Do voluntary industry measures shift support for stronger environmental governance?

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Abstract
Stringent environmental policies often face limited public support. In response, governments often begin with ‘softer’ voluntary industry measures. Yet, it remains unclear how public awareness of those measures, and information about how effective they are expected to be, shapes support for stronger follow-on policies. We test this using a survey-embedded experiment in Switzerland ( n = 6586) anchored on the Swiss Food Waste Action Plan. Baseline support for stronger policies is already high. Awareness of the voluntary plan produces a small increase in support, with no evidence of crowding-out. Information about expected effectiveness changes how respondents view the voluntary plan itself but does not translate into increased support for stronger policy. Accordingly, voluntary measures do not meaningfully shift preferences in either direction. In cases where the baseline support for stronger policy is already substantial, waiting for voluntary measures to increase demand carries real opportunity costs.

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