The Role of NGO’s in Environmental Litigation Against Public Authorities: Some Observations on Judicial Review and Access to Court in the Netherlands

Abstract

With the adoption of the Aarhus Convention and the European legislation implementing it , the rights of environmental organisations have been firmly anchored in national, international and European law. A study, commissioned by the European Commission on access to justice in environmental matters in eight European countries, showed that in the period 1996 to 2001 environmental organisations in the Netherlands brought by far the most cases. This made us wonder what the factual effects are of judicial procedures brought by environmental NGOs. It is our, modest, objective to provide the reader with some empirical data on the de facto use of judicial review procedures by NGOs in the Netherlands.