Māris kļaviņŠ, azamat azizov, JĀnis zaļoksnis environment, pollution, development: the case of uzbekistan

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 11.1. 
 Legislation of environmental protection
The terms ‘environ mental law’ and ‘environ mental legislation’ 
are used for denoting the measures of environ mental legal protection.
Environ mental law means a body of legislative provisions, regu-
lating the public rules of conduct in the area of environ mental pro-
tection. Environ mental law is a relatively new and complex area of 
public law, which includes such legal provisions of constitutional law, 
administrative law, criminal law and administrative procedure law 
that aim to ensure and promote environ mental protection. Environ-
mental law belongs to public law, which means that, to protect the 
environ ment, the state prescribes for the public certain requirements 
that must be followed. If a person fails to comply with these require-
ments, the state may use coercive measures against such a person, 
imposing a corresponding penalty or ordering to eliminate the ad-
verse effects on the environ ment resulting from the violation.
What are the rules of conduct contained in legal provisions can 
be ascertained through studying the sources of law. Environ mental 
law consists of several types of legal sources, representing the writ-
ten law (legislation) and the unwritten law (general legal principles 
and customary law). In addition, the sources of environ mental law 
can be divided into the basic sources (laws) and ancillary sources 
(case law or the rights of judges and jurisprudence – legal science or 
jurists’ law).
The main source of environ mental law is the law (external le gal 
provisions), viz. the written sources of law, which include ge ne rally 
binding rules of conduct. The generally binding legal pro vi sions 
comprise laws adopted by parliament, regulations issued by govern-
ment and binding rules issued by local authorities. Further more, EU 
legislation – including regulations, directives and decisions – is bind-
ing to the European Union Member States. EU en vi ron mental legis-
lation is developed mainly in the form of direc tives that the Member 
States must then integrate into their national law.
National environ mental legal protection is also based on in ter-
national legislation. For the most part, they are international agree-
ments (conventions, protocols) to which the Member State is a party.