1. The Environmental, Democratic, and Rule-of-Law Implications of Harper's Environmental Assessment Legacy.
- Author
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Stacey, Jocelyn
- Subjects
- *
ENVIRONMENTAL impact analysis , *DECISION making in environmental policy , *ENVIRONMENTAL law , *ENVIRONMENTAL protection , *ENVIRONMENTAL risk assessment - Abstract
The article argues that Harper's dramatic changes to federal environmental assessment give rise to a two-dimensional legacy in environmental law: first, a legacy of impoverished environmental decision-making that reflects a narrow, resource-oriented vision of the environment, and second, a legacy of undermining democratic and rule-of-law values in environmental law. The crux of this latter legacy is the argumentthat environmental assessment law provides an essential framework for publicly-justified decision-making in the Canadian environmental context. Indeed, as I suggest in this article, environmental assessment presently performs a quasi-constitutional role in Canadian environmental decision-making in the sense that it is constitutive of legality; that is, it provides the means by which the federal government fulfills its obligation to govern the environment in accordance with the rule of law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2016