The Research On Legal Definition And Protection Of Environmental Public Interests

Environmental public interest should have been a core element in environment protection law.however, it has never received enough attention from legislative and administrative law enforcement organs for a long time. Environmental public interest, enjoyed by majority of people, with a basic characteristic of correlation, public and welfare, refers to some environmental interest protected by environment protection law. Implementation of environmental public interest is the result of the implementation of environment protection law. The implementation of environment protection law can prevent and reduce the damage to the environment; also, it gives a hand to protect and improve environmental public interest. Once the environmental public interest is injured, it should be protected by a specific law.Due to the differences among the environmental public interest litigation, general civil litigation and administrative litigation, we should set up a special environmental tribunal. This tribunal can be considered as a special environmental justice agency, justifying cases in the environmental public interest litigation. The term public interest is of uncertainty, so it is good to extend the range of cases in the environmental public interest litigation. Through this, some cases which are originated from environmental public interest litigation can avoid being excluded. In environmental public interest litigation, the purpose of defining qualification of plaintiff is to make the environmental public interest materialized. Prosecution agencies, administrative authorities, citizens and environment protection non-governmental organizations, all can file environmental public interest litigation as plaintiff. As there is no direct interest between the plaintiff and case, some new system designs which are different from traditional litigation need to be created in the environmental public interest litigation. With the help of setting up pre-program in it, the pressure on environmental judicial organs brought by extending the qualification of plaintiff can be released. More specific, set up forewarn program, that is, administrative departments identify the defendant that carries out the violations and ask him to reorganize in deadline first, and then deliver the reorganization results to the potential plaintiff in written form. If the potential plaintiff shows his dissatisfaction on those results, he can continue to file environmental public interest litigation. This system can avoid too many cases being involved in the litigation.Otherwise, to achieve efficiency, the litigation should be ended up with reconciliation, if the defendant has taken measures and made up the damages. As long as the defendant stops the behavior of destroying the environment and takes positive measures to protect it in time, the judge can preside over the mediation. Environmental public interest litigation, aiming for protecting environmental public interest, has nothing to do with the interests of the plaintiff. Thus, court compensation should be used for restoration of habitat, rather than paying to the plaintiff. This is the difference between public interest litigation and traditional litigation.In short, so as to protect the environmental public interest effectively, China should learn some useful experience from developed countries in environmental public interest litigation; and establish an environmental public interest litigation system which meets the demands of our own national conditions.