Environmental governance in Uruguay: symbolic recognition, institutional changes, and distributional limits following the creation of the Ministry of the Environment (2020–2025)

Abstract

This article examines environmental governance in Uruguay during the period 2020–2025, focusing on the creation of the Ministry of the Environment (ME). It analyzes the extent to which this institutional innovation produced substantive changes in environmental governance and whether it managed to overcome the historical limitations of the country’s environmental policy. Based on a theoretical framework that articulates approaches to environmental governance, institutions, and environmental justice, the study combines a review of the literature with interviews with qualified informants to assess power relations, state capacities, and the advances and limitations of the new institutional design. The results show that, although the creation of the ME represented symbolic recognition of the environment as a public issue and led to certain procedural changes, this did not translate into a strengthening of state capacities or a transformation of the power relations that structure environmental policy. Institutional fragmentation, resource scarcity, weak intersectoral coordination, and low levels of citizen participation in decision-making persisted, limiting the scope of the innovations introduced. This paper discusses these findings in light of the theoretical frameworks adopted and highlights the gap between the promise of hierarchy and innovation and the distributive limits of environmental governance. The conclusions emphasize that the ME produced partial advances, but that environmental governance in Uruguay continues to be affected by structural tensions that condition its capacity for transformation.