Part VI Actors and Institutions, Ch.35 Business
Steven R Ratner
From: The Oxford Handbook of International Environmental Law
Edited By: Daniel Bodansky, Jutta Brunnée, Ellen Hey
- Subject(s):
- Developing countries — Sustainable development — Biodiversity — NGOs (Non-Governmental Organizations)
Business is a central actor in international environmental law. Industry, far more than states, engages directly in environmental degradation as well as the prevention and remediation of its harms. Two conclusions follow, which are both obvious to even a casual observer of environmental policy. First, business will aggressively seek to influence the content and application of environmental law and, second, environmental law will be effective only to the extent that it controls the behaviour of business. Yet the state-centric paradigm of traditional international...
