Implementace a prosazování norem mezinárodního práva a práva Evropských společenství v oblasti ochrany životního prostředí
Authors: Smolek Martin 
Published: February 2025

The study “Implementation and Enforcement of the International and Community Environmental Law” deals with one of the most important and current issue of the recent international as well as EC environmental law, which is the proper implementation and enforcement of their rules in order to safeguard their proper functioning. The issue of implementation and enforcement of supranational environmental norms, which became particularly important with the large increase of the environmental treaties and Community directives and regulations in the field of environment after 1972, has been considered as a relatively separate matter of both legal systems concerned. Both the international as well as the EC environmental law have been facing for a Jong time the problem of huge implementation deficit arising from a number of reasons, which compile the enforcement difficulties of environmental and supranational rules. Among the considerable ones was the lack of proper capacity building, finances and infrastructure, the non-sufficient control mechanisms, the non-existence of strong vested groups etc. The study consists of four chapters: the first one is an introduction into the whole subject, including the definition of the crucial terms “implementation” and “enforcement”, the description of the basic elements of the issue and the principles relating to it. Further, there is also a short history of the evolution of the problematic in the international and Community context. The second and third chapters constitute the core of the work. The second chapter deals with the implementation of the environmental rules on both levels. It describes the two main elements of the implementation of supranational legal norms, which are the legislative implementation and the practical application. Further, it includes also the issue of implementation support, which became one of the most important elements of the implementation of the supranational environmental rules. In a separate section it mentions also the handling of the information in the implementation process. The third chapter covers the issue of enforcement of the international and EC legal norms in the field of environment. In the opinion of the author, the enforcement of the supranational environmental rules has been recently based much more on the “alternative” mechanisms of international control and non-compliance procedure than on the traditional state liability and sanctions. Particular attention is given within this chapter to the possibility of using of on-site inspections for the verification of the supranational norms for the protection of the environment. For this purpose, a comparison between the current stage of on-site inspections mechanisms in the non-proliferation and demilitarisation treaties and in the international and EC environmental law has been made. It has been shown that the on-site verification of the fulfilment of the treaty obligations creates a very effective enforcement tool of the supranational rules, however the necessary condition for its proper functioning are quite detailed procedural rules. The last chapter describes the main actors dealing with the issue of implementation and enforcement of both legal systems concerned. The current treaty bodies have been identified as a good institutional basis, but at the same time, a need for their wider power and cooperation in the verification and enforcement activities has been found.