EU Environmental Law and the Internal Market, by Nicolas De Sadeleer, published by Oxford University Press, 2014, 560 pp., £100, hardback.

• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/reel.12191
• Date: 01 April 2017
• Author: Nikolas Sellheim
• Published date: 01 April 2017

Jefferies deserves great credit for

thoroughly examining the set of

challenges of marine mammal con-

servation and seeking a better gov-

ernance model. One can only hope

this goal will be achieved.

Howard S. Schiffman

Attorney-at-Law, New York

EU Environmental Law and

the Internal Market,byNico-

las De Sadeleer, published by

Oxford University Press,

2014, 560 pp., £100, hardback.

Since the dawn of European inte-

gration, economic interests have

guided policies and legislation and

only in recent decades has the

‘environment’moved more norma-

tively on the agenda of the Euro-

pean Union (EU). You may have

noted the quotation marks framing

the ‘environment’. This is due to the

fact that it is difficult to find a clear-

cut definition of this term and all

the principles accompanying envir-

onmental law. This is not only the

case in legal scholarship and prac-

tice, but for instance anthropologist

Tim Ingold presents the differences

in how the term and concept can be

perceived.

1

This notwithstanding,

based on the different foci of EU

environmental regulation as well as

their scope, the ‘environment’is

being embedded as a guiding fea-

ture into European policy making.

The present volume traces seem-

ingly every facet of EU environmen-

tal policy and its role within the

core element of European integra-

tion: the internal market. In three

major parts and 12 chapters Nicolas

De Sadeleer takes the reader on a

journey to understand what the rec-

onciliation of environmental pro-

tection and internal market

harmonization means in practice.

To this end, Part I provides an

introduction to environmental law.

Here, the origins, purposes and

meaning of EU environmental law

are presented and discussed, both

from a theoretical perspective and

underpinned with a rich body of

case law from the Court of Justice

of the EU. The author’s expertise in

legal theory and European jurispru-

dence surfaces here and the reader

is left with a thorough understand-

ing of what the ‘environment’

means in different contexts in the

EU. This is achieved through an

analysis of treaty provisions and

secondary legislation. The question

of ‘rights’and associated legal

standing, legal bases as well as com-

petences guides the discussion.

Here, I would have hoped for refer-

ence to the indigenous dimension of

the right to environmental protec-

tion as well. After all, the EU is

home to the S

ami in Sweden and

Finland as well as several other

indigenous peoples in former Brit-

ish and French colonies that are leg-

ally part of the EU. Admittedly,

however, this would require sub-

stantial amounts of further research

that might go beyond the scope of

the book.

2

Part II examines the treaty provi-

sions on free movement of goods,

services and establishment. The

author shows the difficulties of

combining fundamental freedoms

under the treaties with the protec-

tion of the environment. This

means that environmental protec-

tion measures interfere one way or

the other with the right to free

movement of goods and services,

whether part of their objective or

not. This said, Member States often

rely on secondary legislation to find

a way to bring treaty rights and

environmental obligations –despite

their vagueness –in unison. Once

again, the author relies on the vast

body of Union case law and

underlines his arguments with the

jurisprudence of the Court. In this

part, I missed a more thorough

focus on the moral dimension of the

exception of free movement of

goods. While the author does refer

to ‘public morality’as a means to

limit the free movement of goods,

he rather overlooks the concept as

being crucial in limiting the trade in

for instance marine mammal prod-

ucts. In particular, whales and seals

come to mind here, since the EU

has an import and trade ban for

whale and seal products in place.

The latter especially holds a signifi-

cant public morality dimension as

the EU used Article XX(a) of the

General Agreement on Tariffs and

Trade to justify its ban due to public

morality concerns before the World

Trade Organization (WTO).

3

The

opposition to trade in whale prod-

ucts, on the other hand, rests on the

1985/1986 moratorium on whaling

by the International Whaling Com-

mission, which was adopted follow-

ing conservation concerns. Despite

its initial temporary character, the

moratorium has been in force ever

since its conclusion. Since not all

whales are endangered and in light

of the EU’s‘knowledge society’,it

would appear reasonable to assume

that opposition to whaling is based

on scientific reasons. Given the

EU’s normative opposition to whal-

ing, however, other reasons, such as

public morality, appear at the sur-

face of the argument. Thus, this

reviewer would have enjoyed some

more attention to this issue in this

volume, and the repercussions this

has on the functioning of the intern-

al market and the possibility of con-

ducting trade in certain products.

The last part of this impressive

work delves into the realm of com-

petition law and the environment.

Right from the outset it becomes

clear that both competition law and

environmental protection do indeed

complement one another, or at least

do not exclude each other, as one

1

T. Ingold, The Perception of the Environ-

ment: Essays on Livelihood, Dwelling and

Skill (Routledge, 2000).

2

To bolster the discussion for a European

context, see L. Hein€

am€

aki, The Right to Be a

Part of Nature: Indigenous Peoples and the

Environment (Lapland University Press,

2010); T. Kolari, The Right to a Decent Envir-

onment with Special Reference to Indigenous

Peoples (Sevenprint, 2004).

3

See N. Sellheim, ‘The Legal Question of

Morality: Seal Hunting and the European

Moral Standard’, 25:2 Social & Legal Studies

(2016), 141.

ª2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd

101

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