In an attempt to help fill the void created by a lack of comparative environmental analysis, this Article will analyze comparatively the legal aspects of air and water pollution control in some of the major legal systems. For practical rather than academically justifiable reasons, a relatively small aspect of environment law, i.e., air and water pollution and closely related matters will be considered. The country by country analysis which follows will be broken down structurally into two groups: common law countries and civil law countries. In an effort to make the country by country analysis more meaningful, air and water pollution control in the United States will be briefly summarized so that the American system can be used as a basis and framework for comparison