Environmental Law Commons^™

Charting Extraterritoriality: Jurisdiction, Corporate Conduct, And Environmental Harm, Kalika Mehta

National Law School of India Review

Chimni’s TWAIL critique of the principle of jurisdiction, the subject of this symposium, implicates its development with the evolution of capitalism. Against this backdrop, this paper uniquely focuses on international criminal law and the selective application of principle of extraterritorial jurisdiction, particularly its exclusion of corporate entities from prosecution for large-scale violence. Through an analysis that engages with Chimni’s critique, the paper illustrates how these extraterritorial prosecutions align with the mainstream liberal theory of jurisdiction, while also exposing gaps in corporate accountability. Further, the paper contributes to ongoing legal reform debates by exploring the proposed international crime of ecocide, a …

Satellites Crash, Laws Clash: A Legal Framework For The Imminent Space Debris Catastrophe, Michael Conklin

Catholic University Journal of Law and Technology

No abstract provided.

“A Hot Day In Iqaluit”? Environmental Rights In Canada’S Constitutional Cul-De-Sac, Stepan Wood

All Faculty Publications

Proposals to include an explicit right to a healthy environment in Canada’s constitution have been advanced since the early 1970s, but Canada is stuck in a decades-long impasse that precludes substantial constitutional amendment. This article uses the metaphor of the cul-de-sac to explore the prospects for legal recognition of environmental rights in this situation. It canvasses past efforts to entrench general and Indigenous environmental rights in Canada’s constitution, introduces culs-de-sac metaphorical and real, and highlights the irony of one commentator’s 2005 quip that it will be “a hot day in Iqaluit” when Canada’s constitution undergoes significant amendment. It then surveys …

Managing Hazardous Waste Pharmaceuticals In Healthcare: A Perplexing Prescription, Garrison Rosser

Kentucky Journal of Equine, Agriculture, & Natural Resources Law

No abstract provided.

Pollution Discrimination: The Epa’S Utilization Of Title Vi Of The Civil Rights Act To Bring Justice To Overburdened African American Communities, Lindsay Bates

Kentucky Journal of Equine, Agriculture, & Natural Resources Law

No abstract provided.

Conservation As Multiple Use, Sandra B. Zellmer

Faculty Law Review Articles

The world is facing unprecedented species extinctions, wrought in large part by climate change. Slashing greenhouse gas emissions is one crucial response to the climate/biodiversity crisis. The conservation of intact ecosystems and the life-sustaining services they provide is another. This goal will be beyond reach if conservation commitments do not cover federal public lands, particularly multiple use lands.

The Bureau of Land Management (“BLM”) has recently proposed a pathbreaking new rule that explicitly defines conservation as a multiple use. In doing so, the Conservation and Landscape Health Public Lands Rule (“Conservation Rule”) puts conservation on par with other statutorily listed …

Enforcing International Human Rights Law Against Corporations, Barnali Choudhury

All Papers

International human rights law is generally thought to apply directly to states, not to corporations since the latter is not a subject of international law. Some domestic courts are, however, enforcing these norms against corporations in domestic settings. Canadian courts have, for instance, recognized that corporations can be liable for breach of customary international law norms while UK courts have enforced international human rights norms indirectly against corporations relying on a combination of domestic corporate and tort law.

At the same time, some states are choosing to enforce international human rights norms against corporations using regulatory initiatives. These initiatives, known …

The Need For Corporate Guardrails In U.S. Industrial Policy, Lenore Palladino

Seattle University Law Review

U.S. politicians are actively “marketcrafting”: the passage of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the CHIPS and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act collectively mark a new moment of robust industrial policy. However, these policies are necessarily layered on top of decades of shareholder primacy in corporate governance, in which corporate and financial leaders have prioritized using corporate profits to increase the wealth of shareholders. The Administration and Congress have an opportunity to use industrial policy to encourage a broader reorientation of U.S. businesses away from extractive shareholder primacy and toward innovation and productivity. This Article examines discrete opportunities within the …

Securities Regulation And Administrative Deference In The Roberts Court, Eric C. Chaffee

Seattle University Law Review

In A History of Securities Law in the Supreme Court, A.C. Pritchard and Robert B. Thompson write, “Securities law offers an illuminating window into the Supreme Court’s administrative law jurisprudence over the last century. The securities cases provide one of the most accessible illustrations of key transitions of American law.” A main reason for this is that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is a bellwether among administrative agencies, and as a result, A History of Securities Law in the Supreme Court is a history of administrative law in the Supreme Court of the United States as well.

Delegated Corporate Voting And The Deliberative Franchise, Sarah C. Haan

Seattle University Law Review

Starting in the 1930s with the earliest version of the proxy rules, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has gradually increased the proportion of “instructed” votes on the shareholder’s proxy card until, for the first time in 2022, it required a fully instructed proxy card. This evolution effectively shifted the exercise of the shareholder’s vote from the shareholders’ meeting to the vote delegation that occurs when the share-holder fills out the proxy card. The point in the electoral process when the binding voting choice is communicated is now the execution of the proxy card (assuming the shareholder completes the card …

Capitalism Stakeholderism, Christina Parajon Skinner

Seattle University Law Review

Today’s corporate governance debates are replete with discussion of how best to operationalize so-called stakeholder capitalism—that is, a version of capitalism that considers the interests of employees, communities, suppliers, and the environment alongside (if not before) a company’s shareholders. So much focus has been dedicated to the question of capitalism’s reform that few have questioned a key underlying premise of stakeholder capitalism: that is, that competitive capitalism does not serve these various constituencies and groups. This Essay presents a different view and argues that capitalism is, in fact, the ultimate form of stakeholderism. As such, the Essay urges that the …

The Esg Information System, Stavros Gadinis, Amelia Miazad

Seattle University Law Review

The mounting focus on ESG has forced internal corporate decision-making into the spotlight. Investors are eager to support companies in innovative “green” technologies and scrutinize companies’ transition plans. Activists are targeting boards whose decisions appear too timid or insufficiently explained. Consumers and employees are incorporating companies sustainability credentials in their purchasing and employment decisions. These actors are asking companies for better information, higher quality reports, and granular data. In response, companies are producing lengthy sustainability reports, adopting ambitious purpose statements, and touting their sustainability credentials. Understandably, concerns about greenwashing and accountability abound, and policymakers are preparing for action.

In this …

Table Of Contents, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

The Marijuana Insurgency: Federalism And Social Reframing In Policy Reform, Matthew P. Cavedon

Seattle University Law Review

After fifty years of federal prohibition, marijuana reform efforts have won political and legal success. These victories hold lessons for anyone seeking to resist federal law without being able to directly affect it.

Victory can come from reframing an issue. For marijuana reform, social reframing—not formal legal analysis or material factors—provides the best explanation for how advocates achieved change. Their unconventional political tactics, akin to those used by insurgents in wartime, undercut federal prohibition by winning hearts and minds.

This is an analysis of the sociology of legal change. It is also the story of how ordinary Americans retook personal …

Saving Species Or Sacrificing Science?: Navigating The Legal Labyrinth Of Research And Conservation Through The Case Of The Long-Tailed Macaque, Maliat Chowdhury

Animal Law Review

For decades, long-tailed macaques have served an instrumental role in advancing biomedical research. However, due to the recent primate shortage in U.S. laboratories, these macaques have become coveted targets for poachers. In 2022, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) elevated the long-tailed macaque’s threat level from “Vulnerable” to “Endangered,” citing research-related capture as a critical factor contributing to their decline. Under this new status, long-tailed macaques are at risk of being categorized under Appendix I of CITES, a designation that will subject them to stricter trade regulations. Alarmed by the potential obstacles this reclassification may pose to scientific …

Force Majeure And The Law Of The Colorado River: The Confluence Of Climate Change, Contracts, And The Constitution, Mary Slosson

University of Colorado Law Review

Climate change is causing significant, permanent changes to the natural world. In the Colorado River Basin, experts forecast that rising temperatures will cause the spread of a drier, more arid climate across the region. The effects of this desertification are already being felt: less rainfall, the loss of deciduous forests, wildfires that engulf urban areas, and a projected 20 to 30 percent reduction in flows on the Colorado River by mid-century. The net effect is an existential crisis for the forty million people that reside in the Colorado River’s watershed. Mitigating the effects of climate change requires swift action. However, …

The Voluntary Carbon Market: Market Failures And Policy Implications, Vittoria Battocletti, Luca Enriques, Alessandro Romano

University of Colorado Law Review

Many companies have made environmental pledges and launched products that claim to be carbon neutral. In most of these instances, corporations rely on carbon offsets. In this Article, we investigate the functioning of the market on which these offsets are created and exchanged, namely the voluntary carbon market, and look into the question of whether and, if so, how it should be subject to regulation. We start by shedding light on the mechanics of this market and then explain why a well-functioning voluntary carbon market is necessary to fight global warming and can also help developing countries build less carbon-intensive …

Applying The Public Trust Doctrine To Local Governments, Talia O. Thuet

Lewis & Clark Law Review

Under the public trust doctrine, the government holds public lands in trust for the public and cannot unreasonably restrict citizens from accessing them or otherwise breach its duties as a trustee. The public trust doctrine is often thought of as a state law doctrine. However, local governments own a significant portion of public land. Some local governments argue that the public trust doctrine does not apply to them because the state is the proper trustee under the public trust doctrine. This Comment argues that the public trust doctrine applies to local governments. State law preempts local government law on matters …

The Misleading Successes Of Cost-Benefit Analysis In Environmental Policy, David E. Adelman, Amy Sinden

Michigan Journal of Environmental & Administrative Law

This Article critically examines the rise of cost-benefit analysis (CBA) in environmental policy and the profound disconnect that has persisted between the actual practice of CBA and its normative grounding. Although CBA is now synonymous with rational decision-making in federal agencies, this has not always been the case. Views about CBA have evolved from bipartisan rejection in the 1970s, to partisan division (Republicans for, Democrats against) during the Reagan-Bush years, to a broad embrace of CBA in the mid-1990s, when centrist legal scholars were instrumental in crafting a new defense of CBA based on a mix of welfare economics and …

The Clean Water Act’S Nurdle-Shaped Gap: Using The Cwa To Address Primary Microplastic Pollution, Taylor Hopkins

Michigan Journal of Environmental & Administrative Law

The term “nurdles” may sound like a silly made-up word lifted from the pages of a children’s book, but unfortunately nurdles are all-too real, with trillions of these microplastics ending up in our oceans each year. Nurdles spill into the environment at every step along their supply chain, allowing them to end up in fish and on our plates. Despite the known danger nurdles pose to both wildlife and humans, they are virtually unregulated. In the absence of regulation by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), some states and their citizens have begun trying to wrangle rogue nurdles, and hold nurdle …