The U.K. approach to delivering sustainable development in government: a case study in joined up working

The impact of the public sector on the overall quality of the environment and more generally towards sustainable development is significant. An essential part of the UK Strategy for Sustainable Development is the commitment to put ‘sustainable development at the heart of every government department’s work’. Sustainable development is one of several cross-cutting policy objectives currently being tacked by the UK government that require cooperation and coordination among many government and non-government actors. Various key mechanisms for achieving environmental policy integration or ‘putting sustainable development at the heart of government’ are critically assessed—special Cabinet and Ministerial subcommittees, the House of Commons Environment Audit Committee, cross-cutting departmental units, and integrated policy appraisal. In the field of sustainable development, though, a key challenge for government is that effective delivery on cross-cutting objectives requires that the objectives themselves are clear, contained, internally consistent, and capable of implementation.