Policy makers are dependent upon scientific knowledge. However, scientific results cannot be applied straightforwardly in practical decision making. We deploy Kant's term “power of judgment” – the human capacity to apply general insights to specific, contingent situations – to show that...

The European Water Framework Directive is shaping a new conception of integrative water protection. In this article, the consequences of the Water Framework Directive in respect to national environmental policy will be discussed in referring to the notion of responsibility which is a central...

Was bedeutet es, nachhaltig zu leben? Welches Erbe wollen wir unseren Nachkommen hinterlassen? Wer diese Fragen beantworten will, muss weit in die Zukunft blicken. Doch was können wir über die Zukunft wissen? Eine Antwort darauf verlangt, in der Nachhaltigkeitsdebatte der Dimension der Zeit...

Was bedeutet es, nachhaltig zu leben? Welches Erbe wollen wir unseren Nachkommen hinterlassen? Wer diese Fragen beantworten will, muss weit in die Zukunft blicken. Doch was können wir über die Zukunft wissen? Eine Antwort darauf verlangt, in der Nachhaltigkeitsdebatte der Dimension der Zeit...

One major scientific challenge posed by the EU Water Framework Directive (WFD) is the design of a decision support process that meets the Directive’s requirement to achieve “good status” for all water bodies using a cost-effective combination of measures. This paper presents BASINFORM, a...

Uncertainty is highly relevant in environmental policy because on the one hand environmental problems are regarded as complex and require a long-term perspective and on the other hand the knowledge available to practitioners and policy makers alike is often fragmentary and not systemised. One...

Land is an essential yet limited natural resource. Its current unsustainable use highlights the need for sustainability policies. In order to explore potential policy strategies, we use the concepts of stocks and durable institutions as tools for analysing temporal structures in nature and...