International Environmental Law

Nowadays, environmental issues such as ozone depletion, climate change, water shortages and water pollution, soil degradation, and loss of biodiversity have become a matter of concern not only for individuals or states, but for the international community as a whole. In view of this, over the past decades, states have concluded or are in the process of concluding hundreds of international agreements aimed at overcoming certain environmental problems at the local, national, regional and global levels. Thus, international environmental law (IEL) has emerged as a new branch of international law, which, however, is already quite complex and extensive. It covers thousands of norms consolidated in hundreds of international legal documents. Their purpose is to ensure the protection of the living and non-living components of the Earth’s environment, as well as ecological processes on the planet. The International Environmental Law course aims to form a comprehensive vision of the relationship between the issues of conservation, use and reproduction of the global environment and its components and international law. The state of international organizations, legal documents and policies in this area will be analyzed in this course. In particular, the theoretical foundations of the IEL, the process of its formation, subjects, sources, principles, mechanism of implementation, compliance and dispute resolution will be considered. The course will also explore the relationship between environmental issues and international economic activity, management of common resources and armed conflicts. The IEL course is useful for the practical purposes of analyzing international law, improving decision-making in the field of environment and its alignment with international legal instruments, and access to international programs and organizations.