The challenges of modern society are huge, and environmental challenges are not the least of them. To address these challenges, all the intellectual input available and all the goodwill and determination of all stakeholders in that society must be mobilized.
For such a society to function effectively, to find paths for sustainable development, the public and its citizens' organizations need to have the tools to function. Transparency of the policies of the authorities and transparency of the actions of the business sector is a must. The right to know is an essential element of democracy, and an indispensable tool for a civil drive to sustainability.
Knowledge is essential, but it is not enough. The traditional ways of decisionmaking are too exclusive. They fail because they close out too many justified interests and opinions. Therefore public participation in forming opinions and taking decisions is the next inevitable step. And finally, the public can have an important role in the actual enforcement of what has been agreed upon. The position that only those who have a direct interest can call upon the judicial powers when rules are violated is therefore too limiting.
These arguments have been brought forward for many years by environmental organizations. Probably the most senior recognition of these arguments by the political leaders of the world is to be found in Principle 10 of the Rio Declaration, which says:
"Environmental issues are best handled with the participation of all concerned citizens, at the relevant level. At the national level, each individual shall have appropriate access to information concerning the environment that is held by public authorities, including information on hazardous materials and activities in their communities, and the opportunities to participate in decisionmaking processes. States shall facilitate and encourage public awareness and participation by making information widely available. Effective access to judicial and administrative proceedings, including redress and remedy, shall be provided."
In the pan-European cooperation that emerged in the "Environment for Europe" process in the early 1990s, the role of citizens has rightfully been constantly stressed. The adoption of the Sofia Guidelines in 1995 and the agreement on a Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation and Access to Justice are two important results of this process. Furthermore, the transparency and accessibility of the process itself is an example of this broader, more complete concept of democracy. The European Environmental Bureau (EEB) has been using these opportunities, along with other organizations, from the very start, and has played a role in further developing these opportunities, including a very intensive coordinator's role in the input of citizens' organizations in the preparations for the Convention.
The EEB, however, is not satisfied with the content of the Guidelines or the Convention, though they are steps in the right direction. Our concern is about the general and compromised nature of many elements. Our experience in Western Europe teaches us that legislation needs to be detailed and unambiguous, and regulations need to include specific requirements not only concerning the rights of the public but also the practical duties of authorities to realize these rights.
The EEB deplores the tendency of Western politicians and officials to consider the "Environment for Europe" process and its products as a learning exercise for Central and Eastern European countries. This study demonstrates that Western countries with a longer, and even in most cases very long, tradition of democracy seriously fail to perform in giving their citizens adequate rights and tools to participate in its development. As we observed in our study on the Sofia Guidelines (Madrid, April 1998), none of the 11 countries monitored bothered to act to implement the Guidelines, assuming that they were covered in existing practice. In many cases this proved not to be true. Western countries have a too high self-esteem about the quality of their democracy. This report shows clearly that there are major deficiencies in all three areas: right to know, public participation, access to justice.
For the EEB this is not an entirely new and surprising conclusion. At the end of the 1980s we were working hard at achieving an adequate and unambiguous Directive on Access to Environmental Information for the European Union. Due to the reluctance of some countries, we ended up with a Directive with serious weaknesses. And the implementation of that Directive is a matter of concern. The review of the Directive should lead to improvements, but even starting that review, on the basis of implementation reports from the member states, is a disappointingly slow process.
For public participation, the EU still lacks a general Directive, and access to justice is recognized by the Commission as a tool that could help the enforcement of EU legislation; but our efforts to get that right recognized in the Treaty of the European Union have not lead to success so far.
The report we present you even shows signs of regression in some countries, especially in the case of public participation. Our conclusions confirm that much needs to be done in the Western countries to make the most of the potential in the public to contribute to sustainable development. Western countries should seriously review their performance. One important opportunity to do so is the early ratification and implementation of the Convention, as a minimum basis. The EEB calls upon the governments to discuss the implementation intensively with environmental citizens' organizations and go beyond the requirements wherever this is seen as necessary and possible. Furthermore, the member states of the European Union should finally agree on similar rules and practices on the Union level.
On behalf of the EEB, I would like to express our thanks to the Danish, Norwegian and Swedish governments as well as the European Commission for having made this study possible. I would like to thank as well the Regional Environment Center for Central and Eastern Europe and Ecopravo-Lviv for their cooperation and inspiration in this project. And last but not least I would like to thank the persons directly involved in the work, in particular Fe Sanchis Moreno of Terra Environmental Policy Centre, who has delivered this excellent report under great time pressure.
John Hontelez
Secretary General