Politics of the Environment Essay 2 (original) (raw)
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The 21 st century global society is already a fact: it is developed on the basis of key-documents adopted under the aegis of the UN, designed to implement the " sustainable development " pattern, instead of the " consumer-type of society " obsolete pattern. Agenda 2030, as a recent UN document, provides legal and conceptual tools for the creation of new types of visionary legal terms, such as " global eco-diplomacy " , " global eco-politics " , " eco-sovereignty " , " eco-nations " etc. The necessity to adjust all the fields of policy and legislation (at infra-national, national, regional and international fields) to the growing demands of environmental and planet protection leads to exploratory studies about new forms of international law and about new evolutions of its basic principles. According to the doctrine, the phrase " common goods " entails the idea of human community, with this type of goods destined to " serve a common aspiration of the human beings towards the improvement of the human condition " 2. The doctrine considers that peace, preservation of natural resources, the planetary ecosystem are part of the " common goods " category. As shown by the doctrine, this concept refers to fields beyond the national jurisdiction of the states, outside the sovereign control of the states, either due to the effects of an international agreement (legal status of Antarctica), or due to the actual impossibility of being the object of a state sovereign control (atmosphere, free sea) 3. Progressively, the international theory of regimes, the theory of durable development, as well as the non-institutionalism theory saw a tendency to consider that " planetary common goods " require normative regimes, global institutions and global solutions for the preservation of their quality, for the use of future generations, with certain authors discussing about the existence of such deficiencies, in the present 1 The present article represents only the personal opinion of the author and it does not involve in any form any other natural person or legal entity. All the rights over the present text are reserved. The quotations from the present text are made by mentioning the author and the complete source.
Global Environmental Change and the Nation State: Sovereignty Bounded?
In spite of early hopes for a 'fading away' of sovereignty in the face of global environmental challenges, recent codifications of international law have confirmed the creeping national enclosure of what were once considered common assets – e.g., exclusive economic zones, under the 1982 Law of the Sea Convention; and access to genetic resources, from the 1983 International Undertaking via the 1992 Biodiversity Convention to the 2001 Plant Gene Treaty. Yet, because of their explicit limitation and qualification by 'common interest' obligations, these expanded sovereign rights of nation-states must be considered fiduciary rather than proprietary. The emerging legal regime is one of international public trusteeship (sometimes referred to as guardianship or stewardship) over a widening range of environmental resources. This chapter traces the evolution of the public trust concept in modern environmental law and its ramifications for international law and governance, as reflected in proposals suggesting a new environmental mandate for the UN Trusteeship Council.
Factors in the Development of a Global Substantive Environmental Right
Onati Socio-Legal Series, 2013
Owing to the fact that there is currently no international treaty that provides a globally accepted substantive human right for the protection of the environment (Anton and Shelton 2011, Turner 2009) there is a case for considering how such a right could or should be developed. This paper considers certain aspects of the potential development of such a right by focussing on key non-state actors that make decisions, which can affect the environment. Consideration is given to three different types of non-state actors: companies (corporations), the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and multilateral development banks (MDBs). It specifically examines their 'constitutional' purposes and the overall legal constraints that their decision-makers are bound to comply with, and where applicable, the legal obligations that they impose upon their members.
PRINCIPAL DETERMINANT OF GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES: AN ANALYSIS OF NATIONAL INTEREST
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF RESEARCH IN SOCIAL SCIENCES, HUMANITIES AND LITERATURE., 2018
The developed nations by distorting and dominating the public sphere are creating hegemony over the developing countries. Through the national interest policies, they are creating a sense of deterrence and havoc among underdeveloped and less powerful countries and become responsible for environmental degradation. The paper tries to analyze how national interest leads to environmental destruction and the failure of environmental protocols. The study focuses on the role of developed countries, particularly the USA, in polluting global environment and their participation in environmental protocols. The study is mainly based on secondary data. The main sources of data are the Census reports, Websites, Research articles and Books. The study reveals that globally human life is suffering from various environmental issues like Ozone Layer Depletion, Global Warming, Climate change, Deforestation etc. The main cause of these environmental crises is mostly national interest and also it is the national interest that is becoming an obstacle in the way of addressing these issues through collective efforts. In case of USA, what comes first is its national interest in order to maintain its hegemony and uni-polar dominance in the world that is traced from its role in the Second World War and destruction of fauna and flora of two cities of Japan by dropping atom bombs. Further, on the name of " Global War on Terrorism " the US military interventions in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan have had a serious impact on the natural environments of these countries. The study also revealed, that in spite of being a major source of global environmental pollution such as climate change, USA has shown its back when time had come to combat these global environmental challenges, with its withdrawal from the Paris agreement 2015 on climate change mitigation before the earliest possible effective date. The motive behind the withdrawn from the agreement was to protect US from loosing economic strength in the world. According to the agreement it has to provide funds and technology for global environmental protection and to reduce the emission of green house gases. Hence, consequently this burden is thrown on the shoulders of third world nations whose economic and technological strength made them incapable to combat these environmental challenges. So there is need to architect some institutional arrangements to facilitate a leap from narrowly defined national interests to a global regime and to entail distributive justice ability to pay approach for financial aids to combat climate change. The developed countries, particularly the USA, should come to front for addressing global problem of climate change.
The Environmental Paradox: How National Interests Conflict with Global Sustainability
Science For All Publications, 2023
This article aims to explore the complex and paradoxical relationship between national interests and global sustainability in the context of environmental issues. As nations pursue their individual interests, conflicts often arise with the broader goal of achieving global sustainability. The article examines key drivers of this paradox and analyzes specific examples to illustrate the challenges faced in balancing national aspirations with the imperative of preserving our planet for future generations. By delving into case studies and relevant literature, this research presents a comprehensive analysis of the environmental paradox and proposes potential strategies for reconciling national interests with global sustainability.
The principle of 'common but differentiated responsibility' evolved from the notion of the 'common heritage of mankind' and is a manifestation of general principles of equity in international law. The principle recognises historical differences in the contributions of developed and developing States to global environmental problems, and differences in their respective economic and technical capacity to tackle these problems. Despite their common responsibilities, important differences exist between the stated responsibilities of developed and developing countries. The Rio Declaration states: " In view of the different contributions to global environmental degradation, States have common but differentiated responsibilities. The developed countries acknowledge the responsibility that they bear in the international pursuit of sustainable development in view of the pressures their societies place on the global environment and of the technologies and financial resources they command. " Similar language exists in the Framework Convention on Climate Change; parties should act to protect the climate system " on the basis of equality and in accordance with their common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities. " The principle of common but differentiated responsibility includes two fundamental elements. The first concerns the common responsibility of States for the protection of the environment, or parts of it, at the national, regional and global levels. The second concerns the need to take into account the different circumstances, particularly each State's contribution to the evolution of a particular problem and its ability to prevent, reduce and control the threat. II. Implications of the Principle of Common but Differentiated Responsibilities In practical terms, the principle has at least two consequences. First, it entitles, or may require, all concerned States to participate in international response measures aimed at addressing environmental problems. Second, it leads to environmental standards that impose differing obligations on States. The principle finds its roots prior to UNCED and is supported by state practice at the regional and global levels. Common responsibility describes the shared obligations of two or more States towards the protection of a particular environmental resource. Common responsibility is likely to apply where the resource is shared, under the control of no state, or under the sovereign control of a state, but subject to a common legal interest (such as biodiversity – termed a common concern of humankind). The concept of common responsibility evolved from an extensive series of international laws (see section III below) governing resources labelled as 'common heritage of mankind' or of 'common concern.' Differentiated responsibility of States for the protection of the environment is widely accepted in treaty and other State practices. It translates into differentiated environmental standards set on the basis of a range of factors, including special needs and circumstances, future economic development of countries, and historic contributions to the creation of an environmental problem. The Stockholm Declaration emphasised the need to consider " the applicability of standards which are valid for the most advanced countries but which may be inappropriate and of unwarranted social cost for the developing countries. " In the Rio Declaration, states agreed that " environmental standards, management objectives and priorities should reflect the environmental and developmental context to which they apply, " that " the special situation of developing countries, particularly the least developed and those most environmentally vulnerable, shall be given special priority, and that standards used by some countries " may be inappropriate and of unwarranted economic and social cost to other countries, in particular developing countries. "
International Political Theory and Global Environmental Issues
ESCAE JOURNAL OF MANAGEMENT AND SECURITY (EJMSS), 2022
As environmental problems transcend national boundaries, they come to be a feature of international politics. This paper seeks to draw a distinction between two ways of thinking about the relationship between international political theory and the global environment. It scrutinizes five sets of arguments which suggest that the traditionalist account of the scope of international political theory provides an inadequate basis for apprehending, comprehending and rationalizing the problems of global environmental change, and which, in disparate ways and to a varied extent, do indeed open up the possibility of a 'fundamental discontinuity in the system of states'. This paper points out that detailed consideration of these arguments is imperative both to understand and illuminate the still very important state-centred agenda of 'traditional' international political theory and to understand the ways in which environmental problems and politics may be altering dominant frames of reference and suggesting a broader, if murkier, scope for international political theory. This paper also indicates that environmental issues have become increasingly prominent on the international agenda over the last sixty years assisted by the effects of globalization. It shows how this has prompted attempts to arrange cooperation between states and surveys the form and function of such activity with reference to some of the main international environmental regimes. Because climate change has become a problem of such enormous significance, a separate section is devoted to the efforts to create an international climate regime. This is followed by a brief consideration of how some of the theoretical parts of international relations (IR) relate to international environmental politics.