中美环境立法的政治文化背景比较——以公众环境意识的演进为视角

A Comparison of the Political and Cultural Background of Environmental Legislation between China and the United States∶From the Perspective of the Evolution of Public Environmental Consciousness

通过构建和比较中、美两国公众环境意识演进曲线,展示了1950—2022年这72年里两国环境立法的政治文化背景,提出如下建议:(1)我国立法机关在利用包括环评制度在内的环境保护法律制度解决第一代环境问题的同时,应当放眼于应对和解决第二代环境问题所需的制度设计;(2)中国公众环境意识的演进具有自上而下和自下而上两个方向的驱动,因此我国立法机关应当因势利导,通过完善环境立法和其他环境保护的法律制度为自下而上的公众驱动做出更好的制度安排;(3)中国特色社会主义市场经济的发展和人口经济结构的改善必然引起公众环境意识的进一步提升,因此国家立法机关应当研究如何使环评程序更好地适应这种客观趋势,为公众依法有序参与规划环评和建设项目环评提供更加完善的制度性保障。

By constructing and comparing the evolution curves on public environmental consciousness in China and the United States,this paper presents the political and cultural context of environmental legislation in both countries over the past 72 years(1950—2022).This paper puts forward that:the first,while using legal systems,including the EIA system,to solve the first generation of environmental problems,China’s legislature should focus on the institutional design needed to deal with and solve the second generation of environmental problems;the second,since the evolution of public environmental consciousness in China is driven by both of the top-down and bottom-up directions,China’s legislature should take advantage of the situation and make a better institutional arrangement for the bottom-up drive by the public through improving environmental legislation and other related environmental protection laws;the third,the development of socialist market economy with Chinese characteristics and the improvement of the economic structure of population will cause people to further improve the environment consciousness,so the national legislature should study how to make the EIA process to be better adapted to the objective trend in the society and to provide a more complete institutional safeguards for the orderly public participation in the EIA processes for both the governmental planning and the construction projects.