Toxics and Transnational Law International and European Regulation of Toxic Substances as Legal Symbolism

About this book

As an environmental issue transcending national boundaries,the spread of toxic substances in the environment, with harmful consequences for ecosystems and human health has become the focus of transnational regulatory efforts in a variety of international fora. In order to address the problems created by transboundary toxic movements a set of binding as well as non-binding norms are being developed at the European and international level.

This book analyses the development and effectiveness of transnational toxics law through two case studies: one dealing with the European regional regime for the control of toxic discharges in the aquatic environment and the other looking at the emerging global regime for the regulation of international trade in hazardous pesticides. It provides a comprehensive analysis of the legal and political framework in EC law for the reduction of inputs of hazardous substances in the marine and freshwater environment, and in regional agreements for the protection of the marine environment of the North Sea and Northeast Atlantic, Baltic Sea and Mediterranean. It also offers a critical account of the development of soft and hard law regulating exports of banned and severely restricted pesticides from industrialised to developing countries; from the resolutions of the United Nations Environment Programme and General Assembly in the late 1970s, to the signing of the Rotterdam Convention on the Prior Informed Consent Procedure in 1998. The author shows that international normative efforts in these two fields have proved much more productive in establishing procedural obligations for states than in laying down actual substantive standards to govern their conduct, and argues that transnational environmental law may be valued by governments more for its symbolic, value-expressive function, than for any real problem-solving capacity.

Contents

PART I. INTRODUCTION1. Toxic Substances as an Object of Transnational Environmental Regulation2. Law as an Instrument of International Environmental PolicyPART II. TOXIC SUBSTANCES IN INTERNATIONAL WATERS:THE REGULATION OF TOXIC EMISSIONS IN THE AQUATIC ENVIRONMENT3. Transboundary Pollution of the Aquatic Environment by Toxic Substances from Industrial Processes and Products: The Problem and its Perception4. The Land-Based Sources Regime for the North Sea and North East Atlantic5. The Baltic Land-Based Sources Regime: The 1974 and 1992 Helsinki Conventions on the Protection of The Marine Environment of the Baltic Sea Area6. The Mediterranean Land-Based Sources Regime: The 1976 Barcelona Convention for the Protection of the Mediterranean Sea Against Pollution and its Protocols7. The Regulation of Emissions of Dangerous Substances in International Watercourses8. The Regulation of Emissions of Dangerous Substances into the Aquatic Environment under European Community Law9. The Interaction between International Law and European Community Law: The Participation of the European Community in International Conventions Concerning Emissions of Dangerous Substances in the Aquatic EnvironmentPART III. TOXIC SUBSTANCES IN INTERNATIONAL TRADE:THE REGULATION OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE IN PESTICIDES10. Health and Environment Effects in the Third World of Inadequately Regulated Pesticide Trade and Use: The Problem and its Perception11. The Soft Response Model: United States Legislation on the Export of Banned and Severely Restricted Pesticides12. The First Phase of International Regulatory Efforts: From Hard Soft Law to Soft Hard Law?13. The Second Phase of International Regulatory Efforts: Towards a Consensus on Prior Informed Consent14. The Third Phase of International Regulatory Efforts: From Hard Soft Law to Soft Hard Law?15. The Implementation of International Norms by the European Community: Community Regulation of Hazardous Chemical Exports16. The Implementation of International Norms by the United States: The Evolution of National Law and PolicyPART IV. OVERVIEW AND CONCLUSIONS17. The Regulation of Toxic Emissions in the Aquatic Environment: A Regime Appraisal18. The Regulation of International Trade in Pesticides: A Regime Appraisal19. Transnational Environmental Law Between Legal Instrumentalism and Legal Symbolism

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Biography

Marc Pallemaerts teaches domestic,European and international environmental law at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, and the Universite Libre de Bruxelles.