The Role of Legal Principles for Environmental Management

The present contribution begins by defining the category of the legal principles as a specific source of international law, highlighting the differences between them and the other two main sources of international law namely treaties and customary law provisions. Then, the most relevant environmental legal principles are presented, with reference to the major developments which marked the evolution of international environmental law in the last thirty years. Principles such as principle 21, the precautionary principle and the principle of co-operation are examined in this context. A specific focus is then put on the most important contemporary environmental principle, namely the principle of sustainable development, whose origins and main constitutive elements are presented, followed by an analysis of the most notable international treaties as well as decisions of international courts and tribunals in which such a principle has been taken into account. The contribution ends with an examination of the various functions environmental legal principles may play in international environmental law, which is conducted in order to determine their effective actual and potential contribution to environmental management. © 2008 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.