Die frühe Öffentlichkeitsbeteiligung

After an increase in protests against major building projects, legislators, by creating the law on early public participation, section 25, paragraph 3 of Germany’s Administrative Procedure Act (Verwaltungsverfahrensgesetz), created a new instrument for citizens to participate in decision-making on such projects. As the law applies a regulatory approach characterised by a significant number of undefined legal terms, many questions have arisen about it, which are addressed and resolved in this dissertation. This book provides the authorities that apply the law, and any departments or legal counsellors for the heads of major building projects with a guide to the law’s application, its legal consequences, what follows if mistakes are made by the department applying the law and in which cases the law’s legal consequences do not apply. Against the backdrop of the legal consequences chosen by the legislator, the book examines if standardising the implementation of early public participation, which is mandatory for the head of a major project, would be constitutionally admissible and how such standardisation could be achieved.