An Ecological Approach to International Law

An Ecological Approach to International Law offers the first major critique of international law based on environmental ethics.
Since the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, governments are legally obliged to respond to global climate change and develop common strategies. But how successful has this been? This work shows that international environmental law is fundamentally flawed and not equipped to meet global climate challenges. It examines international legal responses to global climate change by analyzing key concepts such as the doctrine of state sovereignty, the law on state responsibility, environmental rights and common heritage of mankind. The author argues that there are substantive limitations with each of these concepts, and all share a fundamental weakness: the absence of an ethical and legal commitment towards the global commons and future generations. To argue for such commitments the book takes a dual approach considering ethical and legal features as being equally important. As a result, international environmental law, currently being "the law of nations with respect to the biosphere", would transform to "the law of the biosphere with respect to nations". The text offers a critique of international law based on environmental ethics. By introducing the new principle of common heritage of