Subjects 2008
Environmental Law: Science and Regulation 730720
- Credited Courses: Graduate Diploma in Energy and Resources Law 528; Graduate Diploma in Government Law 178; Master of Commercial Law 504; Master of Laws by Coursework (LLM) 502; Master of Public and International Law 511
Objectives
A candidate who has successfully completed the subject should:
- Gain an understanding of the evolution of environmental law and the factors driving change at an international and national level
- Appreciate the pervasive nature of environmental regulation and its impact across many areas of law and policy
- Understand the influence of other disciplines, such as science, on the scope and character of environmental law Analyse the nature of current environmental approaches such as ‘regulatory mix’ and their implications for legal form, interpretation and implementation
- Be familiar with key case studies that illustrate the dynamic trends in environmental law
- Understand the need for integration across many areas of law in order to achieve environmental goals such as sustainability.
Syllabus
Principal topics will include:
- Centralisation of environmental law at the international level
- The moves to decentralise at the national level to bring environmental management closer to the activities of community members and environmental groups
- Integration between relevant discipline areas concerned with environmental protection, such as the biological sciences (particularly ecology), the social sciences, economics, politics and law
- The challenges of communication between the disciplines, particularly between areas such as law and science, which employ different methodologies and different languages
- The interaction of environmental law and policy with other regulatory areas such as those concerned with public health, development, agriculture, water use, indigenous land management and trade
- The impact of environmental protection on the fields with which it interacts (e.g. are international trade policies environmentally sustainable?).
These themes will be illustrated by cases studies in the following areas:
- Environmental law: The past, the future and the drivers of change
- Environmental actors
- The regulatory mix
- The role of science
- Integration and complexity, which will include case studies of topical areas such as climate change or water regulation.
