This shift is conducive to somewhat more sensible and efficient regulation. Moreover, it has had a profound effect on the substance and tone of the environmental policy debate. It is, above all, an ideology that sees the world as infinitely complex, interdependent, and fragile. This ecological paradigm pushes toward a coherent, though perverse, view of the legal world. Accordingly, environmentalism views property rights as anachronistic privileges that cannot be maintained in the face of the common imperative of protecting an imperiled planet.
Environmentalism eliminates such rights as a constitutional category.
The logic of universal interconnectedness also shapes environmentalism's view of who should get access to the courts. Traditionally, a plaintiff had to show some tangible harm to himself to be entitled to a judicial ruling on the merits of his case. This standing requirement serves to prevent mere bystanders or ideologues from interfering with private transactions or public policies in which they have no actual stake. Environmentalism rejects harm-based standing rules. In a world of omnipresent externalities where there are no unaffected bystanders, what you do with your property is not your business alone but mine also.