Abstract:
The definition and identification of the public is the first problem to solve in the process of public participation. China’s related legislation defines the public by “relevant” and “may be affected”, the scope of the public in public participation in EIA is narrow in China, and the specific identification rules are just principles and are too simple, which is not conducive to the realization of the function of public participation. Although The Measures for Public Participation in EIA implemented in 2019 further clarifies the scope of the public and put forward the criteria of “the scope of EIA”, there is no substantive breakthrough and no systematic identification rules is established. In this regard, we should take “interested in” and “affected” as the core elements of the definition of the public, and clarify the role and the function of various types of the public, especially the neighboring residents, special groups, experts and environmental protection organizations. When identifying the specific public, we should aim at the unity of the quality and efficiency of environmental decision-making, absorb different participants for different stages of the participation, provide specific guidance and help for the top-down and bottom-up approaches to limit discretion and encourage the public, specify random sampling, self-selection, representative selection to make the ultimate choice of participants.