Brexit and the environment: The politics of a more differentiated European Union (JORDANU17SF2)

The 2016 decision by UK voters to leave the EU sent political shock waves across Europe. In the short term it provoked animated debate about the future direction of UK policies across a wide suite of areas including the environment, climate change, energy and agriculture. Depending on whether the UK pursues a future that is within the single market (‘soft’ Brexit) or fully outside it (‘hard’ Brexit), policies in these areas could remain essentially the same or be completely transformed. Brexit offers an important and exciting opportunity to re-think EU-national policy interactions within and across policy areas. It offers a new opportunity to rethink notions of ‘differentiated’ integration, a topic that was exciting discussion before the vote.

Until now, however, differentiation has been understood as a process that allows some states to go further in the integration process. In the environmental sector, EU policy has been differentiated by setting minimum standards that individual states can go beyond if they wish. Brexit, however, opens up the possibility of differentiation (and thus Europeanisation) ‘in reverse’ ie some states dismantling their EU policies and thus moving further apart.

This PhD project will relate these debates to a topic that is expected to dominate policy making for years to come. It will analyse existing examples of differentiation and explore the extent to which they are being drawn on by policy makers wrestling with Brexit. Through documentary analyses and interviews with policy makers, it will enable the researcher to develop an understanding of how policies are being made in the era of Brexit-a vital pre-requisite for many jobs. In addition to the transferable skills training offered at UEA and in the Tyndall Centre, the successful candidate will learn how to secure access to policy makers, write for different audiences and present findings in an engaging manner. They will join a team working on Brexit.

NB applicants from the UK/EU can apply separately for ESRC studentships to the ESRC SeNSS DTP of which UEA is a member. Please contact the supervisor to discuss this further, or see: https://www.uea.ac.uk/study/postgraduate/research-degrees/doctoral-training-partnerships/senss-dtp-studentships