ECPR/CRI Conference ‘Frontiers of regulation: assessing scholarly debates and policy challenges’ Bath, September 7 th -8 th 2006 Public goods, private means. Antinomies of accountability in third generation environmental policy Luigi Pellizzoni Department of Human Sciences, University of Trieste, Piazza Europa 1 – 34127 Trieste, Italy Tel +390405583730 Fax +39040569441 PellizzoniL@sp.units.it DRAFT Abstract The paper addresses accountability as classical problem of political modernity that becomes today particularly troublesome. Full accountability is possible only between identical subjects; but then it is a self- referential exercise with no actual purpose and content. To be fruitful accountability must circumvent self- reference and address alterity, open itself to unexpected questions, unforeseen claims. The antinomy of accountability surfaces in new governance arrangements. Private actors expand their public role by means of contracts or single-handed obligations. Their growing engagement in the policy making by means of contracts and single-handed obligations calls for an increase in controls. However the logic of contract is intrinsically circular, self-referential, preventing any account to and for whatever lies outside the world produced by the contract itself. This issue is addressed by focusing on third generation (neither command-and-control nor market-based) environmental policy instruments. Widely adopted in Europe as well as elsewhere, they include a variety of solutions based on joint public-private agreements, voluntary schemes and self-regulation. Overall these approaches seem to endorse two assumptions: that environmental protection, sustainability, human health and well-being are better ensured by turning to private means, promoting ‘beyond compliance’ corporate behaviour and building on the direct interaction of private actors; that de iure or de facto empowering of the latter is consistent with a strengthening rather than a relaxation of democracy, with the market or other sub-political arenas being the place where democracy is (to be) increasingly practised. Evaluation of third generation regulatory instruments, however, is quite controversial. High expectations and praises are confronted with complaints about their weak legitimacy, effectiveness, efficiency and equity. I argue that such complaints can be traced to a systematic inability of contractual arrangements to address public (i.e. third-party) issues and claims. There is, in other words, a mismatch between the emerging use conditions of environmental goods, as the result of social and technical change, and the connection between users and their actual publics. Is there a way out of the deadlock of contractualization? I have no ready made answers. In the last section, however, some possible evolutionary paths of regulation will be outlined. Keywords: environmental policy, accountability, public, contract, governance. Introduction There seems to be a core antinomy in accountability – a paradox, an unresolvable contradiction. Complete fulfilment of its aims corresponds to its emptying. Full accountability is possible only between identical subjects; but then it is a self-referential exercise with no actual purpose and content. I can tell you everything and you can grasp everything I say if you are just like me; but then you have nothing to learn from me, nor I from you. Complete PDF created with pdfFactory Pro trial version www.pdffactory.com