Owls, Sheep and Dodos: Coping with Environmental Legislation

Abstract

Environmental legislation affects more and more companies in different industries and is likely to continue to do so. Focusing in particular on the issue of the disposal of waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE), this chapter argues that firms are frequently unaware of the threats posed by such legislation, poor at anticipating its provisions and effects, and generally not very skillful at representing their interests in the political process. Contrasting such firms (political “dodos” or “sheep”) with a few (political “owls”) that have proven themselves to be successful political actors; we proceed to identify the generic ingredients of effective corporate political strategy to cope with environmental legislation.