Duplomb Law: How the State Organizes Its Judicial Impunity in the Face of Environmental Damage

She's a real star. Not one you see on the red carpet, certainly, but she's nonetheless front-page news, unleashing passions, both sad and rebellious, and their wild cries.

Since its adoption by the joint committee on May 26, the law of Senator "Les Républicains" (LR) Laurent Duplomb has been the center of attention, both from its ardent defenders and from worried citizens.

So much so that two million people signed, in a short space of time and in the middle of summer, a petition calling for its repeal because of the danger it represents for biodiversity, health and the agricultural world.

Behind these points of tension represented by the reintroduction of pesticides, the facilitation of the construction of mega-ponds or the acceleration of intensive livestock farming, another consequence which has remained under the radar for the time being is to be feared: the legal impunity of the State in the face of appeals regularly brought (and won) by environmental defenders.

"This is part of the gradual weakening of environmental law that has been observed over the past few years," laments specialist lawyer Mathilde Lacaze-Masmonteil. Since Emmanuel Macron came to power,...