation, as occurred in ozone diplomacy after the discovery
of the hole in the ozone layer and the subsequent hardening of scientific
knowledge. Conversely, where scientific uncertainty remains, co-operation
may prove elusive. During the 1970s and 1980s, the British government cited
theinconclusiveness of scientific findings to justify its refusal to reduce acid
emissions (Boehmer-Christiansen and Skea 1991 ;Weale 1992 ). However, sci-
ence is not always of paramount importance in regime formation; it played
only a limited role in reaching agreements on whaling, the ivory trade,
hazardous waste, tropical deforestation and Antarctic minerals (Porter et al.
2000 :142).
Furthermore, scientists are not just passive reporters of ‘neutral’ scien-
tific knowledge and advice; they may also adopt a highly pro-active role
in the policy process (Andresen et al. 2000 ). The influence of scientists has
been analysed through the idea of ‘epistemic communities’, which Peter
Haas ( 1990 )defines as ‘knowledge-based groups of experts and specialists
who share common beliefs about cause-and-effect relationships in the world
and some political values concerning the ends to which policies should be