Legal effectiveness of environmental impact assessment under global environmental conventions: A critical review
Keywords:
Environmental Impact Assessment, Global Environmental Conventions, Sustainable Development, Legal Effectiveness, Climate Change IntegrationAbstract
The paper is a critical analysis of the legal efficacy of Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) requirements in the global environmental agreements with specificregard to the Espoo Convention, the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), and the Aarhus Convention as a procedural participation tool. The research objective is to evaluate the extent to which these treaty regimes develop legally specific, enforceable and institutionally reinforced EIA obligations which can impact domestic environmental decision-making. The article analyzes treaty provisions in relation to five criteria using a doctrinal and comparative legal analysis, which are normative precision, binding force, procedural specificity, compliance architecture and domestic implementation capacity. Analysis concludes that the Espoo Convention offers the most robust procedural framework to trtransboundary EIA whilst the CBD acknowledges EIA by transboundary biodiversity protection obligations but gives broad discretion to states. UNFCCC has an indirect contribution by the climate related planning requirements though it does not have a direct EIA mechanism. The paper also posits that legal effectiveness should be separated into effective implementation, which is a consequence of weak institutions, limited citizens participation, and failure of post-approval monitoring: the issue of weak implementation should be taken into consideration, but the primary legal problem is the lack of enforceability and the inability to design treaties in a coherent way. The article finds that the international EIA duties need more descriptive procedural obligations, enhanced mechanisms of compliance, more integration with the precautionary principle and better domestic incorporation to enhance their role in sustainable development.
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