Research On The Issues Of Parallel Trial Of Environmental Civil Public Interest Litigation And Private Interest Litigation

Article 55 of China’s "Civil Procedure Law" stipulates that for environmental pollution and other acts that damage the public interest,organizations or procuratorial organs with the qualification to prosecute may initiate environmental civil public interest litigation.In 2015,Article 228 of the Interpretation of the Supreme People’s Court on the Application of the "Civil Procedure Law of the People’s Republic of China" and other relevant legal interpretations stipulate that in the face of the same environmental infringement,an organization that has the qualification to sue as a subject initiates environmental civil public interest litigation,Without affecting the right of private parties whose rights and interests have been harmed to file a corresponding private interest litigation,that is,in the face of the relationship between environmental civil public interest litigation and private interest litigation caused by the same environmental violation,China adopts a "parallel approach" to adopt environmental civil public welfare A dual-track relief model for litigation and private interest litigation.Environmental civil public interest litigation is intended to protect the environment and ecology,and environmental private interest litigation is intended to remedy the rights and interests of private subjects damaged by environmental infringement,both of which run in parallel.But unfortunately,the relationship between environmental civil public interest litigation and private interest litigation caused by the same environmental infringement incident has not aroused too much attention from the academic community and practice.In theory,relevant research is inadequate,legislation does not focus on the coordination of the two kinds of litigation,the two kinds of litigation caused by the same violation in judicial practice have problems such as unclear definition of case nature,differences in common disputes and judgments,and failure to effectively protect private interests.Based on this,this paper combs the current situation and problems of the two kinds of litigation parallel trial,clarifies the causes of the problems,analyzes the existing problem-solving paths in the academic circle,and based on the existing system background of our country,follows the path of convergence theory,and puts forward the improvement path of the two kinds of litigation parallel trial.This article is divided into four parts:The first part: the status quo and problems of concurrent trial of environmental civil public interest litigation and private interest litigation.After reviewing the current legislative and judicial status of the two kinds of litigation in China,this part points out that the problems of the two kinds of litigation in parallel trial include unclear definition of the nature of the case,differences in common disputes and judgments,and private interests that have not been effectively guaranteed.The second part: analysis of the reasons for the parallel trial of environmental civil public interest litigation and private interest litigation.This part analyzes the reasons of the two kinds of litigation parallel trial,and finds that the reason of the two kinds of litigation parallel trial is that the theoretical research is insufficient to guide the practice and the legislation does not pay attention to the coordination of the two kinds of litigation.Among them,the legislation did not pay attention to the coordination of the two kinds of litigation in four aspects: the scope of the case,the identification of common facts,the effectiveness of the judgment and the responsibility.The third part: the path selection of environmental civil public interest litigation and private interest litigation in parallel.Aiming at the problems arising from the parallel trial of two kinds of litigation in practice,the academic community proposes that two kinds of litigation under the same infringement should be coordinated,and therefore puts forward the doctrine of three problem solving paths: merger theory,incidental theory,and cohesion theory.Among them,the merger theory believes that we should focus on the overall settlement of environmental infringement disputes and put the public interest litigation and private interest litigation requests involved in the environmental infringement disputes under the same procedure for combined hearing;the theory of incidental puts forward the construction of dispute resolution mechanism of environmental civil public interest litigation with private interest litigation;the cohesion theory believes that environmental civil public interest litigation and private interest litigation belong to different system designs,but there is a specific connection between the two because they are under the same violation.Therefore,under the premise of grasping the difference between the two,The specific connection caused by the entity’s infringement acts as a clue to organically link the two lawsuits.This part analyzes the causes and contents of the three theories.After analyzing the advantages and disadvantages of the merger theory,incidental theory and connection theory,it is believed that the connection theory has the feasibility at the theoretical level and the operability at the practical level under the current system.The fourth part: the improvement of parallel trial of environmental civil public interest litigation and private interest litigation.According to the theory of cohesion theory,this part aims at the causes of two kinds of litigation parallel trial problems under the same infringement act,and makes improvements on relevant matters: defining the scope of the two litigation cases,reasonably connecting the identification of the common facts of the two litigation,reasonably connecting the responsibility of the two litigation and improving the supporting measures.