This book is dedicated to a topic which has for a long time lacked the attention it deserves within the academic world. It intends to address in a coherent and comprehensive manner the problem of the environmental rights of the child, which are not identical to the ones of adults whose environmental rights have been appraised from a general point of view. In the absence of any international law instrument explicitly granting a child the right to a clean environment, drawing on an extensive and original analysis of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the practice of its monitoring body, this book undertakes an assessment of the extent to which these challenges may be overcome through a greater engagement between international law on the rights of the child and international environmental law. The result is the first comprehensive study on the manner in which these two mutually reinforcing legal regimes can interact to strengthen the protection of children’s environmental human rights at stake in the increased strategic environmental and climate litigations at both the national and international level. The book is recommended reading for, amongst others, policy makers, international environmental lawyers and human rights lawyers and practitioners. Additionally, lecturers, students and researchers from a range of disciplines will also gain from seeing how new legal scholarship and intertwined branches of international law contribute to the continual development of the living rights of the human rights conventions. Francesca Ippolito is Associate Professor of International Law in the Department of Political and Social Science of the University of Cagliari, Italy. She holds the Jean Monnet Chair on European Climate of Change - REACT for 2021-2024.

This book presents a broad overview of the many intersections between health and the environment that lie at the basis of the most crucial environmental health issues, focusing on the responses provided by international and EU law. Consistent with the One Health approach and moving from the relevant international and EU legal frameworks, the book addresses some of the most important issues of environmental health including the traditional, such as pollution of air, water and soil and related food safety issues, as well as new and emerging challenges, like those linked to climate change, antimicrobial resistance and electromagnetic fields. Applying an intersectoral and interdisciplinary approach, it also investigates other branches of international and EU law including human rights law, investment law, trade law, energy law and disaster law. The work also discusses ethics and intergenerational equity. Ultimately, the book assesses the degree of effectiveness of the international and EU normative framework, and the extent to which the relevant legal instruments contribute to the protection of public health from major environmental hazards. The book will be a valuable resource for students, academics and policy makers working in the areas of Environmental Health law, Global Health law, International law and EU law.

This title was first published in 2000: A discussion on the right of a child to a clean environment. It links two important contemporary issues: human rights and the environment. The volume consists of the extended versions of some of the papers which were presented at a workshop on "The Right of a Child to a Clean Environment", held at Queen Mary and Westfield College, University of London, in 1997, and there are also some additional contributions. The workshop participants included Michael Anderson and Sylvia Bluck, Harry Post, Holly Cullen and Olufemi Elias. The additional contributors include Veronic Wright, Maria G. Doglioli and Soledad Aguilar. There are essays on general issues, selected case studies and annexes.

This book offers a critical reinterpretation of Western European States’ programmatic support for International Human Rights Law (IHRL) since the 1970s. It examines the systemic or structural constraints inherent to the international legal system and argues that order trumps justice in Western Europe’s promotion of international human rights norms. The book shows that IHRL evolved as a result of a tension between two forces: A European understanding of international society, based on order, the centrality of the State and a minimalist conception of human rights; and a civil society and UN-promoted, mostly Western, particularly European but broader conception of human rights, based on justice. As such, human rights norms emerge and develop when (some) states’ idea of order meets with advocates’ idea of justice. We are living a historical juncture of shifting tectonic plates with rising nationalism in the Global North, ever growing power in the Global South and a declining presence of Europe in global affairs. The conditions under which IHRL emerged have fundamentally changed and unpacking the factors beneath the international recognition of human rights has never been more pressing. This book will be of key interest to scholars, students and practitioners in human rights law, public international law, international relations, critical legal theory and in European politics.

The role of law in responding to global environmental problems and the interplay between different levels of regulation and governance is becoming increasingly relevant in the field of liability and reparation for environmental damage. This book examines the relationship and reciprocal influences between the EU and the international legal order in a multilevel and comparative perspective, in relation to the ongoing efforts to elaborate effective regimes of liability and reparation for environmental damage. It offers a comparative analysis of legal developments in the field of environmental liability within the EU and at the international law level and addresses questions concerning the impact of such interaction on the development, implementation and enforcement of appropriate responses to environmental damage within the respective legal orders and on a global level. Given the book’s focus and the transnational legal dimension of the issues covered, this volume will be of great interest to legal academics and researchers working in the environmental law field from an EU law and international law perspective, as well as more generally to scholars interested in the study of the relationship between EU and international law. Outside academia, the book will also be of great interest to practitioners wishing to get insights into the application of the law of environmental liability in the EU and at the international law level.

In EU Environmental Law, International Environmental Law, and Human Rights Law: The Case of Environmental Responsibility, Armelle Gouritin offers a critical appraisal of EU environmental responsibility law and asserts a new rights-based approach to international environmental law. This book addresses environmental damage, environmental harm, the grounds for environmental responsibility and the exceptions to the responsibility principle. A critical appraisal of EU Directives 2004/35 and 2008/99 is complemented by an analysis of the input of the European Court on Human Rights and international environmental law with a view to filling the gaps identified in the Directives. Gouritin offers a full analysis of the potential and limits of the rights-based approach applied to environmental responsibility.

The Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union enshrines the key political, social and economic rights of EU citizens and residents in EU law. In its present form it was approved in 2000 by the European Parliament, the Council of Ministers and the European Commission. However its legal status remained uncertain until the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon in December 2009. The Charter obliges the EU to act and legislate consistently with the Charter, and enables the EU's courts to strike down EU legislation which contravenes it. The Charter applies to EU Member States when they are implementing EU law but does not extend the competences of the EU beyond the competences given to it in the treaties. This Commentary on the Charter, the first in English, written by experts from several EU Member States, provides an authoritative but succinct statement of how the Charter impacts upon EU, domestic and international law. Following the conventional article-by-article approach, each commentator offers an expert view of how each article is either already being interpreted in the courts, or is likely to be interpreted. Each commentary is referenced to the case law and is augmented with extensive references to further reading. Six cross-cutting introductory chapters explain the Charter's institutional anchorage, its relationship to the Fundamental Rights Agency, its interaction with other parts of international human rights law, the enforcement mechanisms, extraterritorial scope, and the all-important 'Explanations'.

This edited volume presents comparative research on how the courts in Southeast Europe apply international law. After the introductory Part I, Part II discusses specific areas of international law, notably the law of Association Agreements between the EU and third countries, the law of the World Trade Organization, and international environmental law (the Aarhus Convention). Part III consists of country reports on how national courts in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Slovenia are currently applying international law.

Corporate Accountability in the Context of Transitional Justice explores how corporations can be held accountable for their role in past human rights violations when a country is making a transition from conflict or repression to peace and democracy. It breaks new ground in theorizing the linkages between the areas of transitional justice and corporate accountability and analyzing problems frequently arising where the two fields meet in practice, for example where the role of corporations in past human rights violations is examined by truth and reconciliation commissions or in the course of litigation. The book provides an overview of the current trends in law and in legal and political discussion relating to both areas, as well as in-depth analysis of how tools of corporate accountability and transitional justice can complement each other in order to achieve the best outcomes for bringing justice to victims and lasting peace to societies. The authors bring extensive experience from diverse professional backgrounds and jurisdictions to provide the first sustained attempt to address this link. The book will be of interest to scholars, practitioners, policymakers and activists working in the areas of transitional justice; corporate accountability; and business and human rights.

The last decade has witnessed an increasing focus on the relationship between climate change and human rights. Several international human rights bodies have expressed concern about the negative implications of climate change for the enjoyment of human rights, and the Paris Agreement is the first multilateral climate agreement to refer explicitly to states' human rights obligations in connection with climate change. Yet despite this, there are still significant gaps in our understanding of the role of international human rights law in enhancing accountability for climate action or inaction. As the Paris Agreement has shifted the focus of the climate change regime towards voluntary action, and the humanitarian impacts of climate change are increasingly being felt around the world, accountability for climate change has become an increasingly salient issue. This book offers a timely and comprehensive analysis of the legal issues related to accountability for the human rights impact of climate change, drawing on the state responsibility regime. It explains when and where state action relating to climate change may amount to a violation of human rights, and evaluates various avenues of legal redress available to victims. The overall analysis offers a perceptive insight into the potential of innovative rights-based climate actions to shape climate and energy policies around the world.