Climate Ethics is a new and growing area of research that focuses on the ethical dimensions of climate change, and concepts such as climate justice.
Human-induced climate change raises many profound ethical questions, yet many believe that these ethical issues have not been addressed adequately in climate change policy debates or in the scientific and economic literature on climate change; and that, consequently, ethical questions are being overlooked or obscured in climate negotiations, policies and discussions . It has been pointed out that those most responsible for climate change are not the same people as those most vulnerable to its effects.
Terms such as climate justice and ecological justice ('eco justice') are used worldwide, and have been adopted by various groups.
Contents |
An article in the scientific journal Nature (Patz, 2005) concluded that the human-induced warming that the world is now experiencing is already causing 150,000 deaths and 5 million incidents of disease each year from additional malaria and diarrhea, mostly in the poorest nations. Death and disease incidents are likely to soar as warming increases. Facts such as this demonstrate that climate change is compromising rights to life, liberty and personal security. Hence, ethical analysis of climate change policy must examine how that policy impacts on those basic rights.
The rights to life, liberty, and personal security are basic human rights that are the foundation for deriving other widely recognized rights found in international law and practice. These rights, for example, have been the basis for such practical rules as the “no harm principle” and the “precautionary principle.” These rights are recognized in a number of international treaties and decisions in international tribunals, and are widely recognized as foundational by many of the world’s religions. These rights are also expressly set out in Article Three of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which expressly provides that:
Climate change raises a number of particularly challenging ethical issues about distributive justice, in particular concerning how to fairly share the benefits and burdens of climate change policy options. Many of the policy tools often employed to solve environmental problems such as cost-benefit analysis usually do not adequately deal with these issues because they often ignore questions of just distribution.
In December 2004 in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the Collaborative Program on the Ethical Dimensions of Climate Change was launched at the 10th Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The major outcome of this meeting was the Buenos Aires Declaration on the Ethical Dimensions of Climate Change.
The program on the Ethical Dimensions of Climate Change seeks to:
Given the severity of impact to be expected and given the likelihood that some level of important disruptions in living conditions will occur for great numbers of people due to climate change events, this group contends that there is sufficient convergence among ethical principles to make a number of concrete recommendations on how governments should act, or identify ethical problems with positions taken by certain governments, organizations, or individuals.
Facts about climate change and fundamental human rights provide the starting point for climate ethics.
Members of the Ethical Dimensions of Climate Change program include:
Rock Ethics Institute, Penn State University Secretariat
In June 2009 prominent anti-mining activist Marcelo Rivera Moreno was kidnapped, tortured and murdered in Cabañas. In December 2009 two more activists (Ramiro Rivera Gomez on December 20[1] and Dora Alicia Recinos Sorto on December 26[2]) that oppose the activities of the Pacific Rim Mining Corporation in their home region were killed. Dora Sorto was eight months pregnant when she was shot dead, and her two year old son was also wounded in the attack.[3] Dora “Alicia” Recinos Sorto was shot dead near her home. Sorto was an active member of the Cabañas Environment Committee, which has campaigned against the reopening of a gold mine owned by the Vancouver-based Pacific Rim Mining Corporation.[4][5][6][7]