TY - JOUR
T1 - “It's not what you see but what you hear…”
T2 - understanding environment protection officers' responsive decision making
AU - Curtis, Jim
AU - Kaufman, Stefan
PY - 2020/5/15
Y1 - 2020/5/15
N2 - Responsive regulation asserts that regulatory enforcement actions are likely to be more effective in promoting compliance when they respond to a duty holder's motives, capabilities, and external pressures. However, operationalizing responsive approaches that also possess qualities of consistency and transparency remains a challenge for environmental management authorities. This study applied a mixed-method qualitative approach to capture the responsive decision making influences on government environment protection officers in a field context when engaging with different duty holders. These insights then informed compliance narratives across a series of business behavior segments to guide more consistent, transparent and responsive decision making among environment protection officers. Our findings revealed how different constellations of observations, interactions and displays of willingness and ability impact the choice of regulatory responses. Challenges encountered in applying responsive regulation in practice involved difficulties ascertaining business capability, identifying causal links between response strategies and compliance outcomes, and how the use of discretion can impact on consistent and transparent decision making.
AB - Responsive regulation asserts that regulatory enforcement actions are likely to be more effective in promoting compliance when they respond to a duty holder's motives, capabilities, and external pressures. However, operationalizing responsive approaches that also possess qualities of consistency and transparency remains a challenge for environmental management authorities. This study applied a mixed-method qualitative approach to capture the responsive decision making influences on government environment protection officers in a field context when engaging with different duty holders. These insights then informed compliance narratives across a series of business behavior segments to guide more consistent, transparent and responsive decision making among environment protection officers. Our findings revealed how different constellations of observations, interactions and displays of willingness and ability impact the choice of regulatory responses. Challenges encountered in applying responsive regulation in practice involved difficulties ascertaining business capability, identifying causal links between response strategies and compliance outcomes, and how the use of discretion can impact on consistent and transparent decision making.
KW - Behavior change
KW - Compliance
KW - Environment protection officers
KW - Responsive regulation
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85080923623&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.jenvman.2020.110336
DO - 10.1016/j.jenvman.2020.110336
M3 - Article
C2 - 32250813
AN - SCOPUS:85080923623
SN - 0301-4797
VL - 262
JO - Journal of Environmental Management
JF - Journal of Environmental Management
M1 - 110336
ER -