Efficiency of the EU regulation on greenhouse gas emissions in Italy: The hierarchical cluster analysis approach

The implementation and the diffusion of environmental policy is a hotspot in European ecosystem management. Policy diffusion meets the need of the harmonization principle in which the EU countries must converge towards the same targets. In the light of this, the paper aims to explain the main determinants of the environmental diffusion policy, allowing countries to converge on a common base. We outline the achievements of the environmental policy objectives of the countries by using the Environmental Performance Index, a widely accepted index used at the international level. By using a dyadic dataset on 15 European countries, we highlight the economic and institutional determinants pointing out successes and failures of policies adopted. The findings reveal that the economic variables play most important role in the diffusion process of environmental policy.