Book Review: Environmental Liability and Ecological Damage in European Private Law (The Common Core of European Private Law Series)
| DOI | 10.1177/1023263X1001700408 |
| Date | 01 December 2010 |
| Published date | 01 December 2010 |
| Author | Emanuela Orlando |
| Subject Matter | Book Review |
Book Reviews
464 17 MJ 4 (2010)
breadth of subject s considered, will be of major interest to scholars and students of EU
law alike.
Elaine Fahey
European University Instit ute, Florence
Monika Hinteregger (ed.), Environmental Liability and Ecological Damage in European
Private Law (e Common Core of European Private Law Series), Cambridge University
Press, 2008 , 691 pp., hardback
§1. INTRODUCTION
Over the last two decades, the intensicat ion of environmental risks a nd the increasing
occurrences of environmental harm have prompted t he need to reassess the role of tort
law in the protection of the envi ronment and to elaborate new concept ual approaches
to the liabi lity topic. From an internat ional law standpoint, the attention focused
particul arly on the need to dene uniform legal frameworks of liability and compensation
for environmental dama ge, specically for the case s of cross-border pollution involving
two or more jurisdict ions. With this respect, several international conventions have been
adopted with respe ct to specic sectors of ha zardous activities; t hey aim at establishi ng
common provi sions on substa ntive and jurisdictional aspects ar ising in transnational
environmental liabil ity claims.
In the European Union, the harmonization of environmenta l liability regimes across
the dierent Member States has been at the centre of lively debates i n academic research
and at the policy-making level.1 Recent legislat ive developments show that this issue
tends to be increasingly addressed at the crossroads b etween private and public law
approaches. On the one hand, the EU Re gulation No. 44 /2001 on Jurisdict ion and the
Recognition and Enforcement of Judgments in Civ il and Commercial matters2 and the
EU Re gulation No. 864/2007 on the Law applicable to Non Contractual Obligations3
dene common cr iteria to determine the competent jurisdiction and t he law applicable
to cross-border claims, including liability claims arising in the environmental eld.
1 See among others, Bianchi, ‘e Harmon ization of Laws on Environmental Liabilit y for Environmental
Damage in Europe: an Ital ian Perspect ive’, 6 Journa l of Enviro nmental Law 1 (1994), p. 21–42; more
recently, see de Smedt, ‘Should Europe Harmonise Environmental Liabilit y Legislation?’ Environmental
Liability (2001), p. 217–237; by the same author see als o ‘Is Harmonisat ion of Environment al Liabilit y
Rules Needed in a n Enlarged Europea n Union?’, 13 RECIEL 2 (2004), p. 164–174.
2 Council Regulation (EC) No. 44 /2001 of 22 December 20 00 on ju risdiction and the recognition a nd
enforcement of judgments i n civil and commerc ial matters, [2001] OJ L 12/1.
3 Regulation (EC) No. 864/2007 of t he European Parl iament and the Cou ncil of 11 July 2007 on the law
applicable to non-contr actual obligat ions (Rome II), [2007] OJ L 199/40.
To continue reading
Request your trial