| dc.description.abstract | The Florence Integration Through Law Series is the product of a research project centered in the Law Department of the European University Institute, and as such it reflects the research interests of the Department: it is a contextual examination of European legal developments in comparative perspective. In the general introduction to the Series (published in Book One of Volume I), we explained fully the philosophy, methodology and scope of the Project. Here we wish merely to recapitulate some of the principal themes of special relevance to this Volume on Environmental Protection. The European Legal Integration Project set out to examine the role of law in, and the legal impact of, integration in Europe, using the United States federal system as a comparative point of reference. The Project was conceived and executed in two parts. In Part One (published in Volume I entitled "Methods, Tools and Institutions") a number of teams of American and European scholars examined a wide range of legal techniques and mechanisms for integration and undertook an overall general analysis of law and integration. The first book of Volume I ("A Political, Legal, and Economic Overview") establishes the comparative and interdisciplinary context, providing background studies on the political, legal and economic implications of integration in Europe and America and including studies on other federal systems (Australia, Canada, Germany and Switzerland) to add comparative perspective. The second book ("Political Organs, Integration Techniques, and Judicial Process") analyzes the pre- and post-normative stages, examining the decision-making and implementation problems, and the role of political and judicial organs therein, and describing the various forms of normative techniques available in a federal or supranational context. The third and final book of Volume I ("Forces and Potential for a European Identity") focusses on how the law can be harnessed to promote the governmental or integrational objectives of union. It isolates for consideration some substantive goals (foreign policy, free movement of goods and persons, human rights protection and legal education), in order to elucidate the ways in which law has been or can be used to promote substantive objectives. This approach is more fully developed in the studies in Part Two of the Project which deals in greater detail with substantive areas of federal/transnational policy an is open-ended. To date, in addition to the present volume on environmental policy, monographs have been planned in the following four areas: consumer protection, harmonization of corporation law and capital markets, energy policy, and regional policy. It is hoped that further studies may be undertaken in the future. | |
