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Full-Text Articles in Water Law
On Integrity: Some Considerations For Water Law, Christine A. Klein
On Integrity: Some Considerations For Water Law, Christine A. Klein
Christine A. Klein
Expanding upon the aspects of integrity protected under the Clean Water Act, this Article will explore the relevance to water law of chemical,physical, ecosystem, social, and ethical integrity. Just as the Clean Water Act intended to prevent unacceptable "perturbations" of ecosystems, so also this Article will consider the extent to which the law itself may work an unacceptable perturbation of fundamental hydrologic and social principles. In many instances, water policy compartmentalizes the law in ways that have little to do with hydrologic reality and in ways that are antithetical to wholeness and integrity. Examples include the legal bifurcation of surface …
Compartmentalized Thinking And The Clean Water Act, Christine A. Klein
Compartmentalized Thinking And The Clean Water Act, Christine A. Klein
Christine A. Klein
Modern water pollution control traces back to the Federal Water Pollution Control Act of 1972 (Clean Water Act or CWA). Like other statutes of its period, the CWA addresses pollution of a single medium, water. Despite its goal of achieving aquatic integrity, the CWA succumbs to what this article refers to as “compartmentalized thinking.” That is, in drafting the CWA, Congress created a series of regulatory boxes that separate water into constituent parts recognized by law, but not by nature. Undertaking a deeper examination of the fragmentation instinct, this article turns to political theory and cognitive psychology for explanations. In …