ABSTRACT
This pyramid of norms comprises the federal legal system that has to be respected by all other domestic legislation.
2. The Constitutional Right to a Clean Environment
After the 1994 reforms, the Argentinian Constitution defined the right to a clean environment in the first paragraph of Article 41, as the right of all inhabitants to a 'healthy and balanced environment, which allows for human development and productive activities to satisfy the needs of the present generation, without compromising the possibility of future generations to satisfy theirs'. The interpretation of the first part of this phrase will probably give rise to legal disputes, because the terms 'healthy and balanced' are vague and contain an emotive burden that makes them totally dependent upon the values of the interpreter. To pretend that someone can determine when the environment is 'balanced' evidences a conception of the environment as something static when, in reality, it is completely dynamic and subject to permanent change.
