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/ January 2023
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.34069/AI/2023.61.01.26
How to Cite:
Kryzhevskyi, V., Ripenko, A., Nikitin, V., Kozin, S., & Kuzmenko, D. (2023). Organizing the germans’ emotional world through
the prism of the opposition ORDNUNG vs. CHAOS: Ambivalent emotion concepts. Amazonia Investiga, 12(61), 255-261.
https://doi.org/10.34069/AI/2023.61.01.26
State policy in the sphere of environmental protection: the regulatory
aspect
Державна політика в сфері захисту довкілля: нормативно-правовий аспект
Received: January 28, 2023 Accepted: February 27, 2023
Written by:
Kryzhevskyi Vitalii109
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3747-7833
Ripenko Artem110
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4197-4840
Nikitin Volodymyr111
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6915-6319
Kozin Serhii112
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7640-4579
Kuzmenko Dmytro113
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7437-0122
Abstract
The purpose of the article is to analyze the
normative and legal aspect of public policy in the
field of environmental protection and generalize
the relevant legislative basis. Research results.
The understanding of the concept of “sphere of
the environment” and the content of its legal
regulation are generalized. It is substantiated that
under the European integration, adaptation of
international experience to domestic legal
realities, as well as harmonization of national and
international legislation the development of the
latest forms and methods of environmental
protection is an urgent issue. Practical meaning.
It is noted that there is a critical need to develop
new and improve existing legal acts, taking into
account modern trends, since the war unleashed
by Russia on the territory of Ukraine causes
critical damage to the environment and ecology
of Ukraine, and accordingly, such actions must
be properly qualified. Value/originality. The
perspective of further research is the need to
analyze the methods of protection in the field of
environmental protection, which are defined as
effective tools for the protection of nature from
109
Candidate of Sciences in Public Administration, Doctoral Student of the Department of Public Management and Administration of
the National Academy of Internal Affairs, Ukraine.
110
Doctor of Legal Sciences, Head of the Department of Topical Issues of Philosophy of Law, Legal Linguistics, Postgraduate and
Doctoral studies of the Scientific Institute of Public Law, Ukraine.
111
Doctor of Legal Sciences, Acting Dean of the Law Faculty of the National Aviation University, Ukraine.
112
Doctor of Law, Senior Lecturer at the Department of Theory and History of State and Law of the National University of Life and
Environmental Sciences of Ukraine, Ukraine.
113
Candidate of Legal Sciences, Senior Research Fellow of the Scientific Institute of Public Law, Ukraine.
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harmful effects. Informative and complementary
to research is the question of using international
experience in improving the relevant national
mechanism.
Keywords: environment, European integration,
legal aspect, legal status, law enforcement.
Introduction
The issue of environmental protection is the most
acute problem of the 21st century – both for the
entire international community and for each
country in particular. The global ecological crisis
as a result of many centuries of diverse processes
on a planetary scale has loomed over humanity.
Nowadays, there is not a single sphere important
for the life of mankind that has not been affected
by the destructive influence of the spontaneous
development of civilization – from climate
change and the reduction of the number of animal
and plant species, to the destruction of the ozone
layer and irreversible mutations of the genome –
as a result of environmental pollution.
Modern States are making significant efforts to
solve the global environmental crisis, which in
turn necessitates the development and
improvement of the efficiency of environmental
protection activities, enhacement of its
institutional and regulatory support. The issue of
environmental protection activities for modern
Ukraine, on the one hand, in terms of its
importance, is on the same level as the problems
of ensuring peace and security, unity, territorial
integrity of the country, recovery from political
and economic crises, and on the other hand, it is
covered by the spheres of cooperation with the
European Union within performance of the
concluded Association Agreement.
The State strategy for the protection of the
natural environment, in the general legal sense, is
a set of rules of the legislation of Ukraine, which,
in a systemic interrelation, forms a mechanism
for counteraction and prevention of offenses
related to encroachment on the environment. At
the same time, issues related to the definition of
the content and essence of the term
«environment», still remain are still debatable.
The ongoing armed aggression of Russia against
Ukrainian independence and sovereignty, which
is accompanied by causing critical environmental
harm to the environment and the surrounding
natural environment on the territory of Ukraine,
actualizes the need for research into state policy
in the field of environmental protection. In
addition, the harmonization of national
legislation in the context of becoming a candidate
for membership of the European Union by
Ukraine has a positive impact on strengthening
the institutional capacity of State authorities to
protect the environment in any legal way.
In our opinion, taking into account the previously
stated positions, as well as destructive factors and
the latest trends, the issue of elgal regulation of
the sphere of environmental protection in
Ukraine requires additional coordination and
analysis, since this branch of legal relations
remains unprotected.
The purpose of the article is theoretical and legal
characteristics of the legal and regulatory aspect
of public policy in the field of environmental
protection.
Literature Review
As Harari (2015) correctly pointed out, “the
industrial revolution revealed new ways of
converting energy and producing goods largely
liberating mankind from its dependence on the
surrounding ecosystem. People massively cut
down forests, drained swamps, blocked rivers
with dams, flooded plains, laid tens of thousands
of kilometers of railway tracks and built
skyscrapers of business centers. The whole world
was rebuilt to meet the needs of homo sapiens,
while the usual habitats of plants and animals
were destroyed, causing the extinction of many
species. Our once green and blue planet
gradually began to turn into one huge trading
center made of concrete and plastic”.
That is why nature protection activity as a
complex, multifaceted social phenomenon has
Kryzhevskyi, V., Ripenko, A., Nikitin, V., Kozin, S., Kuzmenko, D. / Volume 12 - Issue 61: 255-261 / January, 2023
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been the subject of reflection by scientists, State
and political actors from ancient times to the
present. At the same time, the views on the
essence, principles and forms of environmental
protection activities changed, evolved and
differentiated under the influence of a number of
objective and subjective, rational and irrational
factors. At the current stage of development of
humanitarian (social) sciences, environmental
protection activities are in view of the
representatives of philosophy, history,
economics, pedagogy, psychology, management,
political science, military science and, of course,
jurisprudence.
The formation and development of a sovereign
Ukrainian state is also impossible without the
development and implementation of a multi-
faceted and purposeful system for the protection
of its national security and the component of the
latter – environmental security (Tatsii,
Petryshyn, & Barabash, 2011, p. 115). After all,
according to the Basic Law of Ukraine, ensuring
environmental safety and maintaining ecological
balance on the territory of Ukraine, overcoming
the consequences of the Chernobyl disaster – a
catastrophe of a planetary scale, and preserving
the gene pool of the Ukrainian people is the duty
of the State.
According to Bilozorov and Vyshkovska (2015,
p. 22), the set of sources related to the subject of
scientific research can be conditionally
differentiated into two groups: 1) scientific
research and doctrinal views in the field of
theoretical and legal foundations of
environmental protection activities; 2) forms
(sources) of law regulating relations in the sphere
of protection of the environment, including
international law.
The feature of modern studies of the nature
protection (ecological) function of the state is
that it is currently becoming the subject of
attention both the representatives of the legal
community (first of all, those working in the field
of environmental law) (Karpovich, 2012), and
those scientists who study the problems of the
State administration system development
(Volynets, 2013). The nature protection function
is attributed to the “newest” functions of the
modern State. Therefore, nowadays, along with
the so-called “classical functions of the state”,
“the latest functions” are increasingly
highlighted, the role and importance of which
have significantly grown in recent decades and
which have acquired special importance among
other socially significant areas of public activity.
In turn, specialists from the block of management
sciences consider the main theoretical provisions
of nature protection management, legal
foundations and the system of public
management of nature protection activities in
Ukraine and in the world (Shmatko & Nikitin,
2005). In the field of public administration,
Tishkova (2018) carried out theoretical and
methodological substantiation and developed
practical recommendations for reforming the
State management of environmental protection in
the context of the European integration of
Ukraine.
The work by Kovalska (2013), devoted to the
study of theoretical and methodological issues of
the formation and improvement of the system of
principles of environmental legislation in the
context of the development of the legislative
system of Ukraine, is also a valuable
achievement in the studied area.
Methodology
The methodological toolkit of scientific work
includes a set of philosophical and other
foundations, methodological principles, research
approaches, general methods of thinking,
philosophical, general scientific and specific
scientific (legal) methods, the application of
which ensured the reliability and validity of the
results of the study of the theoretical and legal
foundations of environmental protection
activities.
Taking into account the peculiarities of the
subject, the purpose and tasks of the research, the
following main research approaches were
applied:
Activity-based approach was used during the
theoretical and legal characterization of
environmental protection activity as a type of
human activity.
Systemic approach helped in the course of
determining the place of environmental
protection activity in the legal system, signs and
elements of the mechanism of environmental
protection activity.
Anthropological approach was helpful in
establishing the role of man in the development
and functioning of nature protection activities,
the relationship between person and
environment.
In turn, the dialectical method made it possible to
understand the essence of environmental
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protection activities in the dynamics of its
development and interaction with other social
and state-legal phenomena.
Synergistic method made it possible to present
environmental protection activity as a self-
organizing phenomenon, the emergence and
change of which is based on certain processes
and legal reality.
Formal and legal method contributed to the
research of the theoretical and legal foundations
of environmental protection activities with the
help of legal constructions and legal terminology.
Results and Discussion
Already Aristotle (n.d.) noted that public policy,
like any social process, needs constant
explanation of the genesis of its content and
comprehensive research as an object of scientific
knowledge. Its categorical apparatus requires
special attention, since it has a wide range of
scientific interpretation of its content and
fragmentary justification in the scientific
literature by foreign and domestic scientists.
Besides, repeatedly in the positions of
researchers there is a statement by Friedrich
(1968), who characterized policy as a course of
action proposed by a person, group or
government within the environment, including
obstacles and opportunities that a specific policy
should use or overcome in pursuit of a goal or
objectives or intentions. These views allow to
substantiate that any State policy, being an
expression of the sovereign will of the people and
implemented by the tools of representative
democracy, must be properly established and
formulated. That is, to be one that has specific
limits (i.e. defines the influencing segment), a
clearly formulated goal and task, as well as the
subject matter and the object, which in the future
will allow to pass to the essential characteristic
more detailed, step-by-step implementation
elements.
It should be noted that state authorities and their
officials are obliged to act exclusively within the
limits and in the manner determined by the
legislation of Ukraine, and accordingly, the issue
of normative and legal regulation of the sphere of
environmental protection in Ukraine is critically
important in the context of the analysis of the
specified legislative provision.
First, let’s consider, what environment is. The
latter is the totality of all external conditions that
affect organisms, populations or more complex
biological groups, causing a corresponding
reaction. The environment is always a complex
set of different elements, and they, in turn,
interact with organisms, called environmental
factors. They are divided into two main groups –
abiotic and biotic ones. The first refers to all
elements of non-wildlife affecting the organism;
the most important are light, temperature,
humidity and other climate components, as well
as the composition of water, air and soil
environments (Yesyrkenov, 2008). Thus, it is
necessary to justify the position that all factors
that can be included in the category of the
environment are in one or another way related to
the ecology and level of “ecology” of a particular
activity, which acquire great importance in close
connection with the processes of ensuring rights
and freedoms of a person and a citizen in
Ukraine.
The right of citizens to an environment that is
safe for life and health is enshrined in the Basic
Law of Ukraine (Law of Ukraine No. 254k/96-
VR, 1996) and the ability of the subject, ensured
by the State, to live in an environment that is not
harmful to health, use safe natural resources to
meet their vital needs, to demand from the state,
as well as other individuals and legal entities
compliance with environmental safety rules, and
apply for the protection of the violated right to
the competent authorities in case of their breach.
Accordingly, it should be noted that the strategic
state guarantee, first of all, should take into
account such two integral elements as protection
and security, because being interconnected, they
nevertheless act and function differently.
Thus, being a component of public policy, the
environment protection is embodied in many
forms, since some provisions (formally
established norms of a certain vector and
direction of development) determine the
principles of nature protection and ecological
safety, while the other side of this process
(protection of the right to a safe environment)
determines the list of acts for which there may be
some legal responsibility. Environmental
liability lies in the obligation of a business entity
to compensate the environmental damage. It
differs from administrative or moral one and is
usually identified as a type of civil liability. It is
aimed to provide the following: rescue the
environment by compensating harm; guarantees
of reimbursement to those affected for economic
damage; encouraging the use of preventive
measures (risk analysis, environmental
management system, auditing, etc.) (Kapto et al.,
2019, p. 89).
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Slipchenko (2013) justifies that the
interdependence of the categories "security" and
"protection" creates a number of discussions in
the legal circle, but one cannot speak of the
identity of these definitions. In her opinion, legal
protection includes a variety of legal measures
aimed at protecting the right from possible
infringement. Thus, the possibility of protection
of subjective law and concrete exercise of
protection is one of the means of legal protection.
The essence of legal protection is that it is the
application of the state coercion measure chosen
by a law enforcement body. By concrete
incorporation, coercive measures end the
violation of subjective right, provide the
necessary conditions for its implementation,
restore it or eliminate the consequences of its
breach in one or another way. The stated view
fully confirms our previous comment on the
protective content of any public policy, as well as
the need for procedural formalization of relevant
efforts, since all State authorities and their
officials must act exclusively within the limits
and in the manner determined by the legislation
of Ukraine.
The ecological, or nature protection, function of
the State is a vital activity of any modern country,
the world community as a whole. In progressive
States, significant environmental protection
legislation, which clearly regulates the activities
of people and various organizations in the field
of using the natural environment, has been
adopted. In many countries, national
environmental protection programs, which
provide for the application of active measures of
impact on violators of its integrity, up to the
complete elimination of sources or pollution of
harmful production waste, have been developed
and operated. Nature protection is one of the
most acute social problems and is one of the most
important national tasks. All links of the State
mechanism carry out nature protection activities
within their competence. The implementation of
these principles ensures the focus of
environmental protection functions on solving
the tasks facing the State in the field of protection
and rational use of natural resources.
Environmental protection in Ukraine and the
European Union is based on a whole system of
legal instruments. In Ukraine, environmental
protection measures are carried out on the basis
of a number of resource codes, laws, by-laws,
while the main source of environmental law of
Ukraine is the Constitution. Ukrainian legislation
in the field of environmental protection activities
can be conditionally divided into two groups.
The first one includes regulatory acts
determining the principles of environmental
protection activities, and the second one - legal
instruments establishing the system of
environmental protection agencies and
organizations and determining their legal status.
The irreversibility of Ukraine's European and
Euro-Atlantic course necessitates the
development of European requirements for
environmental protection activities, first of all,
the EU – the integration formation of developed
European states. At present, the EU plays a
leading role in the coordination of policies for
solving global environmental problems. The
example of the environmental policy of the EU,
which in recent decades has achieved significant
success in regulating the environmental
protection activities of Member States,
developing the legal framework of ecopolitics,
and establishing new approaches to
environmental protection, is a model of
transparency for the countries that have achieved
significantly lower results in this area, including
Ukraine (Holovko, 2021, p. 157).
It is worth emphasizing that by the end of the 60s
of the 20th century none of the European
countries had clear legal requirements for the
organization and implementation of
environmental protection activities. Currently,
the EU has adopted more than 300 regulatory
acts aimed at solving environmental problems at
the level of the entire Community. Ecology is the
business of the Union and Member States,
economic operators and citizens. The European
approach to the formation of the legal
foundations of environmental policy has a
preventive nature and is oriented not only to the
solution of already existing environmental
problems, but, first of all, to the prevention of
new ones. Environmental priorities are
embedded in almost all components and areas of
the EU activity; in addition to the legal measures
of environmental policy, legislative prescriptions
for the preservation of the environment are
implemented in the regional, scientific and
technical, agrarian, transport and trade policies of
the EU. In the 1990s, orientation towards the
joint solution of complex and promising tasks of
the interaction of an individual and the
environment began to be traced in the
environmental programs of the Community.
Therefore, the legal foundations of the EU's
environmental strategy can serve as a tool for
solving global problems for other countries
(Lozo, 2010, p. 1).
Presented above directly indicate that all
instruments that can be included in any public
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policy must have a source – a specific regulatory
basis that has already been implemented
according to the needs of society. It is these
complex chains of conception of public strategic
planning in a certain area that allow correctly and
accurately to form the need, based on the norms
of the acting legislation and planning the
production of additional provisions.
For example, international legal obligations of
the States to protect the environment during an
armed conflict are enshrined in both ordinary
environmental treaties and special agreements,
subject to the existence of an armed conflict. To
understand the specifics of the effect of treaties
of the first group, one should dwell on the general
principles of the influence of war on international
treaties. Termination of an international treaty
with the outbreak of war is not the rule, but the
exception. From the interpretations of the
provisions of the Vienna Convention on the Law
of Treaties (United Nations, 1969) on
impossibility of performance and fundamental
change of circumstances follows that war is not a
ground for the automatic termination of treaties,
to which the participants of the armed conflict
became parties in peacetime (International Law
Commission, 2011). The relevant provisions,
with reference to the norms and principles of
international law and relevant legislation, are
quite timely in the context of Russia's armed
aggression against Ukraine, since the natural
environment is suffering very actively right now,
as a result of active hostilities, as well as
systematic massive missile attacks by the enemy
of the territory of Ukraine – the environment,
which in turn necessitates both the prosecution of
guilty persons and the development, at the state
strategic level, of plans and concepts for the
further restoration of the environmental
protection regime and environmental safety in
general.
That is why it is necessary to pay significant
scientific and legislative attention to the issue and
importance of regulatory and legal support of the
State policy in the area of environmental
protection, which in the future can be converted
into the strengthening of the institution of human
and citizen rights and freedoms not only in
Ukraine and the European space, but also in
planetary scale in general.
Conclusion
The article analyzes the regulatory and legal
aspect of the public policy in the field of
environmental protection and summarizes the
relevant legislative basis that ensures the
functioning of this circle of legal relations. It has
been established that the legal instruments
governing State policy in the field of
environmental protection is quite wide and their
source is not only the Constitution of Ukraine,
but also international legislation defining the
standards in nature and environmental
protection.
The authors summarize the approaches to the
concept of the sphere of the environment and the
content of its legal regulation, which lies in the
establishment of the series of systematized legal
acts governing the relevant sphere and ensuring
compliance with a certain range of human and
citizen rights and freedoms in the field of
environmental protection, since all State
resources are the property of the Ukrainian
people, and the state, as their main administrator,
is obliged to regulate the issue of their protection
from the harm that could be done.
Besides, it is substantiated that in the conditions
of European integration, adaptation of
international experience to domestic legal
realities, as well as harmonization of national and
international legislation, the development of the
latest forms and methods of environmental
protection, among which strategic planning in the
field of environmental protection takes the
leading place, is an urgent issue.
It is noted that there is a critical need to develop
new and improve existing legal acts, taking into
account modern trends, since the war unleashed
by Russia on the territory of Ukraine causes
critical damage to the environment and ecology
of Ukraine, and accordingly, such actions should
be properly qualified and all those guilty brought
to legal responsibility, which can be
implemented only after approving a strategic
document in the field of environmental
protection.
The perspective of further research is the need to
analyze the methods of protection in the area of
nature protection, which are defined by the
legislation of Ukraine as effective tools for the
defense of the environment from harmful effects.
The question of using international experience in
improving the relevant national mechanism may
also be informative and complementary to the
study.
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