Absent Environments: Theorising Environmental Law and the City

"Absent Environments" offers a novel approach to environmental law, its principles, its mechanics and its context, as tested in its application to the urban environment. The book proposes a new theory of environmental law whose starting point is a description of a society effectively closed to environmental considerations, where the environment is essentially 'absent'. The book introduces the reader to the key concept of closure as it is described in Luhmann's theory of autopoiesis. In contrast to previous discussions on autopoiesis, however, this book proposes a radically different reading of the theory, in line with postmodern legal, political, sociological, urban and ecological theories, and emphasising the paradox of the (absent) environment. In terms of environmental law, the examined concepts include environmental risk, environmental rights, the precautionary principle and urban waste, as well as discourses on community, proceduralisation and identity. In terms of urban geography, the city is submitted to a phenomenological analysis, which identifies the role of space and body in the urban and legal systems, and repositions the city with regard to utopia, language, memory, essence, and so on. The book redefines the traditional foundations of environmental law and urban geography and suggests a new way of dealing with scientific ignorance, cultural differences and environmental risk within the perceived need for legal delivery of certainty.

Table of Contents:
1 The Law: Closure and Environmental Law closure and the law -- criticisms -- inside looking inside -- in asymmetry 2 The City: Utopia, Society and Reality city and society -- reality, 'reality', and utopia -- matter and meaning -- the cybercity -- globalisation -- in absence 3 Links: Observation, Simulation, Essence a relation of no connection -- internal links -- essence -- unutterance -- an observer -- in essence 4 Risk: Future, Science and the Precautionary Principle risk and time -- the future of systems -- the precautionary principle -- science and politics -- in limitation 5 Boundary Selections: Community and Environmental Rights placation and porosity -- community -- porous community -- environmental rights -- in particular 6 Waste: Openness, Memory and Forgetting openness -- waste -- waste law -- law's waste -- in memory Notes Bibliography

About the Author :
Andreas Philippopoulos-Mihalopoulos, LLB (Thessaloniki), LLM (Cambridge), PhD (London) is a Reader in Law, University of Westminster