Document Type
Article
Publication Date
Spring 2008
ISSN
0008-7262
Publisher
Case Western Reserve University Law School
Language
en-US
Abstract
In this article, I will explore in detail the structure of nuisance law as a mechanism for regulating environmental interferences and suggest a modernized enforcement regime. The modem regime would retain public enforcement primarily in identifying environmental harms. Public enforcement might also be retained in the discovery of sources of harm, as long as it is more efficient than private enforcement in that task. However, enforcement efforts in the proposed regime would largely be delegated to private enforcers. Moreover, the decentralized approach would permit tougher environmental rules than under the public enforcement approach in some areas, and perhaps weaker regulations in other areas, depending on the seriousness of potential injuries. One-size-fits-all would be replaced by regional variation.
The policy proposals in this article are not new. The argument that nuisance law should be permitted to do more of the work of environmental regulation has been advanced by others.5 My contribution in this article is largely technical. Although nuisance law has existed for a long time, there have been few, if any, efforts to use economic analysis to make sense of its details.6 My aim is to provide a positive economic theory of nuisance doctrine and to use that theory to explain the benefits of moving to a more decentralized approach to environmental regulation.
Recommended Citation
Keith N. Hylton,
The Economic Theory of Nuisance Law and Implications for Environmental Regulation
,
in
58
Case Western Reserve Law Review
673
(2008).
Available at:
https://scholarship.law.bu.edu/faculty_scholarship/765
Working paper available on SSRN
Comments
Updated with published version of paper on 9/24/22
Working paper available on SSRN