https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/1900 Sat, 07 Nov 2026 12:20:17 GMT 2026-11-07T12:20:17Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/149751 Title: Paying due regard : balancing fisheries conservation and international development Abstract: This dissertation examines the historical trajectory of the relationship between fisheries and international development in the fisheries-related resolutions of the United Nations General Assembly from 1992 to 2025. It starts from the observation that international fisheries governance repeatedly recognises the special requirements of developing States, while the meaning of those requirements remains dispersed across treaty law, soft law, UNGA resolutions, FAO instruments, WTO rules and RFMO practice. The dissertation applies the Sociology of Knowledge Approach to Discourse (SKAD) to reconstruct how development is made meaningful, which actors are classified as requiring differentiated treatment, and which solutions become institutionally legitimate. The UNGA fisheries resolutions form the longitudinal coded corpus. Annex 3 situates Development within the wider fisheries discourse, while Annex 4 reconstructs the internal hierarchy of development-related code groups. Annexes 6 and 7 connect this hierarchy to related legal instruments and selected RFMO provisions, including WCPFC, IOTC and ICCAT materials. The analysis shows that development is stable and prominent in the UNGA corpus, but that its meanings are not equally weighted. The strongest development code groups are Technical and Scientific Capacity and Institutional and Regulatory Capacity. Development is therefore most consistently translated into data production, scientific research, stock assessment, monitoring, control and surveillance, compliance, port State implementation, RFMO participation, technology transfer and capacity-building. Social and distributive meanings, including food security, small-scale fisheries, gender, Indigenous Peoples, vulnerability, market access, productive sovereignty and disproportionate burden, become increasingly visible, especially in the later period. However, they are often incorporated through an implementation-centred structure. The dissertation argues that due regard and the special requirements of developing States have acquired clearer institutional form where they align with the functional needs of the fisheries regime, but remain less settled where they require allocation, burden-sharing, correction of historical advantage or stronger recognition of community authority. Description: M.A. Ocean Gov.(Melit.) Thu, 01 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/149751 2026-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/40361 Title: The Water Framework Directive's effect on the regulation of sustainable water management in Malta Abstract: In 1995, the European Union recognised the need to formulate a legal framework for the protection and restoration of all types of waters including surface water bodies (namely, water courses and other inland waters, transitional waters and coastal waters) and groundwater bodies. The EU Water Framework Directive, enacted in December 2000, represents an innovative, integrated and holistic approach towards water management that seeks to consolidate all parts of the entire environmental system. In an attempt to determine whether the Directive is being implemented in an effective manner by the Maltese competent authorities, and also whether these measures have had an impact on the quality of our waters as a result, this study shall seek to examine various aspects of the Directive including its legal text. Description: LL.B Mon, 01 Jan 2018 00:00:00 GMT https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/40361 2018-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/40359 Title: Keeping to our commitments : does the Climate Action Act provide the adequate legal framework for Malta to implement its obligations on climate action? Abstract: Climate change is a global threat with implications extending beyond the environmental sphere, thereby affecting aspects of one’s social, political and economic life. Consequently, effort has been made to subject climate change to a wide array of legislative and regulatory initiatives both at an international, EU and national level. Malta’s first overarching legal framework on climate law, the Climate Action Act, was enacted in July 2015. It forms part of a larger trend of countries seeking to enact flagship legislation, with the UK Climate Change Act (2008) taking lead. This term paper seeks to answer two connecting research questions. Firstly, to identify which are the current legal climate change obligations Malta, as EU Member State and party to international agreements such as the UNFCCC, the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement has committed to fulfilling. Secondly, whether the Climate Action Act (2015) addresses in an effective manner such obligations by providing the adequate legal framework for their attainment. This term paper argues that from a legal perspective, an overarching legal framework is essential for mainstreaming the current applicable laws relating to climate change, thereby creating a clear and coherent institutional and legal structure. However, although the Act seeks to streamline climate policy making, the term paper concludes that the overall effectiveness of the Act in practice depends further on how it will continue to be implemented. Such implementation is in turn dependent on a series of factors, including most notably administrative goodwill of the institutions and public authorities concerned as well as a mechanism of efficient financial flows. Description: LL.B Mon, 01 Jan 2018 00:00:00 GMT https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/40359 2018-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/40358 Title: The role and functions of the Environment and Resources Authority under the new Environment Protection Act following the demerger from the Planning Authority Abstract: In 2002, the Development Planning Act was amended by means of the Cultural Heritage Act, whereby the Planning Authority ceased to exist and became the Malta Environment and Planning Authority (MEPA). The MEPA’s core functions were the implementation of environmental and development planning law, until in 2016 the MEPA was split in two distinct public authorities, the Environment Resources Authority (ERA) and the Planning Authority. In this study the roles and functions of the ERA are analysed by first looking at the development of environmental law in Malta which has been pertinent in providing a context to the role and functions that ERA holds today. The first Environment Protection Act in 1991 was crucial to codify environmental legislation and enable the enactment of further legislation, until in 2002 another Act was promulgated to provide the means to implement the environment chapter of the acquis communautaire, then in 2010 the Act that fused the Planning Development Act and the Environment Protection Act was promulgated, which was subsequently repealed following the demerger. The core functions of ERA do not solely emanate from the EPA, 2016 but also from other legislative bodies which put ERA in a decision-taker’s and consultative role on the Board of other Authorities such as the Lands Authority and the Planning Authority. ERA has morphed from a government department, to a Directorate within MEPA, to a distinct public authority responsible of environmental affairs. It has its own permitting and enforcement functions and is syndicated by the EPRT, the Legislative arm of public administration and other Constitutional Bodies such as the Ombudsman and the National Audit Office. The establishment of ERA has translated in a stronger environmental voice, albeit it is yet in its infantile stages and not without acknowledging that its voice can be made even sturdier by affecting legislative amendments that will provide ERA with stronger footing in the decision taking fora that impinge the environmental integrity the most. Description: LL.B Mon, 01 Jan 2018 00:00:00 GMT https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/40358 2018-01-01T00:00:00Z