Transcript Understanding Our Environment

Environmental Science and Policy
Chapter 15
1
2
Outline:
•
•
•
•
•
•
Decision Making
Environmental Policy Cycle
 NEPA and EIS
Environmental Law
 Statutory Law
 Case Law
 Administrative Law
International Treaties
Dispute Resolution
Collective Action
3
DECISIONS IN AN UNCERTAIN WORLD
•
Adaptive Management
 A solutions approach designed to test
clearly formulated hypotheses about the
actions being taken.
- Learning by doing or adaptive
Management ,adopted by natural
resource managers
- Polices are designed at the outset to
utilize scientific principles to examine
alternative and assess outcomes.
4
Wicked Problems
•
Environmental problems tend to be
intractable because they are nested within
sets of interlocking issues.
 Often poor match between bearers of
costs and bearers of benefits.
- No value-free objective answers.
 Best approach comes from
community based planning & often
consensus building.
5
Precautionary Principle
•
Four basic precautionary actions.
 People have a duty to take anticipatory steps to
prevent harm.
 Burden of proof of carelessness lies within new
technologies,process, activity and not the public.
 Full range of alternatives must be examined by
people before using a new technology.
 Decision must be open, informed, democratic &
must include all affected parties.
6
ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION
•
Broad Goals
 Improve understanding among the general
public of natural and built environments
and the relationships between human and
their environment.
 Encourage postsecondary students to
pursue environmental careers.
 Environ. Science is highly interdisciplinary
and integrates information from many
fields of study, how the world works and
how we should behave as environ citizens.
7
ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY
•
•
•
Environmental Policy - Official rules and
regulations concerning the environment that
are adopted, implemented, and enforced by
a governmental agency.
National Policy e.g Clean Air Act.
The international Policy e.g Convention on
International Trade in Endangered species.
 Also encompasses public opinion.
8
Environmental Policy
9
The Policy Cycle
10
Political Decision Making
•
•
•
Politics as Power
 Politics is a struggle among competing
interest groups as they strive to shape
public policy to suit their own agendas.
Rational Choice:
No policy should have greater total cost than
benefits
 In choosing between policy alternatives,
preference should be given to those with
the greatest cumulative welfare and the
least negative impacts.
11
Arguments Against Rational Choice
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Conflicting values and needs are not
comparable due to lack of information
Few agreed-upon broad social goals (rather
benefits on specific group or individual)
Policymakers not motivated by societal goals.
Large investments create sunken costs
Uncertainty drives policy makers toward past.
Costs and benefits difficult to calculate.
Segmented nature of policy making in large
bureaucracies makes policy making difficult.
12
NEPA
•
National Environmental Policy Act (1970) signed by
President Nixon:
 Authorizes Council on Environmental Quality
(CEQ) as the oversight board for general environ
conditions.
 Directs federal agencies to take environmental
consequences into account during decision
making.
 Requires an Environmental Impact Statement
(EIS) for every federal project having significant
environmental impact on quality of human
environment.
13
EIS (Enviromment Impact Statement)
•
•
ESI is one of the most powerful tool in the
environment arsenal:
Every EIS must contain:
 Purpose and need for project.
 Alternative to proposed action.
 Statement of positive and negative impacts
of the proposed activities.
 A final ESI document is often 100’s of
pages and takes approx 6-9 months to
prepare.
14
ENVIRONMENTAL LAW
•
•
Laws that govern environmental quality,
natural resources & ecological sustainibility.
Statutory Law: The Legislative Branch
 Federal laws (statutes) are enacted by
Congress and signed by the President.
- After introduction, each bill is referred to
a committee or sub-committee for
hearings and debate.
- Language is modified, multiple bills may
be combined, and overall bill is passed
on to full committee.
15
Legislative Branch
A bill succeeding in full committee is
reported to full House or Senate for a floor
debate.
- Amendments proposed at each stage.
 House and Senate versions are often
different, and must be sent to conference
committee to meld differences.
 Bill goes back to House and Senate for
confirmation.
 Passed on to President for signature.

16
Case law: The Judicial Branch
•
Establishes environmental law by ruling on
constitutionality of statutes and interpreting
their meaning.
 Legal Standing :First one must
determined if participants have a right to
initiate an action.
17
The Judicial Branch
•
Criminal Law - Derives from federal and state
statutes that prohibit wrongs against the
state or society.
 Charges always initiated by a government
prosecutor.
- Guilt or innocence of defendant
determined by a jury of peers.
- Violation of environmental statutes
constitutes a criminal offense
18
The Judicial Branch
•
Civil Law - Defined by a body of laws
regulating relations between individuals or
corporations.
 Burden of proof lies with prosecution.
- Guilt or innocence based on whether the
defendant could reasonably have
anticipated and avoided the offense.
19
SLAPP
•
Strategic Lawsuits Against Political
Participation - Practice of suing citizens who
criticize businesses or government agencies
over environmental issues.
 Legal defense costs can be exorbitant.
20
Administrative Law: The Executive Branch
•
More than 100 federal agencies have
environmental oversight.
 Federal agencies often delegate power to
a matching state agency to decentralize
authority.
 They usually have power to set
rules,adjudicates disputes & investigate
misconduct.
21
The Executive Branch
22
Regulatory Agencies
•
•
EPA - Primary agency with responsibility for
protecting environmental quality in US
 Cabinet-level department.
Department of Interior (Natural Resources)
 National Park Service
 Bureau of Land Management
 US Fish and Wildlife Service
23
Regulatory Agencies
•
•
•
Department of Agriculture
 US Forest Service
Department of Labor
 Occupational Health and Safety Agency
(OSHA)
Revolving door with workers moving back
and forth between industry and government.
24
•
INTERNATIONAL TREATIES AND
CONVENTIONS
Over past 25 years, more than 170
environmental treaties and conventions have
been negotiated initiated to protect our
global environment.
 Unfortunately many of these environmental
treaties are vague and many do not
comply due to public embarassment.
- Most nations unwilling to give up
sovereignty.
 International court has no
enforcement powers.
25
DISPUTE RESOLUTION
•
Arbitration is a formal dispute resolution,
based in a trial-like setting.
 Arbitrator takes a more active role than a
judge and is more interested in resolving the
disputes than application of the law.
26
Mediation
•
Mediation is a process in which disputants
are encouraged to come up with a solution
on their own.
 Useful in complex issues with multiple
stakeholders with different interests.
27
Collaborative Approaches to Planning
•
Community-Based Planning - Incorporates
holistic, adaptive, pluralistic approaches.
 Collaborative Approaches - Working with
local communities to gain traditional
knowledge and gain local acceptance of
management plans.
28
COLLECTIVE ACTION
•
•
•
•
Student Environmental Groups
 Student Environmental Action Coalition
 Public Interest Research Groups, etc.
Mainline Environmental Organization
 National Wildlife Federation
 Sierra Club,etc.
Radical Environmental Groups
 Earth First
 Sea Shepherd,etc,
International Nongovernmental
Organizations(NGOs) have become powerful
aspects of environmental protection.
29
Summary:
•
•
•
•
•
•
Decision Making
Environmental Policy Cycle
 NEPA and EIS
Environmental Law
 Statutory Law
 Case Law
 Administrative Law
International Treaties
Dispute Resolution
Collective Action
30
31