Charles McElwee on recent post "Environmental Enforcement in China"

Charles McElwee, one of the foremost authorities on Chinese environmental law and policy, and author of China Environmental Law, attempted to leave a comment on CGS's recent post, "Environmental Enforcement in China," but was prevented from doing so by a technical error. It makes an excellent point, and is reprinted below:

I would add one item to your list of "what's to be done?" recommendations--permit citizen suits in China (I can't remember whether this was one of the OECD [Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development] recommendations). Citizen suit provisions allow private citizens to enforce environmental laws (sue for penalties, for instance) where the primary enforcement authority has failed to do so. Thus, they fit in nicely with your theme of "citizen participation." As a practical matter, NGO's will probably need to fund and support most of these actions, but that seems doable.