Environmental Rights in the European Community
![handle is hein.journals/hasint16 and id is 573 raw text is: Environmental Rights in the European
Community
By DNAH L. SI-ELTON*
The Treaties creating the European Community' contain neither
a catalogue of human rights nor a reference to environmental protec-
tion. This is not surprising, given the focus of the Community,' as well
as its relatively early date of inception. The language closest to both
subjects is contained in article 36 of the Treaty of Rome, which states
that provisions of the Treaty shall not preclude prohibitions or re-
strictions ... justified on grounds of... the protections of health and
life of humans, animals or plants.'3 Despite their general absence
from Community documents, both human rights and environmental
protection have found their way into Community law as it has evolved
over more than three decades. The evolution has not produced a de-
clared human right to an environment of a particular quality; how-
ever, it has resulted in certain guaranteed environmental rights,4
including the right to receive environmental information, the right to
participate in decisions affecting the environment, and the right to ac-
* Professor of Law, Santa Clara University. This article was presented in March
1993 at the Hastings International and Comparative Law Review's Eleventh Annual Sym-
posium on International Legal Practice, The European Community in Evolution: Toward
a Closer Political & Economic Union.
1. European Community or Community refers to three separate Communities:.
European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), European Atomic Energy Community
(EURATOM), and the European Economic Community (EEC). TREATY ESTABLISHwnG
THE EUROPEAN COAL AND STEEL COMMUNrrY [ECSC TREATY]; TREATY ESTABLISHING
TH EUROPE ECONOMIC CoMUNITY [EEC TREATY], [hereinafter Treaty of Rome];
TREATY ESTABLHIN G THE EUROPEAN ATOMIC ENERGY COMMUNrrY [EURATOM
TREATY].
2. Article 2 of the Treaty of Rome describes the Community's task in general: by
establishing a common market and progressively approximating the economic policies of
Member States, to promote throughout the Community a harmonious development of eco-
nomic activities, a continuous and balanced expansion, an increase in stability, an acceler-
ated raising of the standard of living and closer relations between the Member States
belonging to it.
3. Treaty of Rome, supra note 1, art. 36.
4. For a general discussion of environmental rights, see Dinah Shelton, Human
Rights, Environmental Rights, and the Right to Environment, 28 STAN. . INT'L L 103
(1991).](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/hasint16&div=36&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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Environmental Rights in the European Community
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