Environmental impact assessment in Estonia and Norway

Authorities in Eastern European countries are looking for the best available policy tools from the West, and policy instruments tailored for a Western context are being introduced massively in the former state socialist countries of Europe. This study examines some of the contextual factors that hamper the introduction of modern, Western tools of environmental management within previously state socialist countries. These are highlighted through a comparison of how environmental impact assessment (EIA) is put into practice in Estonia and Norway. Estonia and Norway belong to the same European Baltic-Nordic region, but the two countries have a dramatically different history for most of this century.