Document Type

Article

Disciplines

International Law

Abstract

Many social organizations in the Soviet Union are engaged in environmental protection. In some instances, their nature conservation activities fall within their express duties and are quite evident. In others, social organizations encounter nature conservation issues only incidentally to their principal activities.

Republic nature conservation societies and societies of hunters and fisherman are in the first category. The second category includes trade unions, the Komsomol,1 the Society of Rationalizers and Inventors and various scientific-technical societies. When social organizations of the second category are created, environmental protection is not included as one of their aims or tasks, but subsequently becomes one of their activities.

All groups concerned with environmental protection are united by a common concept that exists within the framework of Soviet social organizations. These groups, which play an integral part in the political hierarchy of Soviet society, are voluntary associations of working people. Social organizations carry on activities under the guidance of the Communist party and participate in deciding the tasks of communist construction in close cooperation and interaction with state agencies. The most active work in encouraging environmental protection activity is carried on by the nature conservation societies and the social organizations that exist within the framework of various ministries and departments, for example, scientific-technical societies.

The functions of nature conservation societies lie in the domain of assisting state, cooperative and social organizations in the implementation of environmental protection measures and the promotion of the rational use and protection of natural resources. The respective environmental duties of the societies are embodied in their charters. The Fundamental Principles of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics [USSR] and legislation of the union republics on land, minerals, water and forests, as well as the laws on the protection and use of the animal world and the atmosphere, provide for the participation of nature protection societies in fulfilling state nature protection tasks. The mass membership of these social organizations and the concomitant opportunity to exercise additional control over enterprises and exert influence over labor collective members explains the involvement of the various organizations in the tasks of environmental protection and the rational use of natural resources.

Social organizations engage in numerous nature conservation activities. The principal goal of their work is to encourage environmental protection activity in the national economy.' The unique character of these social organizations virtually precludes the use of liability or responsibility as a method of influencing behavior. The most extreme measure of social pressure allowed under the charters of voluntary societies is expulsion from the society. The Charter of the Latvian Society for the Protection of Nature and Monuments, for example, provides that primary and superior organizations may sanction society members for violating the charter by the use of warnings or by expelling them from the society. Decisions regarding expulsion may be appealed to the respective superior organizations.

The central organs have various methods available to influence the societies. For example, they may exert pressure on certain primary organizations by calling attention to their poor work regarding environmental protection or the rational use of natural resources when evaluating the results of socialist competitions, reviews or contests. In addition, social organizations use forms of moral and material encouragement to advance the cause of nature protection work in the national economy.

The functions of social organizations in stimulating nature protection have been established by setting normative values or norms. The organizations create these norms through moral stimulation and material encouragement for the achievements of the working people in the spheres of environmental protection and the rational use of natural resources. An analysis of the charters of social organizations supports the conclusion that the norms providing moral stimuli are used more widely in social organizations than those providing for material encouragement. As noted in Soviet doctrinal writings, this is to be explained by the fact that the principal tasks and purposes of social organizations consist above all in satisfying the various spiritual interests of citizens. Satisfying the economic interests of members of the said organizations is not the aim of the organizations, but has merely auxiliary significance as a means of facilitating the realization of the spiritual interests of citizens who join such organizations.

The activities of republican nature conservation societies have encouraged environmental protection activities in the national economy. These activities are carried on only within the individual republic and are not coordinated at the all-union level. Therefore, each nature conservation society has entirely its own methods and forms of work and acts independently to stimulate environmental protection activities in the national economy. Nonetheless, the forms of encouraging environmental protection used in the republican societies are basically similar.

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