环境公益诉权法权结构的回溯与厘界

Retrospection and Delimitation of the Jurisdictional Structureof Environmental Public Interest Litigation Rights

环境公益诉权作为环境公益诉讼的核心与基础,是实体性环境权能否实现的程序性保障。实践中,环境公益诉权研究在促进环境公益诉讼理论的创新与重构、环境纠纷解决机制完善与超越的现实价值被低估。重新对环境公益诉权法权基础“元问题”进行回溯与追问,重新厘界环境公益诉权的法权向度,并由此对环境公益诉讼目标实现和环境权益维护确立新的价值与目标,成为完善环境公益诉讼制度的重要前提和保障。

Environmental public interest litigation(EPIL)right is the legitimate right for citizens,legal persons and other organizations to bring public interest litigation,to defend the public interest of society and the health and integrity of the environment,when their environmental rights and interests are violated.As the cornerstone of EPIL,it determines whether substantive environmental rights could get an effective procedural guarantee.The legal attributes of EPIL right are uncertain,and the environmental rights recognized in the constitution and the law remain mere theoretically arbitrary standards of interpretation.In practice,the actual value of the EPIL right research in promoting the innovation,reinvention of EPIL theory,and the improvement and transcendence of environmental dispute resolution mechanism,has been substantially underestimated.From the perspective of environmental law,the study of EPIL not only enriches and expands the theoretical system of environmental law and provides support for the formulation and implementation of the environmental legal system but also clarifies the principles,purposes and functions of public interest litigation.In addition,it also helps to strengthen the concept of rights and interests protection and enhance public awareness of the protection of the environment,rights,and interests.From the perspective of environmental litigation practice,the study of EPIL can confirm its central position in environmental protection and provide a theoretical basis for guaranteeing legal environmental rights and interests.EPIL right is a new type of right to sue based on the concept of litigation right,which is characterized by the diversity of subjects and the specificity of objects. It takes both the featuresof the universality and the uniqueness as a right to sue. Its core purpose is to ensurethe sustainable use of the environment and the well-being of humankind. Multiplefactors, including the Industrial Revolution, socialism, the concept of the welfare state,and the notion of human rights have historically influenced the establishment of thisright. Closely linked to the rise of third-generation human rights, the establishmentof environmental human rights has provided a jurisprudential basis for the practiceof EPIL right at the level of international law. Although there are differences amongcountries regarding the provisions of EPIL right in their constitutions and laws, itswidespread establishment undoubtedly reflects the importance that the internationalcommunity attaches to the environment and human rights. In order to improve the EPILsystem, we need to go back and explore in depth the legal basis of EPIL right, redefinethe boundaries of its rights and interests, and establish new values and goals for thedefense of environmental rights and interests. The right to sue for environmental publicinterest is the outcome of legal progress and the development of social rights, which isdeeply rooted in the value of human rights, and has been emphasized and establishedin the constitutions and environmental laws both at an international and national level,which has advocated new thinking and value orientation to EPIL. It not only extendsand deepens the theory of traditional litigation rights, but also provides theoreticalsupport for improving the EPIL system in the context of environmental human rightsprotection. Digging deeper into the connotation and structure of EPIL can provide notonly a new perspective to explore the nature of EPIL, but also academic insight intothe value basis of its institutional framework;at the same time, attaching significanceto its human rights value can better respond to the various challenges in environmentallitigation practices, and facilitate environmental human rights being truly embodied injudicial practices.