The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.
This study did not require formal ethics approval.
Data sharing is not applicable to this article.
The authors received no specific funding for this work.
International environmental law has grown from a few bilateral treaties on transboundary water bodies and precious species into a vibrant and dynamic strand of public international law with almost 1,000 instruments. This article reviews its evolution during four phases: a pre-1950 period of sovereignty-based resource agreements and the Trail Smelter Arbitration; a 1950-1972 period of concern with nuclear and marine pollution; a modern period from the 1972 Stockholm Conference reinforced by the 1992 Rio Conference; and a post-Rio period of concern with climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution. It looks at the UN climate regime (Kyoto Protocol and Paris Agreement), the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, the 2023 BBNJ agreement, current plastics negotiations and the ICJ advisory opinion on states' climate obligations, to update previous accounts through 2025–2026.
International environmental law has grown from a few bilateral treaties on transboundary water bodies and precious species into a vibrant and dynamic strand of public international law with almost 1,000 instruments. This article reviews its evolution during four phases: a pre-1950 period of sovereignty-based resource agreements and the Trail Smelter Arbitration; a 1950-1972 period of concern with nuclear and marine pollution; a modern period from the 1972 Stockholm Conference reinforced by the 1992 Rio Conference; and a post-Rio period of concern with climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution. It looks at the UN climate regime (Kyoto Protocol and Paris Agreement), the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, the 2023 BBNJ agreement, current plastics negotiations and the ICJ advisory opinion on states' climate obligations, to update previous accounts through 2025–2026.
The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.
This study did not require formal ethics approval.
Data sharing is not applicable to this article.