COMPARISON OF THE LEGAL REGULATION OF HUNTING IN LITHUANIA, POLAND, GERMANY, SWEDEN AND FINLAND

Abstract

The legal regulation of hunting plays an important role in the context of environmental protection and the sustainable use of natural resources. This field encompasses the interests of hunters, landowners, farmers, environmental organizations, and society as a whole, which are often conflicting and constitute a primary source of multifaceted disputes. In this context, the legal regulation of hunting becomes an important governance instrument aimed at ensuring ecological balance and the rational use of wildlife resources. The aim of the study is to compare hunting legal systems and to identify the main models of hunting regulation. The research employs linguistic, systematic, and comparative methods. The results of the study indicate that different models of hunting legal regulation are applied in the selected European countries. In Lithuania, hunting rights are based on a state-centered model, where hunting rights are granted by the state. In Poland, a mixed regulatory model is applied, combining elements of state-based and decentralized (community-based) regulation. In Germany, hunting rights are linked to land ownership, while in Sweden and Finland, a property-based model prevails, combining elements of both state regulation and private ownership. A comparison of hunting legal regulation models in different European countries shows that the Lithuanian legal framework is the most distant from the property-based model; therefore, the role of landowners in the context of hunting is the most limited.