A Quantitative Ecological Analysis of the Law: A New Methodological Approach to Legal Studies on Environmental Matters

The main characteristic of economic analyses of law is the adoption of economic efficiency as the essential cri terion in analysing and evaluating the effects of laws. However, contemporary environmental challenges oblige us to radically reconsider not only the legal norms under lying social behaviours but also the methodological approach and the founding principles through which said norms are defined and evaluated. This aspect lays the grounds for a new discipline which could be called quantitative ecological analysis of the law, aimed at quantifying the short- and long-term ecological benefits derived from the introduction of a law. This article devel ops and discusses the prospect of a quantitative ecologi cal analysis of the law as a methodological approach useful in formulating and evaluating environmental laws. The methodological approach proposed in this article is applied to analysing two new environmental laws and quantifying, in analytical terms, the ecological benefits that could derive from the hypothetical introduc tion of these laws in the Italian legal system.