Technical Background Document - Accelerating progress: An empowered, inclusive and equal Asia and the Pacific

The literature on environmental rights can be sorted into three categories — philosophical treatises, legal catalogues and updates, and social scientific analyses. The philosophical works have debated the merits of establishing separate human rights to the environment and rights of the environment, defined the physical and ontological boundaries of the environment, and specified the content of such rights. The legal catalogues and updates constitute the greatest body of work in this area, providing an extensive accounting of the prevalence of environmental rights in constitutions, jurisprudence, and legislation throughout the world and detailed reviews of their implementation across different regions.