The Environment And Sustainable Development In The New Central Europe

by Bochniarz, Zbigniew; Cohen, Gary B.

• ISBN13: 9781845451448
• ISBN10: 1845451449
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2006-08-30
• Publisher: Berghahn Books

Summary

With the enlargement of the European Union, the accession countries are coming under pressure to develop and meet EU standards for environmental protection and sustainable development. In this ongoing process, global economic liberalization, regulatory policy, conservation, and lifestyle issues are all involved, and creative solutions will have to be found. Historians, geographers, economists, ecologists, business management experts, public policy specialists, and community organizers have come together in this volume and examine, for the first time, environmental issues ranging from national and regional policy and macroeconomics to local studies in community regeneration. The evidence suggests that, far from being mere passive recipients of instruction and assistance from outside, the people of Central and East Central Europe have been engaged actively in working out solutions to these problems. Several promising cases illustrate opportunities to overcome crisis situations and offer examples of good practices, while others pose warnings. The experiences of these countries in wrestling with issues of sustainability continue to be of importance to policy development within the EU and may serve also as examples for both developed and developing countries worldwide. Zbigniew Bochniarz, is affiliated to the Evans School of Public Affairs at the University of Washington in Seattle. He spent over twenty years at the University of Minnesota's Humphrey Institute where he founded a Center for Nations in Transition. The Center became an international leader in delivering foreign assistance for Central and Eastern Europe. His work focuses on economic, environmental, and social aspects of sustainability of transforming economies. He is the author, co-author and/or editor of over 100 publications. Gary B. Cohen, has been director of the Center for Austrian Studies and professor of history at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, since 2001. He teaches and publishes on modern Central European social and political history. He is the author of numerous articles and essays as well as two books, The Politics of Ethnic Survival: Germans in Prague, 1861-1914(first edition, Princeton Univ. Press,1981; rev. 2nd ed., Purdue Univ. Press, 2005) and Education and Middle-Class Society in Imperial Austria, 1848-1918(Purdue Univ. Press, 1996).

Table of Contents

List of Figures and Tables	vii
Acknowledgements	xi
Notes on Contributors	xiii
Introduction: Legacies, Challenges, and New Beginnings	1	(10)
Zbigniew Bochniarz
Gary B. Cohen
From Communism to Climate Change: The Sustainability Challenge and Lessons from Central Europe	11	(8)
Robert Wilkinson
Part One: The Environment as Policy Priority
Assessing Sustainability of the Transition in Central European Countries: A Comparative Analysis	19	(26)
Sandra O. Archibald
Zbigniew Bochniarz
Sustainability and EU Accession: Capacity Development and Environmental Reform in Central and Eastern Europe	45	(14)
Stacy D. VanDeveer
JoAnn Carmin
Sustainability of Clusters and Regions at Austria's Accession Edge	59	(22)
Edward M. Bergman
Part Two: The Economics of Sustainable Development
Greenhouse Gases Emissions Trading in the Czech Republic	81	(18)
Jirina Jilkovd
Tomas Chmelik
Ecological Reform in the Tax System in Poland	99	(22)
Olga Kiuila
Jerzy Sleszynski
Part Three: Water Policies and Institutions
The Czech Republic: From Environmental Crisis to Sustainability	121	(8)
Vaclav Mezricky
The Tisza/Tisa Transboundary Environmental Disaster: An Opportunity for Institutional Learning	129	(14)
Eszter Guldcsy
Laszlo Pinter
Jim Perry
Austria and the EU Water Framework Directive	143	(7)
Wilhelm R. Vogel
The Western Bug River: UNECE Pilot Project	150	(17)
James B. Dalton, Jr.
Wastewater Treatment in the Postcommunist Danube River Basin	167	(16)
Igor Bodik
Part Four: Agriculture and Rural Development
``Thinking Unlike a Mountain'': Environment, Agriculture, and Sustainability in the Carpathians	183	(20)
Anthony J. Amato
New Approaches to Sustainable Community Development in Rural Slovakia	203	(14)
Slavomira Macakova
Sustainable Development in Moravia: An Interpretation of the Role of the Small-Town Sector in Transitional Socioeconomic Evolution	217	(15)
Antonin Vaishar
Bryn Greer-Wootten
Building Local Sustainability in Hungary: Cross-Generational Education and Community Participation in the Dorogd Basin	232	(15)
Judit Vasarhelyi
Select Bibliography	247	(10)
Index	257