Over the last century, international law has sought to keep pace with sweeping changes that have revolutionised the international community. It has done so in various ways: by developing new fields, adopting new legal instruments, and including new actors and entities in the international fora. Human rights law and environmental law have emerged to address essential issues raised by civil society. Treaties, judgments and soft law instruments have attempted to fill the gaps in regulation. International organisations, corporations, civil society organisations and individuals have all worked to make and enforce, also by judicial means, legal rules. But is all this sufficient?In an effort to answer this question, the chapters of this volume explore selected emerging issues in the fields of human rights, the environment, cultural heritage and law of the sea. Can state responsibility help to protect the environment? Can protecting human rights be reconciled with national security? Can the UN Security Council address climate change? Is law of the sea still fit for purpose? And how can we balance human rights and the environment, or cultural heritage and law of the sea? The international scholars and experienced practitioners who have contributed to this volume discuss these and other key questions.Given its scope, the book will appeal to researchers and scholars of international law, as well as those specialising in human rights law, environmental law, cultural heritage law, and law of the sea.

The threat posed by climate change has not yet been matched by international agreements and economic policies that can deliver sharp reductions in greenhouse-gas emissions. Although the Kyoto Protocol has now been ratified by Russia and hence come into legal effect, the USA, China, and India are all outside its emissions caps. Few European countries are on course to meet their own national targets, and even if fully implemented, it is widely acknowledged that the Kyoto Protocol would make little difference to the carbon concentrations in the atmosphere. In consequence, there is a search for a post-Kyoto framework, new institutions, and new economic policies to spread the costs and meet them in an economically efficient way. Carbon taxes and emissions trading are, in particular, being established in a number of developing countries. This volume provides an accessible overview of the economics of climate change, the policy options, and the scope for making significant carbon reductions.

Drawing specifically on the international climate regime, Simone Schiele examines international environmental regimes from a legal perspective and analyses a core feature of international regimes - their ability to evolve over time. In particular, she develops a theoretical framework based on general international law which allows for a thorough examination of the understanding of international law and the options for law-creation in international environmental regimes. The analysis therefore provides both a coherent understanding of the international climate regime and a starting point for further research in other regimes.

This unparalleled resource sets forth the international community's blueprint for worldwide development. Here is one reference source for all of the action plans negotiated since the United Nations' historic "Earth Summit" in 1992 in Rio de Janeiro that established the global and regional priorities necessary to sustain environmentally sound economic and social development. Expert commentary and annotations on the implications - both opportunities for investment and concerns about changes in regulatory regimes - of these international legal policy decisions is featured here.
This is the only resource integrating implementation strategies with the Agenda 21 directives, complete with analytical commentary and annotations. This comprehensive work provides expert guidance to the legal instruments framing the strategic objectives for sustainable development. It includes full coverage of the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation, adopted at the UN World Summit for Sustainable Development (2002), which set the priorities for implementing Agenda 21, the action plan that was adopted at the U.N. Summit for Environment and Development a decade earlier. Here also are the strategic measures for financing these strategic objectives, negotiated at the summit meeting in Monterrey, Mexico. Taken together, these legal instruments comprise the current international action plan that guides the multilateral, bilateral, and national economic development agendas around the world.
This invaluable reference is essential for those involved in international trade law, since free trade agreements now contain provisions that mandate negotiations to harmonize environmental and social regulations. Similarly, these agreed policies guide the international programs of the World Bank, regional development banks, and regional integration pacts such as the European Union or the Association of South East Asian Nations.
Coverage includes:
Evolving Delivery Mechanisms for a Clear & Urgent Mission (Commentary by Nicholas A. Robinson)
Agenda 21 - Annotated Action Plan
Johannesburg Plan of Implementation
Monterrey Financing Plan
Policy Resolutions and Implementing Measures
Valuable references to Internet sources for national reports submitted to the U.N. Commission on Sustainable Development.

'Human laws must be reformulated to keep human activities in harmony with the unchanging and universal laws of nature.' This 1987 statement by the World Commission on Environment and Development has never been more relevant and urgent than it is today. Despite the many legal responses to various environmental problems, more greenhouse gases than ever before are being released into the atmosphere, biological diversity is rapidly declining and fish stocks in the oceans are dwindling. This book challenges the doctrinal construction of environmental law and presents an innovative legal approach to ecological sustainability: a rule of law for nature which guides and transcends ordinary written laws and extends fundamental principles of respect, integrity and legal security to the non-human world.

The present study seeks to examine the genesis, development, and proliferation of multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs) - in-built law-making mechanisms and processes of institutionalization - and their ad hoc treaty-based status and the issue of the legal personality of their secretariats. It provides legal understanding of the location of MEA secretariats within an existing international host institution, as well as discussion of the issue of relationship agreements and interpretation of the commonly used language that triggers such relationships. It places under scrutiny the standard MEA phrase 'providing a secretariat', delegation of authority by the host institution to the head of the convention secretariat, possible conflict areas, host country agreement, and the workings of the relationship agreements. The book offers an authoritative account of the growing phenomenon in which an existing international institution provides a servicing base for MEA that, in turn, triggers a chain of legal implications involving the secretariat, the host institution, and the host country.

Rising seas are endangering the habitability and very existence of several small island nations, mostly in the Pacific and Indian oceans. This is the first book to focus on the myriad legal issues posed by this tragic situation: If a nation is under water, is it still a state? Does it still have a seat at the United Nations? What becomes of its exclusive economic zone, the basis for its fishing rights? What obligations do other nations have to take in the displaced populations, and what are these peoples' rights and legal status once they arrive? Should there be a new international agreement on climate-displaced populations? Do these nations and their citizens have any legal recourse for compensation? Are there any courts that will hear their claims, and based on what theories? Leading legal scholars from around the world address these novel questions and propose answers.

In the 1990s and mid-2000s, turbulent political and social protests surrounded the issue of private sector involvement in providing urban water services in both the developed and developing world. Water on Tap explores examples of such conflicts in six national settings (France, Bolivia, Chile, Argentina, South Africa and New Zealand), focusing on a central question: how were rights and regulation mobilized to address the demands of redistribution and recognition? Two modes of governance emerged: managed liberalization and participatory democracy, often in hybrid forms that complicated simple oppositions between public and private, commodity and human right. The case studies examine the effects of transnational and domestic regulatory frameworks shaping the provision of urban water services, bilateral investment treaties and the contributions of non-state actors such as transnational corporations, civil society organisations and social movement activists. The conceptual framework developed can be applied to a wide range of transnational governance contexts.

Conflicts between foreign investment law and environmental law are becoming increasingly frequent. On the one hand, the rise of environmental regulation poses significant challenges to foreign investors in several industries. On the other, the surge in investment arbitration proceedings is making States aware of the important litigation risks that may result from the adoption of environmental regulation. This study of the relationship between these two areas of law adopts both a policy and a practical perspective. It identifies the major challenges facing States, foreign investors and their legal advisers as a result of the potential friction between investment law and environmental law and provides a detailed analysis of all the major legal issues on the basis of a comprehensive study of the jurisprudence from investment tribunals, human rights courts and bodies, the ICJ, the WTO, the ITLOS, the CJEU and other adjudication mechanisms.

Analysing the regulation of vessel-source pollution from the perspective of the political interests of key players in the ship transportation industry, this 2005 book by Alan Khee-Jin Tan offers a comprehensive and convincing account of how pollution of the marine environment by ships may be better regulated and reduced. In this timely study, he traces the history of regulation at the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and investigates the political, economic and social forces influencing the IMO treaties. Also examined are the efforts of maritime states, ship-owners, cargo owners, oil companies and environmental groups to influence IMO laws and treaties. This is an important book, which uncovers the politics behind the law and offers solutions for overcoming the deficiencies in the regulatory system. It will be of great interest to professionals in the shipping industry as well as practitioners and students.

The IUCN Academy of Environmental Law Research Studies' third colloquium of 2005 brought together more than 130 experts from 27 nations on nearly every continent. This book brings together a number of the papers presented there and offers a global perspective on biodiversity conservation and the maintenance of sustainable cultures. It addresses issues from international, regional, and country-specific perspectives. The book is organized thematically to present a broad spectrum of issues, including the history and major governance structures in this area; the needs, problems, and prerequisites for biodiversity; area-based, species-based, and ecosystem-based conservation measures; the use of components of biodiversity and the processes affecting it; biosecurity; and access to and sharing of benefits from components of biodiversity and their economic value.

Written by judges of the International Court of Justice and the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea and other leading experts in International Law this collection of essays deals with the most recent developments in international environmental law since the UN Rio Conference on Environment and Development in 1992. It focuses on sustainable development, natural resources, Antarctica, the protection of marine environment, and the revolution in international fisheries law.

As the contours of a post-2012 climate regime begin to emerge, compliance issues will require increasing attention. This volume considers the questions that the trends in the climate negotiations raise for the regime's compliance system. It reviews the main features of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and its Kyoto Protocol, canvasses the literature on compliance theory and examines the broader experience with compliance mechanisms in other international environmental regimes. Against this backdrop, contributors examine the central elements of the existing compliance system, the practice of the Kyoto compliance procedure to date and the main compliance challenges encountered by key groups of states such as OECD countries, economies in transition and developing countries. These assessments anchor examinations of the strengths and weaknesses of the existing compliance tools and of the emerging, decentralized, 'bottom-up' approach introduced by the 2009 Copenhagen Accord and pursued by the 2010 Cancun Agreements.

Human population growth is a serious biospheric problem yet is largely overlooked. Because of the neglect of demography, environmental policies - while well-intentioned - are unlikely to succeed. This book gives a concise review of world fertility rates and population growth, and offers a valuable summary of studies of the impact of over-population on the biosphere. In addition, the book explains key demographic variables to consider when formulating law and government policy relevant to childbearing, and it summarizes findings of social science research - findings that contradict popular assumptions about the impact of government interventions addressing the frequency of childbearing and immigration.

This work analyses fairness and equity dimensions of the climate regime. A central issue in international law and policy is how countries of the world should allocate the burden of addressing global climate change. With the link between human activities and climate change clearly established, and the first impacts of climate change being felt, there is a renewed sense of urgency in addressing the problem. Based on an overview of science and the development of the climate regime to date, this book seeks to identify the elements of a working consensus on fairness principles that could be used to solve the hitherto intractable problem of assigning responsibility for combating climate change. The book demonstrates how an analysis of fairness dimensions of climate change grounded in practical developments and illustrated with reference to the latest developments can add value to our understanding of current developments and future options for international climate law and policy.

With unique scholarly analysis and practical discussion, this book provides a comprehensive introduction to the relationship between environmental protection and human rights being formalized into law in many legal systems. By illuminating human rights theory and the institutions that can be employed to meet environmental goals, this book instructs on environmental techniques and procedures that assist in the protection of human rights. The text provides cogent guidance on a growing international jurisprudence on the promotion and protection of human rights in relation to the environment that has been developed by international and regional human rights bodies and tribunals. It explores a rich body of case law that continues to develop within states on the environmental dimension of the rights to life, to health, and to public participation and access to information. Five compelling contemporary case studies are included that implicate human rights and the environment, ranging from large dam projects, to the creation of a new human rights, to a clean environment.

With unique scholarly analysis and practical discussion, this book provides a comprehensive introduction to the relationship between environmental protection and human rights being formalized into law in many legal systems. By illuminating human rights theory and the institutions that can be employed to meet environmental goals, this book instructs on environmental techniques and procedures that assist in the protection of human rights. The text provides cogent guidance on a growing international jurisprudence on the promotion and protection of human rights in relation to the environment that has been developed by international and regional human rights bodies and tribunals. It explores a rich body of case law that continues to develop within states on the environmental dimension of the rights to life, to health, and to public participation and access to information. Five compelling contemporary case studies are included that implicate human rights and the environment, ranging from large dam projects, to the creation of a new human rights, to a clean environment.

Global warming is one of today's greatest challenges. The science of climate change leaves no doubt that policies to cut emissions are overdue. Yet, after twenty years of international talks and treaties, the world is now in gridlock about how best to do this. David G. Victor argues that such gridlock has arisen because international talks have drifted away from the reality of what countries are willing and able to implement at home. Most of the lessons that policy makers have drawn from the history of other international environmental problems won't actually work on the problem of global warming. Victor argues that a radical rethinking of global warming policy is required and shows how to make international law on global warming more effective. This book provides a roadmap to a lower carbon future based on encouraging bottom-up initiatives at national, regional and global levels, leveraging national self-interest rather than wishful thinking.

The development of international wildlife law has been one of the most significant exercises in international law-making during the last fifty years. This second edition of Lyster's International Wildlife Law coincides with both the UN Year of Biological Diversity and the twenty-fifth anniversary of Simon Lyster's first edition. The risk of wildlife depletion and species extinction has become even greater since the 1980s. This new edition provides a clear and authoritative analysis of the key treaties which regulate the conservation of wildlife and habitat protection, and of the mechanisms available to make them work. The original text has also been significantly expanded to include analysis of the philosophical and welfare considerations underpinning wildlife protection, the cross-cutting themes of wildlife and trade, and the impact of climate change and other anthropogenic interferences with species and habitat. Lyster's International Wildlife Law is an indispensable reference work for scholars, practitioners and policy-makers alike.

This book explores how vulnerable and resilient communities from SIDS are affected by climate change; proposes and, where possible, evaluates adaptation activities; identifies factors capable of enhancing or inhibiting SIDS people's long-term ability to deal with climate change; and critiques the discourses, vocabularies, and constructions around SIDS dealing with climate change. The contributions, written by well-established scholars, as well as emerging authors and practitioners, in the field, include conceptual papers, coherent methodological approaches, and case studies from the communities based in the Caribbean Sea and the Indian, Atlantic, and Pacific Oceans. In their introduction, the editors contextualise the book within the current literature. They emphasise the importance of stronger links between climate change science and policy in SIDS, both to increase effectiveness of policy and also boost scholarly enquiry in the context of whose communities are often excluded by mainstream research. This book is timely and appropriate, given the recent commission by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) of a Special Report that aims at addressing vulnerabilities, "especially in islands and coastal areas, as well as the adaptation and policy development opportunities" following the Paris Agreement. Coupled with this, there is also the need to support the policy community with further scientific evidence on climate change-related issues in SIDS, accompanying the first years of implementation of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

For many nations, a key challenge is how to achieve sustainable development without a return to centralized planning. Using case studies from Greenland, Hawaii and northern Norway, this 2006 book examines whether 'bottom-up' systems such as customary law can play a critical role in achieving viable systems for managing natural resources. Customary law consists of underlying social norms that may become the acknowledged law of the land. The key to determining whether a custom constitutes customary law is whether the public acts as if the observance of the custom is legally obligated. While the use of customary law does not always produce sustainability, the study of customary methods of resource management can produce valuable insights into methods of managing resources in a sustainable way.

Shannon O'Lear brings a geographer's perspective to environmental politics. The book considers issues of climate change, energy, food security, toxins, waste, and resource conflict to explore how political, economic, ideological and military power have contributed to the generation of environmental issues and the formation of dominant narratives about them. The book encourages the reader to think critically about the power dynamics that shape (and limit) how we think about environmental issues and to expand the reader's understanding of why it matters that these issues are discussed at particular spatial scales. Applying a geographer's sense of scale and power leads to a better understanding of the complexity of environmental issues and will help formulate mitigation and adaptation strategies. The book will appeal mainly to advanced students and researchers from a geography background, but also to social and political scientists who wish to look at the topic from this different perspective.

Uncontrolled transboundary transfer of hazardous wastes was recognized as a major environmental problem in the mid-1980s. The international community responded by elaborating pertinent international agreements. Treaties are now in place at the global and regional levels, and additional ones are being negotiated. Despite their common aim of protecting the environment against the ill-effects of hazardous wastes, they often differ in stringency as well as scope and membership.
The book analyses the key treaties and other international legal rules on the control of transboundary movements of hazardous wastes. It identifies inconsistencies, gaps, and overlaps, and proposes ways to build a comprehensive global regulatory system for the management of hazardous wastes by harmonizing relevant international legal rules.

This book offers a vision for the third generation of environmental law designed to enhance its ability to protect our environment. The book presents two core proposals, an Environmental Legacy Act to preserve a defined environmental legacy for future generations and an Environmental Competition Statute to spark movement to new clean technologies. The first proposal would require, for the first time, that the federal government define an environmental legacy that it must preserve for future generations. The second would establish a market competition to maximize environmental protection. The balance of the book provides complimentary proposals and analysis. The first generation of environmental law sought broad protection of health and the environment in a fairly fragmented way. The second sought to enhance environmental law s efficiency through cost-benefit analysis and market mechanisms. These proposals seek to create a broader, more creative approach to solving environmental problems.

An assessment of policy options for future global climate governance, written by a team of leading experts from the European Union and developing countries. Global climate governance is at a crossroads. The 1997 Kyoto Protocol was merely a first step, and its core commitments expire in 2012. This book addresses three questions which will be central to any new climate agreement. What is the most effective overall legal and institutional architecture for successful and equitable climate politics? What role should non-state actors play, including multinational corporations, non-governmental organizations, public private partnerships and market mechanisms in general? How can we deal with the growing challenge of adapting our existing institutions to a substantially warmer world? This important resource offers policy practitioners in-depth qualitative and quantitative assessments of the costs and benefits of various policy options, and also offers academics from wide-ranging disciplines insight into innovative interdisciplinary approaches towards international climate negotiations.