Public Participation In Environmental Protection

Environmental protection is necessary for the living and development of mankind ,and the effect of the protection on a large extent depends on the degree of public participation in the environmental matters. It is a tendency of using legal measure to guarantee public participation in protecting environment all over the world. As the embodiment of democracy in the environmental matters, public participation has widely been a basic principle of the legal system of environmental protection and has exerted important function in the practice of environmental protection in many country. In the construction of legal system of environmental law in our country, we should attach importance to public participation, construct and perfect the legal system, while advancing the legal process of public participation in environmental protection. This dissertation consists of four parts on the legal issue of public participation in environmental protection. Part 1 summarizes the meaning of public participation , theories'foundation of public participation, and the main body of public participation. At the present time, there is no consistent agreement on the conception of public participation. In this dissertation, public participation is considered that citizen have the right to participate in the environmental decision-making and management related to the environmental interests through the determinate procedure and approach in the area of environmental protection, and to supervise government activities of decision-making and management and privy activities of resource using. The establishment of public participation in the environmental law is based on three theories, including theory of common property, theory of common trusty , theory of environmental rights, Under the theory of common property, environmental elements are considered as common property, and no one could possess ,administrate or damage them discretionarily. Public institution on the behalf of public should take charge of the environmental elements under the scientific measure and procedure ,such as public participation. Based on theory of common property, theory of common trusty indicate that environmental elements should be devolved to the government on the trusteeship , and public have the right of supervising the government activities through the determinate procedure and approach. Theory of environmental rights argues that environmental right should be established in the law which could ensure citizen to survive in a favorable and zoology-reasonable environment and to explore and utilize the nature resources in a reasonable extent. Mean body of public participation includes citizen, government , enterprise, caste ,and any community member who has wish and capability to participate in the environmental protection and management. Part 2 analyzes the actualities of public participation. Now ,some countries , such as USA, Canada, France, Japan, Sweden, Russia , establish the principle of public participation in their legislation and practice. There are four characteristics of public participation In those countries. First, environmental right of citizen is established in the legislation, and stretches idiographic procedure rights. Second, perfect EIA system insures the public participate in the decision of environmental matter. Third, large numbers of NGOs affect the environmental protection distinctively. Last, perfect litigation system isconvenient for public to stick up for their environmental interests. Compared with the factors described above, public participation in our country is in a primary level. Though basic spirit of public participation has been embodied in some laws, legal system of public participation with systematic, perfect and specific contents is still absent. Problems in the weakness of public environmental consciousness and small numbers of NGOs restrict the development of public participation in our country. Part 3 probes into the necessity of public participation . Environmental problems can be essentially considered as the unbalance between human beings and nature in the social development. Since the problems were due to the human beings, all the social members—public—should deal with them. On account of the essence of environmental protection, public should become the main power to urge the development by the ensurence of the law measure. From the actualities of environmental protection, the situation —government charges the environmental matters alone while public are subordinative —results in the outcome that departments of government are too weak to deal with all the environmental problems while public could not exert their capabilities , Therefore, the conflict will aggravate the environmental crisis, For surging of movement of environmental protection all over the world at nonce, our country should come up with the popular tendency and excavate the tremendous potential of public power in our country. Part 4 analyzes the path of system construction of public participation in environmental protection. First, substantial and procedure environmental rights should be established in lawmaking. Now, public are difficult to participate in the environmental protection and management for short of legal...