The Renewed EU SDS: Policies, Governance, Actors and Political Relevance

This sub-section reviews key policy and governance aspects of the renewed EU SDS that was adopted by the European Council in 2006. It (i) retraces the lengthy renewing process leading to the policy document, (ii) summarises its contents (including thematic continuities and overlaps), (iii) explores its linkages to the so-called Lisbon Strategy and the 6th Environmental Action Programme (6 EAP), (iv) outlines the so-called “governance cycle” that is supposed to facilitate the implementation of the EU SDS, and, (v), it draws some conclusions regarding its deteriorating political relevance. By doing so, the chapter highlights the roles different actors played during the development and the implementation of the strategy, and it shows that the early governance of the renewed EU SDS resembled a “light form” of the Open Method of Coordination (OMC, a method that played an important role in the context of the Lisbon Strategy), but that several OMC features have deteriorated since 2008. The section concludes that the renewed EU SDS added momentum to SD policy making in Europe around its adoption in 2006 but that this momentum has faded away in recent years.