Last year when attending a meeting of legal aid groups, I was exposed to  a side of lawyers that I had not seen (or had not been aware of).  That, behind the scenes of China’s developing civil society, its lawyers were beginning to develop means that would ultimately support those affected by lax environmental compliance and enforcement.

IT was one of those “ah-ha” moments that lead to a new appreciation of lawyers, and one of those” ah-ha” moments where I realized that the old model was changing.  That, as an NGO leader in China, as lawyers (and media) engaged, improvements could be made on a much higher level.  It was an important revelation in my mind, and the recent NRDC announcement NRDC and Partners Establish New Environmental Law Training Base for Judges, Lawyers and Environmental Regulators in Central Chinaprovides another encouraging sign that more improvements are on the way:

NRDC has been working on environmental governance and rule of law issues in China since 2005.  As part of this work, last week, we launched a new environmental law training base for judges and lawyers last week in Wuhan, Hubei Province in collaboration with Zhongnan University of Economics and Law and the American Bar Association’s China Rule of Law Initiative.  It is the first training center of its kind outside of Beijing.

simply put, this is a big step, an important step for China as it goes forward and looks to improve the process through which violations surface and are managed. that, while the old system of flareups may have been effective for that particular cause, it did not improve the system, and that through a wider program of training lawyers and judges we can look forward to improvements in how environmental cases are handled.