This page intentionally left blank The International Law of Environmental Impact Assessment The central idea animating environmental impact assessment (EIA) is that decisions affecting the environment should be made through a comprehensive evaluation of predicted impacts. Notwithstanding their evaluative mandate, EIA processes do not impose specific environmental standards, but rely on the creation of open, participatory and information-rich decision-making settings to bring about environmentally benign es. In light of this tension between process and substance, Neil Craik assesses whether EIA, as a method of implementing international environmental law, is a sound policy strategy, and how international mitments structure transnational interactions in order to influence decisions affecting the international environment. Through prehensive description of international EIA commitments and their implementation within domestic and transnational governance structures, and drawing on specific examples of transnational EIA processes, the author examines how international mitments can facilitate interest coordination, and provide opportunities for persuasion and for the internalization of international environmental norms. Neil Craik is an associate professor at the Faculty of Law, University of New Brunswick, where he teaches and researches in the fields of international environmental law and domestic (Canadian) environmental law. Prior to his academic appointment, Professor Craik practised environmental and land use law with a major Canadian law firm. cambridge studies in international parative law Established in 1946, this series produces high quality scholarship in the fields of public and private international law parative law. Although these are distinct legal sub-disciplines, developments since 1946 confirm their interrelation. Comparative law is increasingly used as a tool in the making of law at national, regional and international levels