The study, through the prism of comparing various government practices, critically examines the problems of Russian legislation and policies in the field of renewable energy sources, such as problems of fragmentation, obsolescence and lack of legislation. The article examines the current legislation, which establishes incentives for the development of renewable energy. The research question consists

The most evident shortcoming of the international agreements on climate actions is the compliance to their prescriptions. Can John Rawls’s social contract theory help us to solve the problem? We apply the veil of ignorance decision-making setting in a sequential dictator game to study the compliance to climate change agreements and we test the model in a laboratory experiment. The veil of ignorance

This paper describes the complex hydrogeological, legal framework and socioeconomic costs of the groundwater protection in major groundwater basins (MGBs) in Poland in accordance with European directives. The hydrogeological criteria developed in Poland for establishing MGBs and the principles of their protection provide more details to the directives that are in force in Europe, which define the general

A growing scholarship argues that decarbonization cannot be achieved with single instruments like carbon pricing alone. A broader mix of reinforcing policies is required. This literature focuses on how policies can accelerate technological innovation, restrict polluting activities, promote green growth, and ensure social justice. Applying the policy mix literature to the European Union (EU), this article

President Biden faces tremendous challenges to overcome political polarisation as he re-commits the United States to the Paris Agreement on Climate Change and promises decarbonisation of the US economy over the next three decades. To achieve deep decarbonisation, recent scholarship identifies the crucial role of broad policy mixes that create reinforcing effects between climate and energy policies

This paper reviews the national environmental agenda of Arab countries in the Middle East and Africa in an attempt to determine coherence of local efforts with the international environmental commitments these countries have made by signing and ratifying the Paris Agreement under the United Nations Framework and Convention on Climate Change. The paper succinctly summarizes the impacts of climate change

In international disputes between investors and host-States, the traditionally asymmetric nature of international investment agreements (IIAs) may prevent States from bringing claims against investors for harm caused, including environmental damage. At the same time, allowing host-State counterclaims for environmental damage is a potentially useful tool for rebalancing the asymmetric nature of IIAs

This paper examines the effects of political pressure groups (lobbies) on transboundary emissions of individual countries and on the stability of international environmental agreements to reduce emissions. We consider two types of lobbies, industry and environmentalists, and we allow for asymmetric countries to consider differences in lobby strengths to study strategic international spillovers of national

In the original publication of the article, the second author's name was published incorrectly. The correct name is given with this Correction.

The principle of ‘no significant harm’ as a way of addressing transboundary environmental challenges is both inadequately researched and inadequately implemented in many parts of the world. This paper addresses the questions: What is the nature of transboundary harm in the Anthropocene? Is the principle of no significant harm able to address current and pre-empt future transboundary harm in the field

This paper provides a historical and legal perspective of EU regulation on genetically modified organisms (GMOs)—through its initial development to its current position—in view of major advancements of modern molecular biotechnologies used for agriculture. We argue that the emergence and development of EU regulation of GMOs were shaped by antecedent events, notably bovine spongiform encephalopathy

The combined effects of socio-economic growth as well as climate change exert increasing pressure on international river basins and require dedicated cooperative efforts to jointly manage international rivers. Cooperative strategies drawn from scientific literature, empirical research and practitioner’s handbooks are explored and clustered into six key dimensions of goals, instruments, structures,

Access to water has been recognized as an international human right at least since 2010, when both the United Nations General Assembly and the Human Rights Council adopted resolutions to this effect. The no significant harm principle can be found in the UN Watercourses Convention, and in numerous other global, regional, and watercourse-specific treaties. This paper provides an explanation of how the

In April 2019, the European Union (EU) revised its fuel economy policy for new passenger cars (PC). The new standard set an ambitious policy framework that featured high CO2 caps on these vehicles from 2025 and 2030 with limited flexibility for automobile industry to comply with the new standard, reflecting European decision-makers’ aspirations for zero-emission mobility. Most literature on EU policy-making

The international legal architecture to manage freshwater and ocean ecosystems does not adequately provide for the interconnected nature of these ecosystems or the transboundary harm flowing between them. Pollution from land-based sources exemplifies this issue where plastic, agricultural run-off, discharge of nutrients and pesticides and untreated sewage accounts for approximately 80% of all marine

The no-harm principle is at the heart of the several international conventions focusing on the uses, allocation, management and protection of transboundary water resources. However, in the framework of these agreements, the meaning of “no-harm” remains rather vague. Through an analysis of six emblematic cases brought before the International Court of Justice and arbitration tribunals, we elucidate

The chapter addresses the no-harm principle as a core pillar of the international water law regime, and its inter-relationship with the principles of equitable and reasonable utilisation and cooperation. No harm will be described in its harmonised relation to the latter two principles under the “community interest” approach to transboundary watercourses, as enunciated by the Permanent Court of International

Recognition that hydropower plays a role in fostering sustainable development and helping countries move away from fossil fuels has led to a resurgence of planned projects on transboundary rivers around the world. Whilst these projects offer clear benefits, they are not without their socio-ecological impacts. An added feature of hydropower projects is that they tend to involve a wide range of actors

Scholars commonly hypothesize that enhanced capacity—improved ability to do as agreed—increases states’ compliance with international agreements. In contrast, using a novel dataset that covers 31 states and three decades of cooperation, I find a negative effect of capacity on compliance. To help explain this seemingly counterintuitive finding, I offer a novel conjecture of the capacity–compliance relationship

The duty to prevent significant transboundary harm remains a cornerstone principle of international law, and especially of international environmental and water resources law. However, this rule focuses on the conduct of a State where harm originates, rather than on the fact that harm has resulted from such conduct, and thus requires that States exercise due diligence in anticipating and in preventing

The principle of no significant harm has become a cornerstone of international environmental and specifically international water law. Its implementation does, however, regularly lead to disagreements and conflicts between riparian states to shared watercourses as interpretations as to what constitutes significant transboundary harm and whether a certain water resources infrastructure project can move

Today, the world community is faced with one of the most significant challenges—climate change. Natural disasters, unpredictability of weather conditions, sea level rise etc. jeopardize life activity, increase the likelihood of natural disasters, and are the consequences of climate change, global in nature, and often of unprecedented scale. At the same time, the anthropogenic factor in climate change

The Bern Convention aims to conserve wild flora and fauna and their natural habitats, especially those species and habitats whose conservation requires the cooperation of several states. Turkey became a party to the convention in 1984 and therefore made it binding in terms of domestic law. It was sought to answer the question of how effective the Bern Convention was in Turkish legislation and judicial

This article pioneers new thinking on learning by organizations created by international environmental agreements, especially the boundaries within which learning can take place. It hypothesizes that there are ideological, institutional and technical boundaries to learning, which negatively impact the effectiveness of international environmental programming. This theory is rigorously tested by applying

This paper contributes theoretically, empirically and methodologically to the literature on transnational advocacy networks (TANs). This study is guided by two associated research questions: ‘How are TANs structured?’ and ‘What relation is established between the TANs’ structure and their efficiency?’ The paper shows that environmental transnational advocacy networks are not as horizontal as assumed

The past few years have witnessed a growing interest among scholars and policy-makers in the interplay of international bureaucracies with civil society organizations, non-profit entities, and the private sector. Authors concerned with global environmental politics have made considerable progress in capturing this phenomenon. Nevertheless, we still lack in-depth empirical knowledge on the precise nature

Contributions to the climate governance literature have highlighted the importance of recognizing its new polycentric nature, which includes roles for non-state and subnational actors in climate change mitigation and in leadership for climate action. Yet, the literature is missing a normative cartography—that is, a mapping of the distribution of moral duties in the real world—which is tailored to a

A number of recent international environmental regimes including the Sustainable Development Goals, the Paris Agreement on climate change and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction rely on soft law featuring voluntary action, wide-ranging provisions for participants and non-binding commitments, while skirting the idea of sanctions. Because of the increasing prevalence of soft law regimes

In 2015, the international community adopted the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), a goal-setting governance strategy that aims to achieve sustainable development across social, economic, and ecological areas. SDG 14 (‘life below water’) is directed to the sustainable use and conservation of the oceans and marine resources. Regional fisheries management organizations (RFMOs) are

Calls to advance the democratization of sustainable development negotiations have recently proliferated. However, the participatory schemes set up by international organizations and governments have fallen short of answering to academic and empirical demands for global democracy, in particular by excluding the most marginalized actors from policymaking. Deliberative democrats argue that discursive

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)—a normative (non-binding) global international environmental agreement (IEA)—claim to be universal as they were multilaterally negotiated between UN member states. However, is giving the Global South a seat at the table truly inclusive development? This article looks at a cross-cultural comparison of the African philosophy of Ubuntu (specifically in South Africa)