This book examines the obstacles to achieving environmental justice in the context of neo-liberal economic systems founded upon deregulation, privatization and the use of market mechanisms as a policy tool. The book explores definitions and policy dimensions of environmental justice and market mechanisms. For some, environmental justice, social justice and ecological sustainability represent the new yardstick against which all concepts of environmental law and policy are to be measured. For others, the market economy, whether free or regulated, marks the starting-point for any strategy of environmental protection. This book is the first to investigate the link between these two approaches, measuring market-based tools of environmental law such as tradable permits and ecotaxes against the requirements of environmental justice. Based on papers delivered at a major international conference held in March 1998, at the University of Auckland, New Zealand, the book outlines the global context of the tensions between environmental justice and market-based instruments, focusing on the issue of international trade liberalization. It reports on experiences in a range of countries and regions: the United States, the European Union, Central and Eastern Europe, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand. Despite the variety of approaches and experiences, all the countries have been trying to adjust their environmental policies to the challenges of deregulation on the one hand and environmental justice on the other. The book concludes with a call to transcend the dichotomy between regulation and the market, and suggests it might be more realistic to perceive environmental policy as a `new deal', a combined effort of the state and the market in which environmental justice provides the overall normative framework.

The environmental justice literature convincingly shows that poor people and minorities live in more polluted neighborhoods than do other groups. These findings have sparked a broad activist movement, numerous local lawsuits, and several federal policy reforms. Despite the importance of environmental justice, the topic has received little attention from economists. And yet, economists have much to contribute, as several explanations for the correlation between pollution and marginalized citizens rely on market mechanisms. Understanding the role of these mechanisms is crucial to designing policy remedies, for each lends itself to a different interpretation to the locus of injustices. Moreover, the different mechanisms have varied implications for the efficacy of policy responses—and who gains and loses from them. In the first book-length examination of environmental justice from the perspective of economics, a cast of top contributors evaluates why underprivileged citizens are overexposed to toxic environments and what policy can do to help. While the text engages economic methods, it is written for an interdisciplinary audience.

Environmental justice is a significant and dynamic contemporary development in environmental law. Rechtschaffen, Gauna and new coauthor O'Neill provide an accessible compilation of interdisciplinary materials for studying environmental justice, interspersed with extensive notes, questions, and a teacher's manual with practice exercises designed to facilitate classroom discussion. It integrates excerpts from empirical studies, cases, agency decisions, informal agency guidance, law reviews, and other academic literature, as well as community-generated documents. This second edition includes new chapters addressing climate change, international environmental justice, and a capstone case study. It also adds expanded coverage of risk and the public health, empirical environmental justice research, and environmental justice for American Indian peoples.

Taking stock of all the major developments in the field of international environmental law, this text explores core assumptions and concepts, basic analytical tools and key challenges.

With the growing number, complexity, and importance of environmental problems come demands to include a full range of intellectual disciplines and scholarly traditions to help define and eventually manage such problems more effectively. Decision Making for the Environment: Social and Behavioral Science Research Priorities is the result of a 2-year effort by 12 social and behavioral scientists, scholars, and practitioners. The report sets research priorities for the social and behavioral sciences as they relate to several different kinds of environmental problems.

political science and international relations." --Book Jacket.