[Gravityloss]

There are quite a lot of anti-pollution and other laws that work very well. Why wouldn't they? You have to protect the society as well. If someone does damage to your property, I assume you'd think it's ok to protect you against that? What if the property is owned by the state? Or is an important natural resource that is not owned by anyone, but depended on by millions, or even billions?

Also, where do the laws come from? Many environmental laws enacted by nations are influenced by international treaties - this is required because many environmental problems don't respect borders. Take for example waste water cleaning and the Baltic Sea.

It is hard to create such treaties. But it has been done and can be done in the future.