The right to a good environment as a human right : a philosophical appraisal

Abstract

Humanity is facing immense environmental difficulties across the entire globe and this includes effects such as the rising temperatures, pollution, contamination, loss of biodiversity, habitat destruction, as well as desertification. In 2006, a report was released by the Living Planet organisation and highlighted that the world's regeneration is no longer meeting expectations. Worldwide ecological challenges have for a long time been addressed through the predominant international treaties even at the present day. The global community has risen to the occasion through immediate actions in an effort to safeguard the worldwide biosphere as well as ecological systems. These actions are primarily focused on enhancing the protection of the lives and health of upcoming generations. As a result, over the past three decades, there has been a profusion of international declarations attempting to address international and regional ecological consequences. The declaration of the human right to a good environment by the United Nations is the latest of these international declarations in order to safeguard the lives and health of those to follow. This thesis sets out, using major philosophical schools of thought and other political contributions, to analyse one of the latest human rights - the human right to a good environment. Seeing as though we are living in a time of major climate change, such a human right seems only logical to be instituted in the United Nations Human Rights list. However, there must be a clear identification with respect to the extent of which this human right can deal with these environmental catastrophes. Other questions also arise such as `Is this third generation human right equal to other human rights?`, `Can the environment be a basis for a human right?`, `Would the human right to a good environment be effective in practice or only a symbolic right?`. Through the use of philosophical and political schools of thought, the thesis shall be answering these points. This thesis aims to evaluate this new human right and at the end will show whether or not this human right is the right way of tackling the issues of climate change and whether it can do so effectively.