ABSTRACT
In a rapidly deteriorating natural environment, environmental law, despite its history of successes, must give way to ecological law—a regime in which the need to protect ecological systems must limit human activity affecting those systems. Lawyers can play an essential role in shaping and moving to a régime of ecological law by developing and participating in a process for transition to the new regime not only in environmental law but in all areas of law that govern human relations and define institutional structure. In legal representation and adjudication, lawyers can analyze and critique current law and argue for its application, interpretation and revision in light of evolving ecological values. As legislators, they can revise old laws and enact new ones that the move to an ecological future requires. Lawyer planners can articulate the new ideas and design the new structures for that future. In the legal academy, lawyers can define the new vision in their scholarship and inspire a new generation of lawyers to carry it out. This chapter uses examples involving the marine environment to illustrate these points.
