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29 Ga. L. Rev. 599 (1994-1995)
The Rio Declaration on Environment and Development: Two Steps Forward and One Back, or Vice Versa

handle is hein.journals/geolr29 and id is 609 raw text is: THE RIO DECLARATION ON ENVIRONMENT AND DEVELOPMENT: TWO STEPS FORWARD AND ONE BACK, OR VICE VERSA? David A Wirth* I. INTRODUCTION It has now been three years since the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), the so-called Earth Summit, was held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil from June 3 to 14, 1992. Both before and immediately after the meeting proper, there seemed to be as many views as there were observers, not all of which could be reconciled with each other. Now that the dust has begun to settle, examining the impact of this historic occasion in light of the accumulating objective evidence of its concrete impact, instead of on the basis of conjecture and speculation, becomes an increasingly viable task. Rather than undertake that entire enterprise, this Article evaluates the significance of the Earth Summit to the continuing maturation of international environmental law through scrutiny of the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, one of the principal instruments adopted at UNCED. The Rio Declaration is compared to its predecessor, the Stockholm Declaration on the Human Environment, which resulted from the United Nations * Associate Professor of Law, Washington and Lee University, Lexington, Virginia. This work was supported by grants from the Creswell Foundation and the Frances Lewis Law Center of Washington and Lee University. The author gratefully acknowledges the helpful comments on earlier drafts provided by Elizabeth P. Barratt-Brown, Susan Biniaz, Robert 0. Blake, Daniel D. Bradlow, Richard 0. Brooks, Jutta Brunn6e, Wolfgang E. Burhenne, Charles E. Di Leva, Jeffrey L. Dunoff, Daniel C. Esty, David S. Favre, J. William Futrell, Sanford Gaines, Michael Grubb, Lakshman Guruswamy, Christopher Herman, David R. Hodas, Harald Hohmann, Robert F. Housman, Ellen S. Kern, Norman J. King, Jeffrey D. Kovar, Winfried Lang, Stephen C. McCaffrey, Linda A. Malone, Joan Martin-Brown, Sean D. Murphy, Paul Orbuch, Marc Pallemaerts, Gareth Porter, Walter Reid, Naomi Roht-Arria- za, Armin Rosencranz, Peter H. Sand, Wick Schrage, Philippe Sands, Thomas J. Schoen- baum, William J. Snape, III, Maurice F. Strong, Patrick J. Szdll, Barbara Stark, Richard G. Tarasofsky, Konrad von Moltke, Michael P. Walls, and William P. Weiner. Mary M. Brandt and Thomas W. France provided additional advice and assistance. The responsibility for all views expressed in the Article, however, is the author's own. 599

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