Environmental Law: Understanding the Inter-Relation between Human Rights and the Environment

Running head: ENVIRONMENTAL LAW
Environmental law
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1ENVIRONMENTAL LAW
INTRODUCTION
Environmental law deals with pollutions related to soil, land, air and water and issues
related to depletion of natural resources, global warming and so on and so forth. Environmental
law is a group of treaties, statutes, policies that study the environment and the inter-relation
between human and the nature. These encompass local, national and international regulations to
understand the effect of humans on the non human world. Preserving the nature and the
environment must be the most important task of humans because it is an essentiality. The aim of
the environmental law is to ensure that the pollution is kept under check, if there is preservation
if natural resources and the Government take steps to reduce pollution in all its forms.
ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARD
Environmental pollution is a growing concern claiming lives all across the globe. In the
recent years, lives have been lost due to environmental pollution, natural resources have
depleted, not only humans but animals have fallen prey to environmental degradation1. The
United Nations Environment Programme has detected that more than 2 million deaths occur due
to pollution2. Men, being a social animal, are linked to the society in ways more than one and as
a result, the entire system is interconnected. Natural disasters are on the rise like deforestation,
forest fire which affect the livelihood of indigenous people because they have no other means of
income and if their source is gone, they will die of unemployment3.
1 Plater, Zygmunt JB, et al. Environmental law and policy: Nature, law, and society. Wolters Kluwer Law &
Business, 2016.
2 Angell, Philip, Gregory Mock, and Jen Lesar. "United Nations Environment Programme." (2014).
3 Cullet, Philippe. Differential treatment in international environmental law. Routledge, 2017.

2ENVIRONMENTAL LAW
With growing pollution, weather change has become erratic and with extreme weather
change comes the rise of health risks arising from life threatening diseases like malaria, dengue
which are contagious and posing high health risks. Most of the air and water borne diseases have
exponentially exacerbating because health conditions are degrading rapidly. Human health is at
the receiving end of these extreme climate changes4. Environment has a huge role to play in the
well being of humans. Environment is all encompassing and if not taken seriously can cause far
reaching havoc. Environment has to be seen as an important aspect of human rights, though this
has been widely debated. Most countries do not lay emphasis on the importance of environment
and the interrelation between environment and human rights. Human rights are inalienable rights
which are essential to every human being and are considered the most basic and innate rights.
Every human has a right to safe, healthy and disease free environment. The right to provide a
safe and ecologically balanced environment should be human rights as these are basic rights5.
The United Nations through the Rio Declaration and the Stockholm Declaration have
tried to bridge the gap between human rights and environmental law6. In the very early stages of
the United Nations’ attempt to deal with human rights issues and understanding human rights in
the light of dignity, the Stockholm Declaration has played a big role.
Stockholm Declaration 1972 has created various legal instruments and frameworks to
battle environmental degradation. It was the first declaration of its kind that linked human rights
with health and environmental protection. It recognized for the first time that every man should
live in an environment which is adequate for his well being and health. It recognized “ human
rights to understand that man has the fundamental right to freedom, equality and adequate
4 Gillespie, Alexander. International environmental law, policy, and ethics. OUP Oxford, 2014.
5 Werksman, Jacob, James Cameron, and Peter Roderick, eds. Improving compliance with international
environmental law. Routledge, 2014.
6 Viñuales, Jorge E., ed. The Rio declaration on environment and development: a commentary. OUP Oxford, 2015.

3ENVIRONMENTAL LAW
conditions of life, in an environment of a quality that permits a life of dignity and well-being”.
The Declaration aimed at achieving a healthy environment. There are a thousand environmental
conditions that impede the healthy living in an environment and if not checked can cause hazard
to the well-being of humans around them. This Declaration along with regional and local laws
have the same end result and goal-to achieve sustainable development and make environmental
law a part of human rights.
Environmental concerns have gathered significant momentum in the last few years and
have got alarming reviews from governmental, non-governmental agencies, academicians, policy
makers who have expressed their concern over the growing environmental pollution that is
plaguing us. The current situation calls for immediate international law protection which shall be
buttressed by laws and policies. The relation between environment and human rights are
mutually inclusive because one cannot be understood without the other. The clear conclusion to
the relation inter-relation between human rights and environment can have only one answer-
these are so intrinsically linked that it can be said that humans have the basic right to a clean and
healthy environment. Though this concept has been severely advocated by scholars and
academicians but when it comes to legal recognition, there has not been too much legal status
that has been granted. Understanding environmental law in the light of international law has not
garnered much attention but preliminary understanding of human rights lead to the conclusion
that it has started to gain recognition in customary international law. There needs to be legal
recognition of environment and analysis of legal status granted to agencies that deal with
environment.