Principles Of Environmental Law Research Articles

Harnessing the Power of Crowdsourcing and Public Participation to Advance Global Environmental Protection

The principles of international environmental law serve as an effective framework in analyzing the legal elements of environmental hazards. In the light of the matter, the important principle of participation is regarded as the primary facilitator in the process of environmental protection and the prevention of the extent and progression of environmental hazards. This principle, in considering methods such as crowdsourcing, may identify a progressive strategy and visualize the impact of citizens and people in the protection of the biosphere. The basic approaches of this research include participatory democracy, access to information, public decision-making, and environmental litigation. This research intends to light up a path to attaining the goals of international environmental legislation by drawing a two-way interaction between the two with the goal of examining the viability of realizing the principle of participation in light of crowdsourcing. It also seeks to resolve the question of how effective the process of using crowdsourcing as an implementation tool of the participation principle may be in attaining the goals of environmental support and protection. By reviewing and analyzing relevant sources, this article argues that enhancing the participation of stakeholders, including civil groups and individuals, may improve the effectiveess of environmental legislation and promote social and environmental justice and suggests that creating platforms to share information and engage with stakeholders and the public, as well as consider mechanisms to ensure accountability and the balance of power along the way, can be very effective.

The Application of the Principle of Common but Differentiated Responsibilities in Environmental Governance on the High Seas

Abstract As an important principle of international environmental law, the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities (the CBDR principle) is being applied to various international environment protection regimes including environmental governance on the high seas as an important guiding principle in the law of the sea. This may be beneficial for engaging the international community to protect the high seas in solidarity. However, the application of the CBDR principle encounters difficulties, which include obstacles regarding cross-sector application, different understandings of the CBDR principle and difficulties in implementation of international instruments. This article argues that the differentiation should not depend exclusively on the traditional dichotomy of developing and developed countries but must be determined on a fluid and case-by-case basis. This suggests that the details of the differentiated responsibilities should also be context-specific rather than uniform for all States. Moreover, the implementation of the CBDR principle to address environmental problems on the high seas should be based on substantive fairness. Finally, this article makes several observations. First, the demands of developing countries in the field of maritime emission reduction should be considered. Second, obligation of capacity building and the transfer of marine technology prescribed in the BBNJ Agreement should be encouraged and implemented. Third, strengthening international cooperation in plastic pollution control on the high seas is expected. Fourth, the international community should provide developing countries with the financial support and technical assistance in persistent organic pollutants control. All of these may contribute to the protection of the high seas environment and the future realization of the sustainable development of the oceans.

Climate Litigation in Europe: a Discussion about Emerging Trends in the Context of Principle of Non-regression

The climate crisis is one of the most serious problems that humankind has ever faced. With the adverse consequences of this phenomenon, new practices have emerged in social, economic, and legal structures. One of these new practices is doubtlessly climate litigation that aim to pressure states to fulfil their positive obligations concerning the mitigation of the human-induced climate crisis. Global warming, advancing at an unprecedented rate, is pushing governments to take immediate measures and shape their legislation accordingly. Within this movement, the principle of non-regression, rooted in human rights, has gained a tangible form in environmental law. This study explores the potential role of the climate crisis and, specifically, the climate litigation cases in Europe in establishing the principle of non-regression as a settled principle in environmental law. It discusses its value as an argument in climate litigation from a practical point of view.

International Trade and Environmental Protection: Revisiting Hardin’s “Tragedy of the Commons”

Twenty-eight years after the emergence of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) regime, the trade-environmental protection relationship seems to have achieved some harmonisation from an initial chequered one, though not without some forms of lopsided balancing of the variables. This work explores the relationship between international trade and the environment, revealing whether the competing values are balanced. The methodology adopted is doctrinal, with a comparative and analytical approach involving desk and library research. The work is bifurcated into six parts, commencing with an introduction in the first: the second flesh out international environmental agreements relevant to the trade-environment interaction. The third part examines principles of international environmental law. The paper reflects unilateral trade measures in the fourth part. The fifth part takes stock of WTO jurisprudence. While considerable efforts have been made to mainstream environmental protection into trade objectives through the WTO jurisprudence, there remain some forms of market failures, making the trade-environment relationship lopsided, with inadequate attention given to the environment, which brings to fore the need to revisit David Hunter’s metaphoric invisible elbow destroying the common goods created by an invisible hand.

Systemic crisis of modern international environmental law

The article examines the issue of a complex crisis situation in the field of international legal mediation of environmental protection activities, caused by the treacherous attack of the aggressor country on the territory of Ukraine, which showed the complete inability of the established model of international law, including its organizational and institutional component, to oppose the aggressor's plans due to the forced cessation of hostilities , which follows from the direct functional purpose of the United Nations as the main world peacemaker. First of all, a terminological excursion was made into the formation of the name of the field of international law, which provides legal protection of the environment, which is characterized by the absence of a unified conceptual and categorical apparatus, where, along with international environmental law, the names of international ecological, international nature protection and international environmental law are used. The author's conclusion is made about the expediency of finally stopping at the universal name of international environmental law. The conducted analysis made it possible to establish that the aggressor violated almost all existing branch principles of international environmental law, except for the principle of inadmissibility of radioactive contamination of the environment, which is also under constant threat of violation. The lack of an effective mechanism for the protection of the rights and interests of subjects of international environmental law is illustrated by the example of a number of international documents, in particular the Convention on the Prohibition of Military or Any Other Hostile Use of Means of Impact on the Natural Environment, the Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material and Nuclear Installations, the Convention on nuclear safety and the Agreement between Ukraine and the International Atomic Energy Agency on the application of safeguards in connection with the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.

An International Approach to Environmental Business Rights and Energy Sustainability Throught the Lenses of the Competition Law

This article examines the principles of environmental law and its relationship with business rights, as well as the principles of regulation of energy law, particularly those related to economic efficiency and environmental sustainability. We consider both principles must be harmonized through competition law considering energy sustainability. Likewise, the collaboration among governments, companies, environmentalists, and consumer organizations is necessary to design a regulation articulating a new understanding of rights toward sustainable energy management.

Legal Regulation of Environmental Protection: Interrelations between Financial and Environmental Law

The paper compares financial and environmental law principles of regulating activities related to environmental protection. The author analyzes the concept of environmental protection and focuses on the complex nature of the legal regulation of public relations that develop in the process of environmental protection. The author points out that historically, the rules regulating environmental relations appeared in order to protect property, in particular financial interests. It is emphasized that natural resources are the main source of income for our state and environmental protection measures are implemented for the common good. Activities related to environmental protection can be effective only in conditions of proper financing. Based on the conducted research, it was concluded that the specifics of the subject and method of legal regulation led to the attribution of financial and environmental law to the number of public branches of Russian law, which means that financial and environmental law regulation is primarily aimed at implementation of public interest. These industries are similar in terms of the method of legal regulation: environmental law, as well as financial law, mainly regulates public relations through the imperative method — the method of power and subordination. Despite the fact that the compared branches of Russian law regulate separate, different areas of public relations, their subjects may overlap. This is due to the fact that financial activities and activities in the field of environmental protection are not opposed, are not mutually exclusive. This is largely facilitated by the fact that financial law is a universal branch of Russian law, and financing is the most effective tool for influencing public relations.

Astronomical withdrawals: a green criminological examination of extreme energy mining on extraterrestrial objects

Mining for natural resources on-Earth is commonplace and dates back over a hundred years at an industrial scale. Technological advances in outer space exploration are enabling the mining of extraterrestrial resources to transition from mere science fiction, to a serious possibility. In recent decades, several new start-up companies have arisen with the sole intention of exploiting resources that exist in outer space, such as on Earth’s moon, asteroids, meteorites, planets, and various planetary satellites, such as the moons of Mars - Phobos and Diemos. However, despite the increased investment and interest in space mining, criminologists have remained virtually silent on outer space issues. In this paper we adopt a green criminological approach to explain the emergence of outer space mining, and argue that now is the time to be researching and debating the phenomenon of extraterrestrial mining in order to prevent future social and environmental harm (following the precautionary principle of environmental law). To do this, the paper does three things. Firstly, it examines strategies for conducting space mining (such as its feasibility, probable locations, and innovative mining techniques). Secondly, it analyses the terrestrial and extraterrestrial impacts of space mining, unveiling several avenues for the creation of social and environmental harm. Finally, it uses a green criminological approach to justify the rationale for engaging legal scholars and criminologists with problematic space mining issues. The paper concludes that now is the time to discuss these issues, prior to the industrialisation and exploitation of unique celestial bodies.

The Principle of Insignificance and Environmental Law

The Principle of Insignificance and Environmental Law

Ubuntu: An Underutilised Foundational Constitutional Principle of South African Environmental Law

Ubuntu: An Underutilised Foundational Constitutional Principle of South African Environmental Law

System of principles of environmental protection law in Ukrainian and Polish law doctrines

The article analyzes theoretical approaches to the understanding system of principles of environmental protection law in Ukraine and the Republic of Poland. The author interprets fundamental normative-legal acts and summarizes views of Ukrainian and Polish scientists regarding the understanding of fundamental basics of environmental-legal regulation of social relations. The system of principles of environmental protection law of Ukraine is traditionally derived from the normatively established list of principles in Art. 3 of the Law of Ukraine “On Environmental Protection”. At the same time, more generalized or, conversely, detailed lists of the principles of environmental protection law are presented in educational and scientific Ukrainian legal literature. The Polish fundamental law on environmental protection does not contain a single list of principles, but includes a number of separate articles, united under the category of general principles of environmental- legal regulation. In the Polish environmental-legal doctrine (as well as in the Ukrainian one) there is no single approach to the systematization of principles. The article states the main approaches presented in the scientific literature and the proposed system of principles in the doctrines of both states, which coincide in many positions. At the same time, the author notes the tendency of recent years, both among Ukrainian and Polish scientists, to a broader analysis of principles of environmental protection law, which are based on general principles of EU law, such as justice, proportionality, subsidiarity. In a narrow understanding of principles of environmental protection law, scientists emphasize the principle of sustainable development, prevention, an integrated approach, and ensuring public participation. In environmental protection law of Poland, the principle of integration is of particular importance, which implies the need to take into account environmental protection issues in various sectoral policies, strategies, plans. In Ukraine, the principle of the ecosystem approach is gaining actual importance and significant attention in works of scientists.

Can Domestic Environmental Courts Implement International Environmental Law? A Framework for Institutional Analysis

AbstractThe rapid and widespread establishment of domestic environmental courts and tribunals raises important questions regarding their implications for international environmental law and global environmental governance. I use an interdisciplinary, multi-method approach to consider the capacity of domestic environmental courts to identify and apply norms and principles of international environmental law in domestic opinions. I first review existing literature, identifying jurisdiction, judicial discretion, and a court's position in a legal system as key institutional determinants of this capacity. I then develop a typology of domestic environmental courts and tribunals, which suggests that, all else being equal, a court with national geographic jurisdiction that also enjoys attributes of broad subject-matter jurisdiction and discretion may be expected to be best equipped to implement norms and principles of international environmental law. Next, I integrate existing assessments of environmental court presence with original outreach and web research to identify all countries which possess environmental courts, and assess a subset of eight existing national-level institutions. The analysis of this subset highlights the diversity of institutional models that can incorporate theorized best practices. Based on these findings, I draw several theoretical conclusions: specifically (i) the relevance of environmental court research to individual- and institutional-level analysis in transnational and international environmental law, (ii) the need for further legal-institutional analysis in global environmental governance scholarship, and (iii) the opportunity for further interdisciplinary analysis of the role of domestic courts in environmental governance.

Natural resource management and legal consequences for the environment from the perspective of international environmental law

Management of natural resources that is not in accordance with international problems such as air pollution. Pollution that occurs in the air environment due to forest fires that occurred in Indonesia, especially in 2019 in Riau Province, is not in line with the principles of international environmental law. One of them is the principle of "Sic utere tue ut alienum non leads" in which the state is prohibited from allowing and/or carrying out activities that are detrimental to other countries. So that from these actions there are legal consequences for the State of Indonesia. The purpose of this study is to analyze and find out about preventive measures for the air environment and environmental law due to the air environment based on international law. The method used in writing this thesis is a normative research method. The legal materials used are primary, secondary and tertiary legal materials. The results of this study are that the management of natural resources is not carried out in accordance with the principles of international law, causing air pollution which has a negative impact on the State of Indonesia and also for the State of Malaysia, Singapore. From this research, it is also not allowed to take preventive action through supervision carried out through the government of the State of Indonesia.

Application of Principle of Sustainable Development in Governing Transboundary Water Pollution

International water law, based on the two major water conventions, imposes two main obligations of due diligence and cooperation on the complicated issue of governing transboundary water pollution. Meanwhile, principles of sustainable development, as one of the basic principles of international environmental law, are reflected in international water law documents. The practice of preventing, controlling and reducing transboundary water pollution under international water law explains the implications of equity and continuity under principles of sustainable development. Furthermore, advancing cooperation in transboundary water pollution governance also contributes to the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals stipulated in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

The Legal Framework for Carbon Tax: A Case of Cameroon

This article builds a case in favour of using carbon tax as a cost-effective tool for regulating greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions as part of the climate change mitigation solution in terms of discouraging further GHG emission. Drawing on existing primary and secondary data, the article makes an assessment of the Cameroon’s legal environment for the design and implementation of carbon tax and articulates on the prospects and challenges of designing and implementing it. The article postulates that in spite of the promising opportunities that carbon tax offers for regulating GHG emissions, the potentials of this climate-smart fiscal policy tool has not yet been explored within the framework of climate governance in Cameroon. The article finds that while the spirit of carbon tax is underpinned by relevant environmental law principles, there is a timid legal framework both at the international and national levels for using carbon to regulate GHG emissions in Cameroon. The article concludes with a recommendation of the strong need for Cameroon to introduce a carbon-tax system as one of the cost-effective measures to reduce the country’s GHG emissions by adopting a carbon tax legal instrument designed specifically to target major GHG emitters across dozens of economic sectors. The model of carbon tax proposed for Cameroon could be useful and replicable elsewhere.

Integration of general principles of international environmental law into the law of the sea: Assessment and challenges

This paper discusses how general principles of international environmental law and the law of the sea regime, namely the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and its related agreements, have interacted with each other over time. It analyses how the early adoption of international instruments influenced the adoption of Part XII of UNCLOS and how the content of Part XII has evolved through the adoption of new instruments as well as interpretation by international courts and tribunals. It argues that several environmental principles have become normative concepts in the context of the law of the sea, which implies potential development of Part XII of UNCLOS in the future to meet the contemporary environmental challenges.

LEGAL FRAMEWORK FOR CORPORATE AND GOVERNMENT PARADIGM TO DISASTER VICTIMS

The environmental law enforcement paradigm has not implimented well. This can be known through the government's inability to stop several acts of environmental destruction committed by several corporations. On the other hand, based on the principles of environmental law, it is stated that the government must be responsible for environmental management. The topic of this research is important to uncover the background between whether or not there were violations of regulations committed by corporations. The results of the research indicated that the paradigm of enforcing environmental law is contained in Law No. 32/2009 concerning Environmental Protection and Management; Law No. 24/2007 concerning Disaster Protection; Law No. 30/1999 concerning AAPS (Arbitration and Alternative Dispute Resolution) and Law No. 4/2009 concerning Mining is still a normative paradigm which causes the weakening of environmental law enforcement.

Proceduralising indigenous peoples’ demands: Indigenous environmental rights and legal pluralism in contemporary jurisprudence

Biodiversity, climate change and environmental protection are commonly associated with indigenous peoples’ customs and holistic cosmovisions. This paper strives to uncover the legal rationale thereof, notably by identifying the procedural dimension underlying “indigenous environmental rights”, and the importance of collective and intergenerational rights in channelling indigenous environmental rights into dominant legal orders while facilitating the exercise of these rights. Grounded in Latin American jurisprudence, we understand environmental claims from the perspective of indigenous peoples’ rights, that is, their articulations in existing State law as well as the pertinence of legal pluralism as a transformative approach including its decolonising functions. It is examined to what extent such rights undergo processes of positivization or codification amidst the wide scenery of legal pluralist orders. Given their scarce procedural foundations, the main contribution lies with approaching indigenous environmental rights theoretically, exploring the possibilities for procedures in International Human Rights Law to be applied to them, including questions of representation, translation in a wider sense, or autonomies. Alongside classical procedural principles of human environmental law – information, participation, access to justice – indigenous environmental rights are related to concepts of guardianship, parental responsibility and best interest as these have been developed in relation to the rights of the child, or questions of autonomy and representation being derived from the framework governing persons with disabilities. In that sense, indigenous environmental rights find themselves (re-)imagined, including debates on vindicating these, their qualities and attributes as well as reflections on different procedural routes available.

AN INTERNATIONAL LAW PRINCIPLE OF NON-REGRESSION FROM ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTIONS

AbstractA principle that prohibits States from weakening their domestic levels of environmental protection continues to emerge at varying speeds within international trade, investment and environmental law. This article explores the principle's diverse history, rationale and legal expression in each of these domains and finds that its various articulations in different international treaties suffer the same shortfalls and deficiencies. Non-regression clauses may leave the complexities and nuances of implementing environmental protections unaddressed, including identifying and measuring when a regression has occurred and balancing these environmental protections with other legitimate policy and environmental measures. As these clauses are increasingly subject to investor–State and State–State dispute procedures, States expose themselves to heightened liability for changes to their environmental laws, even where those changes might be legitimate and reasonable. The particular emergence of this principle in environmental law offers treaty-makers an opportunity to clarify the rights of States to derogate from otherwise narrowly drafted clauses that require them to maintain their level of environmental protection strictly.

The Precautionary Principle in Environmental Law

The Precautionary Principle in Environmental Law