Analyzing the Mechanisms of Civil Liability for Compensating Environmental Damages

Physical, material, and moral damages incurred by a person following the occurrence of environmental damages make provisioning and implementing a proper civil liability system a necessity more than ever before. Although, there are lots of literature on the subject matter, it is essential to explore the relationship between the two subjects of “civil liability” and “environmental protection” to analyze the mechanisms of the former in determining the compensation of damages incurred by the latter. This is a descriptive-analytic research using library and note-taking and by referring to laws and regulations and literature. The findings showed that due to the failure of mechanisms of offense-based civil liabilities in compensating environmental damages, it can be beneficial to use strict civil liability based mechanisms, environmental responsibilities, insurance, and environmental damages fund. However, the approach of international environmental law in this field is to humanize the category of environment. Lack of mandatory environmental responsibilities for polluting businesses and lack of regulations on environmental damages fund are the most important challenges for a civil liability system in Iran to be effective in compensating for environmental damages.