Ethics - Should international criminal law be used against inaction on
climate change?
Hello, honoured guests and fellow speakers. Climate change. I am positive
everyone listening is well aware of the never-ending threat it poses and the
imminent doom we are constantly facing. Increased temperatures that
cause seas levels to rise and ice glaciers to melt. Except, is this really
never-ending? Humans have come so far in our technological advances
and ever-expanding knowledge of every crack in this world. So why not
address climate change with the same determination we had when creating
cars and computers and robots, or something smaller, like empires?
International criminal law addresses a multitude of international felonies,
ranging from war crimes to genocide to crimes against humanity. This
includes murder, sexual violence and torture. We use laws to rectify such
heinous crimes because they are unjust and cause a colossal amount of
physical and psychological damage to other humans. Now, to be clear,
crimes against humanity refer to specific crimes committed as part of a
widespread attack against a civilian population. By that definition alone, the
dismissal of climate change is a crime against humanity. Knowingly sending
out tonnes of carbon dioxide into the air is a crime against the Earth and
therefore against human beings. Although, it is understood that many of our
industrial processes can’t avoid polluting the atmosphere while producing
cement and palm oil, the latter of which is in almost everything we
consume.
However, according to UNESCO, over the last 250 years, we have burned
fossil fuels, destroyed carbon sinks and grown the global population only to
be in danger of using up our carbon budget. The 2018 Special Report of
the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change suggests we are likely to
exhaust our carbon budget within the next decade, at our current trajectory
of carbon emissions, which in 2020 was 31.5 GtCO2 and we need to limit
warming to 1.5°C to avoid the worst impacts of climate change, which
means the world can emit 770 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide into the
atmosphere. Warmer air holds more moisture, and water vapour traps heat
as well. The more greenhouse gases we have in the atmosphere, the
worse climate change gets.
Now, we have already seen the horrible effects of climate change in recent
years: severe droughts, flash flooding in Europe and Asia, higher
temperatures causing wildfires and the destruction of animal habitats as a
result. This could risk the extinction of humanity, as already, so many are
dying due to climate change. The DailySabah details in an article that July
floods in China killed 300, floods in Germany killed 165, wildfires killed 80
in Algeria and Turkey, Hurricane Ida in Louisiana killed 100 and caused
$100 billion worth of damage. These are all effects of climate change we
have heard numerous times, but they are real and enduring; they’re the tip
of the iceberg. We want to reach net zero emissions by 2050, yet we are
not holding anyone accountable for negatively impacting climate change.
How do we do that? Professor Catrionna McKinnon states, “For there to be
a crime, there must be a criminal.” The crime is ecocide, the criminals,
human beings. The current definition of ecocide is “unlawful or wanton acts
committed with knowledge that there is a substantial likelihood of severe
and either widespread or long-term damage to the environment being
caused by those acts.” An article by Bloomgberg Green states, there have
been several attempts to add ecocide as a crime, to the Rome Statute - the
document that established the International Criminal Court - but to no avail.
The suffering caused by climate change is appaling, but it’s not enough to
prompt prosecution under international criminal law because there is no
one culpable party to prosecute. There are multiple. It is agreed that
everyone in some way contributes to climate change. The ICC only has
jurisdiction over natural persons, thus a corporation itself cannot be judged
by the court, raising questions as to which individual then be held liable for
ecocide. Structural issues would definitely arise. Despite that, simply
creating awareness and hoping for the best will never be enough compared
to the scale of the disaster we face.
We’re in Newton’s First Law of Motion: Law of Inertia, where we’re moving
in a uniform state, and only do we change direction when there is an
external force. When does that external force step in? Personal habits can
be easily changed, however, what we really require is a forceful action
against our inertia. If groups of people, countries, aren’t changing, even
when aware of the harm they may be causing, they should be lawfully
punished because they are aiding and abetting an eventual worldwide
massacre. Contributing to human extinction can and should be considered
a crime against humanity. The external force we need is international
criminal law.
I’m not here to change the world for myself or for anyone. I know I can’t. I
know I’ll be long gone before anything substantial changes. But I don’t take
joy in the fact that thousands are tormented and many more will soon be
tormented due to climate change. Due to older generations using the Earth
to experiment and leaving it in ruins for generations to come. Generations
that may have to spend every waking moment to amend the problems that
we have created. We have the power and means to rectify ecocide; we’re
just not using it.
As of 22nd June, 2021, the legal definition of ecocide that I previously
mentioned was proposed to amend the Rome Statute of the International
Criminal Court as a potential 5th international crime. We’re already trying to
lawfully punish people for climate denial, and I hope it’s not wishful thinking
when I say that I want us to go through with it. The current climate crisis
was caused by humans, and we have only worsened it. It is our fault. It is
high time we fix it, in whatever way necessary.
.
EXTRA:
*UNESCO claims that even if all countries meet their mitigation targets, we
are likely to see a 2.6°C warming by 2100.
*Palm oil is in bread, shampoo, ice cream, makeup, chocolate, soap, etc.
*Ecocide was actually included in the early drafts of the Rome Statute, but
was dropped when deemed inadequately defined. UK, US, netherlands
deemed it inadequately defined
*For every degree the earth warms, the atmosphere can hold 7% more
moisture
*WHO states that climate change already kills 150,000 people a year.
Between 2030 and 2050, climate change is estimated to cause an
additional 250,000 deaths per year.
*A carbon sink is anything that absorbs more carbon from the
atmosphere than it releases
*31.5 GtCO2 = 412.5 parts per million
*The Rome Statute’s current reference to environmental harms, including
those related to war crimes, was considered by the IEP as too limiting as it
would not address harms that occur during peacetime.
