La via europea al costituzionalismo ambientale e il formante legislativo/costituzionale

The European Road to environmental constitutionalism and the legislative/constitutional formant

Abstract

Environmental protection was absent from the constitutions fifty years ago. Today, however, there are a great many constitutions that contain provisions relating to the environment. The environment constitutes a value, a prerequisite for all other rights and, as such, represents a challenge for the entire structure of what, according to the constitutions born in the second half of the last century, can be defined as the constitutional State. The process of codification of the right to environmental defense therefore appears an inexorable and certainly indispensable process for the relationship between man and the environment to be considered among the cornerstones of the constitutional order permeating the entire structure. Nonetheless, this process cannot be exhausted at the level of the so-called high branches of the legal system, but must be accompanied by an equally fruitful process of application and implementation of constitutional rules.