15. Environmental law and policy

This chapter examines environmental law and policy in the European Union, considering Union powers and the international context. It discusses the framework for Union environmental law and policy; environmental principles; European Union environmental law by sector; trade in endangered species; nature conservation; environmental protection implementation and enforcement; and environmental litigation.

Key Features of Environmental Law and Psychology

This chapter argues that environmental law is psychologically distinctive. This distinctiveness flows in large part from the unique emphasis environmental law has on environmental and ecological injury—injury that tends to be diffuse, complex, and nonhuman in character. These characteristics trigger a set of psychological phenomena, which tend to make environmental and ecological injuries challenging for people to perceive, understand, and care about. A psychology of environmental law should account for these distinctive characteristics, while respecting the normative goals and institutional constraints through which environmental law and policy is created and enforced.

The Aarhus Convention and Polish Regulations Concerning Parties to Proceedings for Issuing the eia Decisions

The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-Making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters was adopted on 25 June 1998 in the Danish city of Aarhus. According to its provisions each state Part shall, within the framework of the national legal order, ensure that members of the public concerned have access to a review procedure before a court of law or another independent and impartial body established by law. At the same time, it contains regulations specifying the criteria that constitute the basis for determining persons enjoying rights to access justice with respect to national legal orders. Poland, being one of the state Parties, introduced into national legal order special provisions enabling implementation of the Aarhus Convention, including regulations concerning parties to proceedings in environmental matters. The aim of the study is to analyse and assess these regulations in the light of the requirements adopted in the Aarhus Convention and to formulate general conclusions in the field of key issues of the international and European environmental law and policy.

Wpływ prawa i polityki Unii Europejskiej na planowanie przestrzenne i zarządzanie terytorialne państw członkowskich w zakresie wybranych kwestii środowiskowych = Impact of European Union law and policy on spatial planning and territorial governance of the Member States as regards selected environmental issues

The main objectives of the research carried out were identification of the strength of – and trends characterising – the impact of EU law and policy on spatial planning and territorial governance in Member States, in relation to selected environmental issues; as well as an attempt to determine geographical regularities. The first issue analysed issue concerned the impact of EU environmental law on Member States’ spatial planning, while the second sought to demonstrate the importance of major EU policies in relation to their environmental objectives. A third aspect saw impact (“clout” ) assessed and trends identified where two environmental priorities under EU policies were concerned, i.e. (I) the strengthening of ecological structures and cultural resources as added value for development, (II) sustainable growth – promoting a more resource efficient, greener and more competitive economy. Most attention was paid to the top-down impact of the EU on spatial planning and territorial governance, though studies als sought examples of bottom-up and horizontal influence as signalled by national experts. This article is based on the results of the ESPON COMPASS project entitled: Comparative Analysis of Territorial Governance and Spatial Planning Systems in Europe. Analysis of the very extensive questionnaire material available, as well as the results of the case studies, resulted in an acknowledgment that the top-down influence determines the impacts of EU environmental law and policy on Member States’ spatial planning. In sum, that impact of the EU environmental law was identifiable as quite strong at all levels of planning. Indeed, trends for an increasing influence applied to the vast majority of countries. There were three regularities identified in this respect: (I) it is a strong impact and increasing clout that prevail to a significant degree among EU-15 countries, (II) a constant impact is characteristic for the vast majority of the Nordic countries, and in both cases is mainly an aspect of countries caring for the quality of the environment, (III) the greatest variation in terms of the strengths and irections of impact can be identified within the group of post-communist countries, even as there is a prevalence of upward trends noted in these countries. Among the EU environmental regulations exerting the greatest impact on the spatial planning and territorial governance of the Member States, the ones highlighted most frequently were the Directives on environmental assessments (EIA and SEA), as well as the so-called Habitats and Birds Directives. In seeking to summarise the strength of impact of the selected EU environmental policy priorities on Member States’ spatial planning and territorial governance – as well as the trends for that impact – the largest group of countries pointed to an upward trend and a moderate impact. However, results obtained offered no basis for the identification of clear regularities However, the Europeanisation of environmental law and policy was shown also to have a significant impact on the Europeanisation of environmental spatial planning. It also proved possible to demonst ate how spatial planning, although constituting a reserved domain of each country, is actually the most Europeanised of all environmental issues. With regard to the top-down impact of environmental law, i.e. that exerted from the EU level down to the spatial planning and territorial governance of the Member States, the adoption of the acquis communautaire is to be indicated as the main reason for the significant impact. Equally, when it came to the impact of environmental policy, it was usual for a strong link with Cohesion Policy to be identified. The article also offers recommendations regarding the development of a more-effective connection between Cohesion Policy and spatial planning and territorial governance, in the sphere of the protection and strengthening of countries’ natural and cultural heritage.

Science and Law in Environmental Law and Policy: The Case of the European Commission

This article draws on empirical research conducted with European Commission officials in three Directorates-General and its other services on their perception of how the legislative and policy-making process facilitates the interaction of science and environmental law. This article deploys Sheila Jasanoff's theoretical framework of co-production as an important lens to examine how the European Commission creates this interaction of science and law in environmental policy making and identifies how the Commission incorporates different voices and stakeholders in this policy area. The Commission can be seen as a vehicle of co-production of science and law in EU environmental policy by building strong expert identities, putting in place institutional processes and instruments, and creating discourse between scientists and lawyers leading to outputs of co-production. It is argued that in actively facilitating co-production, the Commission underpins the legislative and policy-making process with its institutional values.

Securing High Levels of Business Compliance with Environmental Laws: What Works and What to Avoid

This regulatory reflection considers an elusive question: how to secure high levels of business compliance with environmental laws? It examines, at a time of great uncertainty and challenge for environmental law and policy, what forms of regulatory intervention appear to have worked and some that have clearly failed with a view to drawing lessons. Some fresh evidence is presented on specific environmental interventions which the Environment Agency for England has found appear to work and on some which do not appear to work. It is suggested that despite its many shortcomings well-designed and enforced environmental regulation when aligned to the market delivers huge benefits to society.

Environmental Planning

This chapter discusses the importance of environmental plans as an instrument of environmental law and policy across jurisdictions. It first explains the concept of environmental plan, how environmental plans evolved in different jurisdictions, and the theory of environmental plans before considering the contents of national environmental plans. Using the examples of China, Sweden, France, the Netherlands, Sweden, the United Kingdom, the United States, and the European Union, the chapter examines the emergence and consolidation of national environmental plans, their underlying rationales, the processes through which they are formulated, and the areas most frequently addressed by them. It also shows how national environmental plans are implemented in those jurisdictions, along with their legal effects.