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Open research questions in Environmental law and policy

39 unresolved questions extracted from the limitations and future-work sections of 2,095 Environmental law and policy papers in our library. Each links back to the study that raised it.

What the literature leaves open

  • 565 566 The Court notes that the protection of the interests of future generations is not limited to the environmental sphere, because it also encompasses other human rights such as to food and culture and the rights of Indigenous Peoples.

    From ‘well below 2°C’ to 1.5°C: The ICJ Advisory Opinion on Obligations of States in respect of Climate Change · 2026 · DOI

  • Judicial Methodology Reforms should be able to issue binding compliance orders and require restoration of damaged environments where harm has already occurred.40 or review projects with The courts in Uganda should adopt a more structured way of reviewing disputes between development and environmental protection. This does not require abandoning Article 39 of the Constitution, but it does require a clearer method when courts are asked to potential approve environmental impact. A practical approach would be a three-step inquiry in development cases. First, courts should ask whether the project serves a legitimate public purpose such as energy supply, infrastructure or economic development. Second, courts should examine whether the environmental harm could reasonably be avoided or reduced through alternative measures or improved project design. Third, courts should assess whether the environmental harm is still justified when weighed against the expected public benefit. This would make judicial reasoning more consistent and reduce reliance on broad references to national interest without detailed justification.

    Judicial Balancing of Environmental Rights and Economic Development: A Comparative Analysis of Uganda and the European Court of Human Rights Interventions · 2026 · DOI

  • Finally, it concludes that although there is no tangible certain legal basis to apply such a concept under current il other than the terms of indigenous rights; developments in recent decades show that, ea debate, testing the boundaries of law, might truly have the potential to the development of literature beyond the anthropocentric paradigms; but also underlines the need for further work on its potential legal framework under il .

    Environmental Autonomy · 2023 · DOI

  • The literature analysis has shown that studies on climate justice in Latin America are still scarce and present, mainly, a critical theory conception pointing towards capitalism and colonialism as the cause of climate problems, as well as the need for equitable distribution in terms of climate change.

    Is the Brazilian National Climate Change Adaptation Plan Addressing Inequality? Climate and Environmental Justice in a Global South Perspective · 2020 · DOI

  • The Broken World I am especially interested in the philosophical implications of the possibility that dangerous human-induced climate change may produce a broken world, where resources are insufficient to meet everyone's basic needs, where a chaotic climate makes life precarious, where each generation is worse-off than the last, and where our affluent way of life is no longer an option.

    The Future of Utilitarianism · 2011 · DOI

  • We argue that further investigation of institutional designs that grant climate policy management greater independence would be valuable in terms of increased stability and predictability.

    Climate acts vs central bank acts – the power of arm’s length distance · 2026 · DOI

  • In addition, the definition of „collective interest” is ambiguous, and the procedural legitimacy is limited to a few entities, not including environmental protection organizations or independent research institutes.

    CONSUMER RIGHTS IN THE REPUBLIC OF MOLDOVA IN THE CONTEXT OF THE TRANSITION TO A CIRCULAR ECONOMY: INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACHES FROM ENVIRONMENTAL, CIVIL AND EUROPEAN LAW · 2026 · DOI

  • It found that the extant climate change laws are insufficient and neither gendered nor related to violence, leaving the courts to purposively connect the dots.

    Climate Justice on Trial: Role of Nigerian Courts in Connecting the Dots between Climate Change and Violence against Women · 2025 · DOI

  • The paper argues that the United States’ early explorations of climate change policy during the 1970s were foundational yet largely underrecognized, particularly through the Subcommittee on Climate Change, which significantly laid the groundwork for later climate policies.

    Before the IPCC: American explorations of climate change policy during the 1970s <sup>1</sup> · 2025 · DOI

  • Abstract Although the value of climate science in the courtroom is widely acknowledged, few studies have evaluated how judges achieve a scientifically sound grounding for their rulings.

    A comparative study of the judicial construction of scientific credibility in climate litigation · 2024 · DOI

  • However, a sovereignty‐based justification fails to recognise the international obligation of climate action and is insufficient for reconciling the conflict.

    A quasi‐normative conflict: Resolving the tension between investment treaties and climate action · 2024 · DOI

  • While larger populations generally lead to higher greenhouse gas emissions, I argue that reducing population growth is insufficient as a standalone climate strategy due to demographic momentum, and because it disregards existing disparities and structural inequalities.

    Re-examining the role of population policies in climate action · 2024 · DOI

  • Abstract This article argues that the current approach of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) to evaluating scientific evidence is lacking and hampers its ability to properly handle cases involving questions of science, and particularly environmental cases which are replete with them.

    THE USE OF SCIENTIFIC EXPERTS IN ENVIRONMENTAL CASES BEFORE THE EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS · 2024 · DOI

  • Scholars have argued that the finance for loss and damage should be based upon the principle of reparations, but there is very limited research exploring how a reparations scheme should work.

    Reparations For Climate Harm and The Role of The Loss and Damage Mechanism: Lessons from Other Areas of Law · 2023 · DOI

  • Theory-led bioethical analyses of the scope and weight of physicians' normative duty towards climate protection and its conflict with individual patient care are currently scarce.

    Physicians’ duty to climate protection as an expression of their professional identity: a defence from Korsgaard’s neo-Kantian moral framework · 2023 · DOI

  • This article explains how these goals can affect the design and appraisal of participatory processes and highlights the under-recognised value of law in determining the objectives of public participation in international environmental forums.

    OBJECTIVES OF PUBLIC PARTICIPATION IN INTERNATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL DECISION-MAKING · 2023 · DOI

  • As companies are (perhaps) no longer limited to the pursuit of profit, they could act to protect the environment, or at the very least, not contribute to its destruction or to global warming.

    IS THE ENVIRONMENT A FACTOR IN THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE COLLECTIVE INTEREST IN LABOUR LAW? · 2023 · DOI

  • To date, the uneasy relationship between sustainable development and animal welfare remains remarkably underexplored, and legal research investigating the interdependence of sustainable development and animal welfare is almost non‐existent.

    Bringing animal welfare under the umbrella of sustainable development: A legal analysis · 2021 · DOI

  • COP25 also failed with a lack of consensus amongst post-2020 tasks such as art 6.

    The Development of a Quasi-Loss and Damage Compensatory System for Developing Countries through Climate Litigation · 2020 · DOI

  • The scope and scale of solar geoengineering, the diverse concerns it raises, and the lack of consensus surrounding it pose particular challenges for justice.

    Geoengineering Justice: The Role of Recognition · 2018 · DOI

  • The article concludes by calling for further investigation of the multivalence of climate justice and of how climate justice might be spatially represented to advance its leverage in political debates on climate policy.

    Spatializing Climate Justice: Justice Claim Making and Carbon Pricing Controversies in Australia · 2017 · DOI

  • The ideal of mutual recognition provides a basis for environmental protections, including but not limited to the global atmosphere as a necessary condition for the realization of self-autonomy for all human kind.

    Global Climate Change Justice: From Rawls’ Law of Peoples to Honneth’s Conditions of Freedom · 2015 · DOI

  • In particular, it argues against the excusable ignorance objection, which holds that historical emissions produced at a time when our knowledge of climate change was insufficient ought to be removed from the equation when applying rectificatory principles to this context.

    Compensation for Historical Emissions and Excusable Ignorance · 2014 · DOI

  • If, on this wider definition, our resources are insufficient to meet all our needs, if we must choose between present and future needs, then our world is already broken.

    The Future of Utilitarianism · 2011 · DOI

  • The emergence of the global administrative sector and its new forms of knowledge production, expert rationality, and standardization, remains an understudied topic in science studies.

    Science and Power in Global Food Regulation: The Rise of the Codex Alimentarius · 2009 · DOI

Most-cited papers in Environmental law and policy

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39 open questions have been extracted from the limitations and future-work passages of 2,095 Environmental law and policy papers in our library. Each one below links back to the study that raised it, so you can read the original claim in context.

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