ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with the scholarly literature that green criminologists produce. It considers laws and policies and especially the emergence of global environmental enforcement. The chapter explores how traditional legal approaches to environmental crime are not appropriate solutions to environmental crime. It reviews important multinational environmental agreements (MEAs), including the benefits and limits of this type of global approach to enforcement. The chapter suggests that while green criminologists recognize potential gains that may result from stronger regulation, they also point out the structural limits that prevent the law from slowing rates of ecological destruction. It emphasizes that appropriate responses to environmental violations must consider the political economy and "treadmill of production", proposing that environmental law must recognize that the base of current economic structures of capitalism increase and perpetuate environmental crimes. The green criminology developed to account for the tremendous amount of ecological destruction occurring across the globe.
