IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v12y2020i14p5636-d383910.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A Global Pact for the Environment: The Logical Outcome of 50 Years of International Environmental Law

Author

Listed:
  • Yann Aguila

    (Sciences Po Paris, 27 Rue Saint-Guillaume, 75007 Paris, France)

Abstract

The Global Pact for the Environment is a project for an international treaty that seeks to recognize the environmental rights and duties of citizens, states, and businesses. The text of the initial Pact project was drafted in June 2017 by a network of over 100 environmental law experts from more than 40 countries. In May 2018, the United Nations General Assembly paved the way for its negotiation by adopting the resolution “Towards a Global Pact for the Environment”. These talks resulted in a recommendation for states to adopt a “political declaration” in 2022 for the 50th anniversary of the Stockholm Conference. This article retraces the origins of the Global Pact project and makes the case for its adoption. It argues that a Global Pact is the missing piece to implement the 2030 Agenda and would help to “constitutionalize” fundamental environmental principles. The article further responds to concerns raised about the Global Pact project, such as interactions with existing instruments, the applicability of broad principles at the national level, as well as the risk of regression. It ultimately asserts that all stakeholders would reap benefits from its procedural and substantive provisions, should it be adopted.

Suggested Citation

  • Yann Aguila, 2020. "A Global Pact for the Environment: The Logical Outcome of 50 Years of International Environmental Law," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(14), pages 1-17, July.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:12:y:2020:i:14:p:5636-:d:383910
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/14/5636/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/14/5636/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. World Commission on Environment and Development,, 1987. "Our Common Future," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780192820808.
    2. William J. Ripple & Pete Smith & Helmut Haberl & Stephen A. Montzka & Clive McAlpine & Douglas H. Boucher, 2014. "Ruminants, climate change and climate policy," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 4(1), pages 2-5, January.
    3. Saffron J. O'Neill & Nicholas Smith, 2014. "Climate change and visual imagery," Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 5(1), pages 73-87, January.
    4. Anonymous, 1950. "International Court of Justice," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 4(3), pages 475-478, August.
    5. Anonymous, 1950. "International Court of Justice," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 4(4), pages 670-670, November.
    6. Muradian, Roldan & O'Connor, Martin & Martinez-Alier, Joan, 2002. "Embodied pollution in trade: estimating the 'environmental load displacement' of industrialised countries," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(1), pages 51-67, April.
    7. Anonymous, 1950. "International Court of Justice," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 4(2), pages 310-312, May.
    8. Anonymous, 1950. "International Court of Justice," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 4(1), pages 123-125, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Mohammed Touitou & Raquel Langarita, 2021. "Environmental Kuznets Curve for Carbon Dioxide Emissions and Economic Growth in Algeria," Margin: The Journal of Applied Economic Research, National Council of Applied Economic Research, vol. 15(4), pages 418-432, November.
    2. Jihuan Zhang, 2021. "Environmental Kuznets Curve Hypothesis on CO 2 Emissions: Evidence for China," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 14(3), pages 1-16, February.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bright Nkrumah, 2021. "Anywhere but Here: a Calculus for Protection of Children with Albinism," Journal of International Migration and Integration, Springer, vol. 22(2), pages 729-748, June.
    2. J. Joseph Speidel & Jane N. O’Sullivan, 2023. "Advancing the Welfare of People and the Planet with a Common Agenda for Reproductive Justice, Population, and the Environment," World, MDPI, vol. 4(2), pages 1-29, May.
    3. Richard Twine, 2021. "Emissions from Animal Agriculture—16.5% Is the New Minimum Figure," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(11), pages 1-8, June.
    4. Mechthild Donner & Anne Verniquet & Jan Broeze & Katrin Kayser & Hugo de Vries, 2021. "Critical success and risk factors for circular business models valorising agricultural waste and by-products," Post-Print hal-03004851, HAL.
    5. Cornelis Leeuwen & Jos Frijns & Annemarie Wezel & Frans Ven, 2012. "City Blueprints: 24 Indicators to Assess the Sustainability of the Urban Water Cycle," Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA), Springer;European Water Resources Association (EWRA), vol. 26(8), pages 2177-2197, June.
    6. CHEN, Helen S.Y., 2020. "Designing Sustainable Humanitarian Supply Chains," OSF Preprints m82ar, Center for Open Science.
    7. Jim Butcher, 2006. "The United Nations International Year of Ecotourism: a critical analysis of development implications," Progress in Development Studies, , vol. 6(2), pages 146-156, April.
    8. Denise Ravet, 2011. "Lean production: the link between supply chain and sustainable development in an international environment," Post-Print hal-00691666, HAL.
    9. Mara Del Baldo, 2012. "Corporate social responsibility and corporate governance in Italian SMEs: the experience of some “spirited businesses”," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 16(1), pages 1-36, February.
    10. Megan Devonald & Nicola Jones & Sally Youssef, 2022. "‘We Have No Hope for Anything’: Exploring Interconnected Economic, Social and Environmental Risks to Adolescents in Lebanon," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(4), pages 1-17, February.
    11. Rigby, Dan & Woodhouse, Phil & Young, Trevor & Burton, Michael, 2001. "Constructing a farm level indicator of sustainable agricultural practice," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(3), pages 463-478, December.
    12. Michael Howes & Liana Wortley & Ruth Potts & Aysin Dedekorkut-Howes & Silvia Serrao-Neumann & Julie Davidson & Timothy Smith & Patrick Nunn, 2017. "Environmental Sustainability: A Case of Policy Implementation Failure?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(2), pages 1-17, January.
    13. Shiferaw, Bekele & Holden, Stein, 1999. "Soil Erosion and Smallholders' Conservation Decisions in the Highlands of Ethiopia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 27(4), pages 739-752, April.
    14. Ibrahim Ari & Muammer Koc, 2018. "Sustainable Financing for Sustainable Development: Understanding the Interrelations between Public Investment and Sovereign Debt," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(11), pages 1-25, October.
    15. Parnphumeesup, Piya & Kerr, Sandy A., 2011. "Stakeholder preferences towards the sustainable development of CDM projects: Lessons from biomass (rice husk) CDM project in Thailand," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(6), pages 3591-3601, June.
    16. Pengji Wang & Adrian T. H. Kuah & Qinye Lu & Caroline Wong & K. Thirumaran & Emmanuel Adegbite & Wesley Kendall, 2021. "The impact of value perceptions on purchase intention of sustainable luxury brands in China and the UK," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 28(3), pages 325-346, May.
    17. Christoph M. Schmidt & Nils aus dem Moore, 2014. "Wie geht es uns? Die W3-Indikatoren für eine neue Wohlstandsmessung," RWI Positionen, Rheinisch-Westfälisches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, pages 16, 03.
    18. Katundu Imasiku & Valerie M. Thomas & Etienne Ntagwirumugara, 2020. "Unpacking Ecological Stress from Economic Activities for Sustainability and Resource Optimization in Sub-Saharan Africa," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(9), pages 1-12, April.
    19. Chin-Shan Lu & Kuo-Chung Shang & Chi-Chang Lin, 2016. "Examining sustainability performance at ports: port managers’ perspectives on developing sustainable supply chains," Maritime Policy & Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 43(8), pages 909-927, November.
    20. Kebede, Yohannes, 1993. "The Limits to Common Resource Management: The Bypassed Commons or Commons without Tragedy," MPRA Paper 662, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 01 May 1993.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:12:y:2020:i:14:p:5636-:d:383910. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.