Traditional means of international dispute settlement have proved to be largely ineffective in ensuring the effectiveness of international environmental law. Thus, states are increasingly creating regime-specific systems to control, facilitate and assist the implementation of and compliance with each multilateral environmental agreement.

By bringing together the perspectives of scholars, negotiators and practitioners, this book provides a comprehensive and in-depth analysis of the most advanced of these systems, the so-called “non-compliance mechanisms”, in which a specialized treaty body is entrusted with the task of examining cases of non-compliance by State parties.

Included are descriptions of each mechanism and an analysis of cross-cutting issues. It also explains how these systems relate to relevant concepts and mechanisms of general international law and, for the first time, of European Union law.

The book is a valuable source of information and recommended reading for academics, practitioners, civil servants, NGOs and all those interested in public international law, EC law and environmental law.

Tullio Treves is a Judge at the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea and Professor of International Law at the University of Milan; Laura Pineschi is Professor of International Law at the University of Parma; Attila Tanzi is Professor of International Law at the University of Bologna and Chairperson of the Compliance Committee of the Protocol on Water and Health; Cesare Pitea is Aggregate Professor of International and European Law at the University of Parma; Chiara Ragni is a Senior Researcher in International Law atthe University of Milan; and Francesca Romanin Jacur is a Post-doc Researcher in International Law at the University of Milan and Legal Adviser to the Italian Ministry of the Environment, Land and Sea in a project of the University of Siena.