EPA, for example, recently agreed to notify OSHA when new EPA air toxics rules might induce firms to seal pollutants inside the workplace. The same ought to apply to the different program offices within EPA, and across the government. More radically, mergers of splintered agencies might be worthwhile. Similarly, the splintered congressional committees and subcommittees dealing with health and environmental issues, which generate the splintered statutes and agencies in the executive branch, could be linked or even combined into an integrative Committee on Risk in each house of Congress. Ultimately, the primary obstacle to further improvements in environmental quality is not economic growth, markets, capitalism, or government, but the deeper and more encompassing problem of flawed institutions .
Human designs are imperfect.
Among these flawed institutions we must count not only markets and firms, but also the numerous and diverse organs of governance, including the agencies and committees whose ostensible mission is environmental protection. The goal of environmental sustainability should be protecting the environment against the hazards of all imperfect institutions, rather than an alliance between environmentalism and government against markets and capitalism. The better path is for environmentalism to rediscover its loyalty to the environment and its skepticism about the activities of all institutions, and to remember that government, too, is an imperfect institution that can injure as well as nurture. The problem of unsustainable governance is not as simple as too much government. Government failures stem from both weakness and strength, so less government can be as problematic as more.