Environmental law’s benefits lag far behind its politics because ecological problems resist quick fixes.

Evidence

Nixon’s turnabout is revealing of the inherent challenges of environmental lawmaking. Nixon correctly perceived a temporal disconnect between the politics of environmental protection and the law of environmental protection. Success and failure in the political arena is measured by a time frame far shorter and more episodic than is possible for the analysis of the success of new, complex, and comprehensive legal regimes. Because of the sheer complexity and associated scientific uncertainties of ecological problems, and the inherently compromising and conservative character of our nation’s lawmaking institutions, palpable environmental improvements are likely to occur only after years, if not decades, of program experimentation, implementation, and enforcement. In many instances, it simply takes time to understand and address a complex ecological problem. And, even when the answer may be clear, the enormous distributional repercussions of its legislative embrace prompt the enactment of laws that may promise the world, but that are in fact riddled with the compromises and accommodations, which further stall the realization of environmental improvements. Hence, while the electoral politics of environmental protection occur over weeks and months during congressional and presidential election cycles, the yield of environmental protection law frequently presents itself only on a much longer time scale. — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 368

Categorization

• recurring: this claim recurs 2 times within its source
• XREF: connects to: Land-use problems resisted the technological fixes that made pollution law politically feasible — Adam Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside:…, 983; Environmental standard-setting is institutionally unsuited to the legislative arena — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 838; Americans strongly want environmental laws but resist paying near-term costs for them — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 1089 (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Environmental protection structurally requires present sacrifice for unverifiable future gain #expands (0.86) — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 983
• Land-use problems resisted the technological fixes that made pollution law politically feasible #corroborates (0.85) — Adam Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside, 983
• Americans strongly want environmental laws but resist paying near-term costs for them #corroborates (0.80) — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 1089
• Environmental standard-setting is institutionally unsuited to the legislative arena #expands (0.72) — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 838