Environmental Management in Europe

Environmental Management in Europe is an interdisciplinary distance e-learning course offered by the University of Copenhagen with contributions from the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences in Vienna and the University of Hohenheim. It is open for MSc students from Denmark, other countries in the EU and the rest of the world.

The focus of the course is environmental management of natural resources (soil, water, biodiversity and climate) from a European perspective. The course will bring up how the European Union (EU) sets the policy frame for almost all environmental regulation in the member states, and how this frame determines both the possibilities and the limitations for carrying out environmental management and developing environmental solutions in the EU.

This course commences with an introduction to the e-learning platform used, and the overall concept of environmental management and current state of the European environment. Students will learn about environmental management theory and application, and how it incorporates environmental monitoring and assessment, areas of governance including EU environmental law, economic tools for environmental valuation and cost benefit analysis and EU environmental policy and lobbyism.

The course features different EU environmental policy initiatives related to soil, water, biodiversity and climate (e.g. European Green Deal, the Habitat Directive, the Water Framework Directive, and the Soil Framework Directive). The course details and analyses how these initiatives originated, and how they are interpreted and implemented from the EU level to the national, regional and local levels. The intertwined character of environmental, economic and social consequences of EU environmental policies are discussed, addressing the need for a combined systems approach and environmental policy integration.

This is a compulsory course for the “Environmental Science – soil, water & biodiversity” MSc Program (www.enveuro.eu). It is also available for University of Copenhagen students in other MSc programs, and it is possible for students to take this as a single subject e-learning course from all over the world (i.e. as part of a continuing or professional education).

Note 1: In the beginning of the course all students will meet for one day to get to know each other, meet the teachers and learn about the online learning system. This introduction day is organised as blended online and onsite at one of the university campuses.

Note 2: Students may follow the course in the first or second year of their Master programme, e.g. as a part of the Basic Semester Package in the EnvEuro MSc programme in Environmental Science (www.enveuro.eu).