International policy-making as a learning process : The European Community and the greenhouse effect

Abstract

The central idea of this study is a simple one. It is to develop the argument that action must be explained by the way actors reflect about a problem. The study argues that those reflections and their consequences for action can be described in systematic ways. Behind this basic statement lies a fundamental assumption: Besides analysing the interests, preferences and strategies of actors and the resulting interaction, it is at least equally important to study the emergence of these interests, preferences and strategies. In other words, it is important to examine not only how actors get what they want but also why they want what they want. Systematic patterns of reflection, this is the thesis, are at the basis of interests, preferences and strategies.