我国环境影响评价公众参与工作存在的问题及解决对策

本文通过对我国环境影响评价公众参与发展历程的回顾和采用对比法分析各省市出台的相关公众参与的实施办法或条例的基础上,分析我国环评公众参与具体操作过程中存在公众参与作用边界被无限放大、参与对象缺乏代表性和形式单一等问题,从信息公开制度、公众参与对象的选择、公众参与形式、公示内容、公众反馈意见等方面提出提高公众参与有效性的对策和建议.     

我国公众参与环境保护制度存在的问题及对策

阐述了公众参与环境影响评价的重要意义和相关依据,指出了我国现行公众参与制度中存在信息公示程度不足、征求意见方式单一和公众意见重视不够等问题,并从完善法律法规体系、丰富公众参与形式和提高公众参与透明程度等方面提出了改进措施和建议。     

关于新形势下推行企业环境报告制度的思考

<正>企业环境报告制度是推动企业环境信息公开规范化的技术支撑,有助于完善实施细则、倒逼企业转型、促进公众参与。分析了推进企业环境报告制度面临的各方面障碍,并提出了相应的对策建议。2015年"两会"期间,环境保护部部长陈吉宁在答记者问时强调,要加大信息公开,让所有的污染源排放暴露在阳光下,让每一个人成为污染排放监督者。作为污染防治与公众监督的实践形式,环境信息公开已经成为经济社     

深圳市环境信息公开和公众参与管理实践与对策

环境信息公开和公众参与已经成为一种重要的环境管理辅助手段,深圳市立足城市之先,在立法和执法方面开展了一系列实践工作,并积累了一定的经验和教训。在研究深圳市环境信息公开和公众参与管理现状的基础上,结合实践中存在的焦点和难点问题,以提高公民环境知情权和参与权的落实水平为目标,从观念、立法、技术指引和参与形式等方面提出政策建议,为深圳市环境信息公开与公众参与管理实践提供了较好的理论和实践探索。     

行政正当程序视角下环境公众参与制度的规范与完善

行政正当程序理论是环境公众参与制度的理论基础。2014年修订的《中华人民共和国环境保护法》中已经确立以环境公众参与权为核心的环境公众参与制度,但是对于公众参与的规范特别是参与权的规范过于笼统。面对实践中参与主体类型界分不明、多项权利内容规范缺失、法律责任规范效力存疑及环境行政管理规范不足等问题,本文建议应以行政正当程序理论为指导,实现参与主体的类型化界分,细化公众参与权利内容,增加公众参与法律责任条款,并完善环境行政管理公众参与规范。     

增强环境影响评价公众参与有效性的研究

本文结合《环境影响评价公众参与暂行办法》的内容和要求，根据从事环境影响评价的工作经验，提出当前环评中公众参与存在的信息公开及听证主体不尽合理等问题，并加以分析。针对如何更好地做好公众参与工作，提出诸如扩大并完善公众可以参与评价的方式和媒体参与等一系列对策建议。     

论环境信息公共服务

中国环境信息行业发展历经三部曲：自给自足、信息公开与公共服务。当前正处于环境信息公开向环境信息公共服务的转型与变革期。相较环境信息公开,环境信息公共服务强调以公众为本位的“信息流再造”．要按照公众需求来重塑环境信息流,安排环境信息的生产、公开,服务与反馈等信息活动;强调制度构建,重点包括建立政府统筹协调下的干系人参与网络、以公众环境权益保障为中心的信息体系、信息质量和信息标准、信息流的全过程管理及价值显现与补偿机制等。发展环境信息公共服务,顺应服务型政府建设与改革需要,是大势所趋。     

环境资讯

正【环境新闻】环保部全面备战新环保法明年将实施的新环保法对于信息公开作出了明确规定。对此,环保部副部长潘岳今天提出,环保系统全面推进环境信息公开和公众参与。进一步完善建设项目环评、排污单位监管等方面的信息公开,健全举报违法、公益诉讼等公众参与的程序机制。来源:中国新闻网2014-09-23环保部:环保部门要更深介入国家和地方规划     

论我国环境信息公开制度的完善

环境信息公开制度是建设资源节约型，环境友好型社会必不可少的制度，也是促进生态文明建设的有力措施。然而，我国环境信息公开制度存在很多不足：公开义务主体范围狭窄、公开内容少、公开方式不明确、监督机制缺失、惩罚力度轻等。以国内环境信息公开制度的立法现状为视角，运用实证研究方法，结合立法实践，深入分析环境信息公开制度目前的问题，并阐述相关建议，逐步完善我国环境信息公开制度。     

环境保护的公众参与现状、问题及对策

本文从我国环境保护公众参与进程缓慢的历史和参与意识日益提高的现状出发，分析了目前我国环境保护的公众参与存在缺乏相应的法律制度保障、公众主动了解环保知识不足、参与机制不健全、渠道不顺畅等问题，提出了以加强环境信息公开、环境决策民主化，建立和发展环保社团等办法推动公众参与环境保护的对策。     

Contemporary Public Involvement: toward a strategic approach

Many planning agencies and stakeholder groups experimented with innovative forms of public involvement in the 1990s. British Columbia is one such jurisdiction which embraced the concept of public involvement in a broad range of land and resource management planning scales - to the degree of collaborative planning with communities, using consensus. The purpose of this paper is to present lessons for planners, supported by literature and by research in British Columbia, Canada from 1995-97, on these public involvement processes. Building on earlier 'typologies' for public involvement in planning, it proposes a strategic approach for identifying and analysing stakeholders, for setting objectives and for subsequently choosing the most appropriate level of public involvement.     

Contemporary Public Involvement: Toward a strategic approach

Many planning agencies and stakeholder groups experimented with innovative forms of public involvement in the 1990s. British Columbia is one such jurisdiction which embraced the concept of public involvement in a broad range of land and resource management planning scales - to the degree of collaborative planning with communities, using consensus. The purpose of this paper is to present lessons for planners, supported by literature and by research in British Columbia, Canada from 1995-97, on these public involvement processes. Building on earlier 'typologies' for public involvement in planning, it proposes a strategic approach for identifying and analysing stakeholders, for setting objectives and for subsequently choosing the most appropriate level of public involvement.     

WATERSHED COUNCILS: AN EMERGING FORM OF PUBLIC PARTICIPATION IN NATURAL RESOURCE MANAGEMENT1

ABSTRACT: There is increasing interest in using watershed councils to provide information to public natural resource managers, particularly in the western states. Watershed councils are composed of interested governmental and nongovernmental stakeholders that form to collaboratively manage water and other natural resources at the scale of a watershed. This research is the first step in a multi-step policy analysis designed to answer the question of whether watershed councils are an improvement over traditional methods of public involvement in natural resource management. This paper outlines why watershed councils form and discusses their structure and operation. There is considerable variability in terms of watershed councils' goals, their effectiveness, stakeholder composition, their involvement in the “real” decision-making process, types of participation that are allowed, leadership, financing, decision-making procedures, efficiency, and temporal scale. These structural components are presented as a framework that can be used by researchers to develop criteria to evaluate watershed councils.     

ASSEMBLY OF MAP‐BASED STREAM NARRATIVES TO FACILITATE STAKEHOLDER INVOLVEMENT IN WATERSHED MANAGEMENT1

ABSTRACT: Watershed stewardship activities throughout North America have evolved into a process that requires more involvement in planning and decision making by community stakeholders. Active involvement of all stakeholders in the process of watershed stewardship is dependent on effective exchange of information among participants, and active involvement of a wide range of stakeholders from “communities of place” as well as those from “communities of interest.” We developed a map‐based stream narrative tool as a means to: (a) assemble a wealth of incompletely documented, “traditional” ecological or natural history observations for rivers or streams; and (b) promote a higher level of active involvement by community stakeholders in contributing to information‐based, watershed management. Creation of stream narratives is intended for use as a tool to actively engage local stakeholders in the development of a more comprehensive information system to improve management for multiple stewardship objectives in watersheds. Completion of map‐based stream narrative atlases provides a valuable supplement to other independent efforts to assemble observations and knowledge about land‐based natural resources covering entire watersheds. We are confident that completion of stream narrative projects will make a valuable addition to the information and decision making tools that are currently available to the public and resource agencies interested in advancing the cause of community‐based approaches to watershed and ecosystem management.     

PUBLIC INFORMATION AND CITIZEN INVOLVEMENT1

ABSTRACT: Public information, an important contributer to citizen involvement in the governmental decision making process, has traditionally been given a low priority by government agencies. However, citizens are becoming increasingly concerned about governmental decisions that affect their lives and are demanding more information about governmental activities, including information about water resource issues, Because of this active citizen interest and involvement, the role of public information in increasing citizen awareness is becoming more important. Government officials and professionals should recognize that public information efforts also play an important role in achieving increased credibility and respect for their agencies. Once an agency recognizes the importance of public information and decides to initiate a public information program, careful planning is required to develop a program that addresses the needs of both the citizens and the agency. Two of the most flexible and cost effective ways to get information to the publié are through publications and public meetings. Both can be easily adapted to suit the needs of specific audiences and projects. A successful public information program can be carried out at a relatively low cost, but it requires a substantial amount of time and energy. The commitment of time and energy for this purpose is a good investment, however, because an effective public information program can play a significant role in improving the quality of governmental decisions through the increased involvement of the citizenry.     

The Politics of Participation in Watershed Modeling

While researchers and decision-makers increasingly recognize the importance of public participation in environmental decision-making, there is less agreement about how to involve the public. One of the most controversial issues is how to involve citizens in producing scientific information. Although this question is relevant to many areas of environmental policy, it has come to the fore in watershed management. Increasingly, the public is becoming involved in the sophisticated computer modeling efforts that have been developed to inform watershed management decisions. These models typically have been treated as technical inputs to the policy process. However, model-building itself involves numerous assumptions, judgments, and decisions that are relevant to the public. This paper examines the politics of public involvement in watershed modeling efforts and proposes five guidelines for good practice for such efforts. Using these guidelines, I analyze four cases in which different approaches to public involvement in the modeling process have been attempted and make recommendations for future efforts to involve communities in watershed modeling.     

The Ythan Project: A Case Study on Improving Catchment Management through Community Involvement

Increased participation in resource management decisions by a wide range of stakeholders has been widely advocated, and has recently been formally incorporated into the European Water Framework Directive. However, achieving such participation has generally proved to be problematical. In response to locally perceived needs, a project was set up in the Ythan catchment in northeast Scotland, to undertake catchment management actions with increased public involvement. This paper outlines the methods used to increase public participation in such actions, and some preliminary assessments of the effectiveness of these. The experience of the project and the lessons learnt, including some of the difficulties of ensuring fully representative stakeholder involvement, are discussed in relation to published criteria for public participation in resource management.     

The role of public involvement in environmental impact assessment in Vietnam: towards a more culturally sensitive approach

This paper explores the extent to which Western approaches to public involvement in environmental impact assessment (EIA) have been transferred to Vietnam, constraints on their use, and their appropriateness for the Vietnamese context. The research is based on an analysis of the public involvement content found in 26 EIA reports from development banks and interviews with 26 key informants. The study found that public involvement in Vietnam is generally technocratic, expert-driven and non-transparent, similar to the early days of EIA in the West and emerging economies. Public involvement usually occurs through authorised state channels such as commune leaders, mass organisations and professional organisations. The lack of a participatory culture for EIA, the nascent nature of grassroots democracy in the country, and Vietnamese cultural norms regarding respect for authority provide a challenging context for involving the public in EIA. The paper concludes by offering a number of suggestions for culturally appropriate public involvement at a time when Vietnam has just introduced mandatory public consultation for EIAs.     

Assessing participatory and multi-level characteristics of biodiversity and landscape protection legislation: the case of Poland

In this paper, we present a comprehensive framework for analysing formal rules regulating the involvement of various actors in protected areas decision-making over time and apply it to Poland. Based on the analysis of legal acts and policy documents, we suggest that since the democratic transition started in 1989, the governance of Polish protected areas has been increasingly multi-level and participatory. However, different designations indicate different levels of involvement by non-state actors, with Natura 2000 standing out from the traditional protected areas. Regarding governance issues, establishing and taking management decisions were characterised by the greatest changes in actors’ involvement. While participation of non-public actors is still limited mostly to information and consultation, the involvement of non-state public actors of various levels increased significantly. The paper highlights the importance of a systematic analysis of legal rules as a starting point for empirical investigation of the governance of protected areas.     

Promoting the use of environmental data collected by concerned citizens through information and communication technologies

Public participation within environmental monitoring may contribute to increasing the knowledge on the state of the environment at the same time it promotes citizens' involvement in environmental protection. However, the use of voluntary collected data is limited due to a lack of confidence in data collection procedures. Additionally, data quality is often unknown and the data are usually dispersed and non-structured. Information and communication technologies (ICT) may promote the use of voluntary collected data through the development of a collaborative system that incorporates tools and methodologies to facilitate data collection, access and validation. Furthermore, the use of ICT may promote public involvement within environmental monitoring, since it facilitates communication among all the stakeholders. This paper analyses the role of ICT in developing a system for environmental collaborative monitoring intending to promote the use of volunteer collected data. It starts by analysing the role of volunteers within environmental monitoring and continues analysing the potential of ICT to take advantage of the benefits of using data collected by citizens. A collaborative system that allows the public to express its knowledge on the state of the environment is described. Special emphasis is given to tools that explore non-traditional types of environmental data such as images, sounds and videos in association with spatial information. To illustrate the above mentioned concepts, a case study for beach quality monitoring developed within the Senses@Watch project, is described.