The Italian Constitution in the Anthropocene. Tracing The European Tradition of Environmental Constitutionalism

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to provide a comparative framework for the European tradition of solidaristic

environmental constitutionalism, as the backdrop of the recent Italian environmental constitutional

amendment. The paper will firstly present a historical analysis of the different cultural approaches to the

constitutional protection of the environment. Secondly, the contribution will investigate how the methodological

toolbox of comparative law could be employed to identify some prototypes of environmental constitutionalism

(e.g., the European model of ‘instrumental protection’, the North American model of ‘procedural protection’,

the recognition of the legal subjectivity of Nature in Global South constitutions). Finally, this contribution

will briefly review three case studies, in an effort to underline the potential of ex ante (or physiological)

instruments, like deliberative democracy, as well as ex post (or pathological) tools, like climate litigation. The

French Convention citoyenne pour le climat of 2019, the order Neubauer, et al. v. Germany issued by the

German Federal Constitutional Court and, lastly, the Italian environmental constitutional amendment

approved in February 2022, will be examined.