West Fails, Shifts Carbon Reduction to Developing World
The Institute of Ideas - Institute of Ideas
Increasingly, political and social issues are viewed through the prism of their environmental impact - and none more so than global development.We are warned that if countries like China and India were to achieve the standard of living enjoyed in the West, this would hasten environmental catastrophe. Rising carbon emissions, natural resource depletion and bio-diversity loss in the developing world are thus cast as global problems demanding global solutions.Environmental concerns have joined terrorism and nuclear proliferation as key preoccupations in international affairs since the end of the Cold War.Free from the political constraints of the 'old world order', UN officials, Western politicians and NGOs frequently argue that the 'international community' has a responsibility to intervene in the affairs of 'rogue' sovereign states.Should industrial pollution and the destruction of natural habitats be seen as 'crimes against nature' (ecocide), justifying ecological interventions similar to humanitarian ones?Is the use of force to prevent serious and immediate environmental harm something we should now seriously consider?Or would this amount to 'eco-imperialism', transgressing international legal and political norms and state sovereignty? - Battle of Ideas
