Lugaresi, Nicola --- "Measuring the Environment through Public Procurement" [2011] ELECD 646; in Benidickson, Jamie; Boer, Ben; Benjamin, Herman Antonio; Morrow, Karen (eds), "Environmental Law and Sustainability after Rio" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2011)

Book Title: Environmental Law and Sustainability after Rio

Editor(s): Benidickson, Jamie; Boer, Ben; Benjamin, Herman Antonio; Morrow, Karen

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9780857932242

Section: Chapter 7

Section Title: Measuring the Environment through Public Procurement

Author(s): Lugaresi, Nicola

Number of pages: 16

Extract:

7. Measuring the environment through
public procurement
Nicola Lugaresi

1. THE ENVIRONMENT, ECONOMIC ANALYSIS AND
MARKETS

From a legal point of view, the environment resembles Rubik's cube. The
different sides symbolise different components of environment, economics
and the social, cultural and political context which law must consider
separately, but must bring back to unified alignment. Facing environmental
issues without considering the relationships among the different components
that must ultimately be integrated means ignoring the combination and the
array of colours on the other sides of the cube. You can get a side of a single
colour, but you are very likely to mix up the other sides in the process.
Economic analysis is one aspect of administrative discretion in
environmental decision-making; it must not to be neglected, and should not
be considered in isolation.
Economic analysis may contribute, alongside political and legal
evaluations, to further understanding and knowledge, operating from an
ostensibly neutral perspective. Through assessments supported by numerical
criteria, alternative solutions to a specific issue are organically weighted,
pointing out the most economically advantageous one. At first glance,
economic analysis may seem a very rational and verifiable way to deal with
environmental issues, but it may seem, on the other hand, a `colder' one. If
uncritically adopted, without appropriate consideration of the environmental
peculiarities (and of the legal specificities), economic analysis may constitute
a weakness of decision-making systems. It risks subordinating protection of
public environmental (and therefore social) interests to predominantly
economic interests. The Rubik's ...