Environmental protection through the green principle in the Civil Code of the People’s Republic of China

Abstract

Environmental protection and sustainability have become among the main focal points of regulatory intervention by public authorities, including those of the People's Republic of China, which has rapidly evolved, in the past forty years, both the first country by output and by total carbon dioxide emission, with dire consequences on the environment and collective health.

Through the amalgamation of indigenous cultural elements and the rediscovery of some Marxist leitmotivs, the Chinese legislature has been adopting or amending laws and regulations to promote a “tighter system of environmental control” within the “socialist rule of law with Chinese characteristics” which is often marked by regulatory gaps and the structural problem of “publicizing private law”.

Within this framework of normative attention to tackling climate degradation, the introduction into the Chinese Civil Code, which came into force in 2021, of provisions soon known as the “green principle” is worth noting.

This paper aims to propose a comparative and problematizing analysis of the green principle in the recent Chinese codification, reconstructing, on the one hand, its value as a general regulatory principle of legal relations between parties and between parties and third parties, and on the other hand as an effective limitation on the bargaining autonomy of private parties. To assess the impact of the green principle, reflections in jurisprudence will be considered, including in light of China's emerging environmental doctrine.