Date of Award

Spring 4-20-2026

Degree Type

Dissertation

First Advisor

Michael Daw

Second Advisor

Remigius Chibueze

Third Advisor

Innocent Onwuazombe

Abstract

This dissertation critically examines the disjuncture between the formal recognition of the right to a safe, clean, healthy, and sustainable environment in international law and its practical implementation, a phenomenon widely characterized as the "implementation gap." Despite five decades of prolific treaty-making and normative development, from the 1972 Stockholm Declaration to the 2022 United Nations General Assembly Resolution 76/300 recognizing the right to a healthy environment as a human right, environmental degradation continues to accelerate, with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warning that the window for securing a liveable future is "rapidly closing."

The study addresses a central research question: how can the implementation gap be explained and remedied, particularly through comparative analysis of the United States and Nigeria? Employing a doctrinal legal methodology supplemented by comparative and socio-legal analysis, the research integrates four theoretical frameworks, namely International Relations theories (Regime Theory and Compliance Theory), Legal Theories (Monism and Dualism), Human Rights Theory (Generations of Rights and the Indivisibility Thesis), and the Environmental Justice Framework, to construct a comprehensive analytical apparatus.

The dissertation's findings reveal that the implementation gap is not merely an administrative delay but a structural feature of contemporary environmental governance. Through a "most different systems" comparative design, the study demonstrates that despite vast disparities in wealth, institutional capacity, and historical development, both the United States and Nigeria exhibit persistent failures to translate international commitments into domestic reality. In the United States, the gap is driven by "regulatory whiplash," that is, extreme partisan polarization that produces volatile enforcement priorities and the judicial dismantling of administrative deference following decisions such as Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo (2024). In Nigeria, the gap stems from "structural fragility," namely a dualist constitutional framework requiring legislative domestication of treaties (Section 12 of the 1999 Constitution), chronic underfunding of enforcement agencies, and the "oil and gas exception" that shields the petroleum sector from the National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency.

The analysis of multilateral environmental agreement compliance mechanisms reveals a consistent structural preference for the "Managerial Model" over the "Enforcement Model." Compliance committees under the Paris Agreement, the Convention on Biological Diversity, and other regimes are designed to be facilitative, non-adversarial, and non-punitive, prioritizing transparency and capacity-building over sanctions. This design choice, while essential for maintaining universal participation, has produced a "transparency-action gap" where states can remain in formal compliance (by submitting reports) while failing in substantive compliance (by continuing to pollute). Only regimes such as the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), with its authority to recommend trade suspensions, have demonstrated that "harder" enforcement mechanisms can compel domestic legislative action.

The dissertation advances several theoretical contributions. It articulates the "Sovereignty-Sustainability Paradox," theorizing the implementation gap as a structural equilibrium where states maintain international legitimacy through "managerial compliance" while domestic economic imperatives ensure substantive non-compliance. It challenges the conventional view that the gap is merely a developing-world problem, demonstrating instead that it is a consequence of institutional design that prioritizes short-term economic sovereignty over long-term ecological stability.

Based on these findings, the study proposes a multi-level strategy for reform. At the international level, it recommends adopting an Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights recognizing the right to a healthy environment as a stand-alone, justiciable right; redesigning multilateral environmental agreement compliance committees to include an "adversarial branch"; and establishing a Global Environmental Registry to harmonize reporting obligations. At the regional level, it advocates for an Additional Protocol on Environmental Rights for the African Union and the establishment of a West African Environmental Enforcement Network. At the national level, it proposes constitutional reform in Nigeria to render environmental rights justiciable, statutory clarification in the United States to insulate administrative agencies from judicial overreach, and cross-cutting reforms including the democratization of environmental data through National Environmental Data Commons and the protection of environmental human rights defenders.

The dissertation concludes that closing the implementation gap requires a fundamental shift from state-centric consent to rights-based accountability. This transformation demands the constitutionalization of environmental rights, the democratization of environmental data, and the insulation of regulatory institutions from political and industrial interference. For communities in the Niger Delta and vulnerable populations in the United States, the effectiveness of environmental law is a matter of physical survival and human dignity, a reminder that environmental rights are not "third-generation" luxuries but the prerequisites for the exercise of all other human rights. The law remains our most potent tool to ensure that the right to a healthy environment is not merely a diplomatic aspiration but a lived reality for present and future generations.

Download

Included in

Law Commons

Share

COinS