Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-q99xh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-25T19:57:15.064Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Environmental Protection and an Equitable International Order: Ethics after the Earth Summit

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 January 2015

Holmes Rolston III
Holmes Rolston III*
Affiliation:
Colorado State University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract:

The UNCED Earth Summit established two new principles of international justice: an equitable international order and protection of the environment. UNCED was a significant symbol, a morality play about environment and economics. Wealth is asymmetrically distributed; approximately one-fifth of the world (the G-7 nations) produces and consumes four-fifths of goods and services; four-fifths (the G-77 nations) get one-fifth. This distribution can be interpreted as both an earnings differential and as exploitation. Responses may require justice or charity, producing and sharing. Natural and national resources come into tension with the common heritage of humankind, exemplified in disputes about who owns biodiversity resources. Ethics has to learn planetary home economics.

Type
Articles
Information
Business Ethics Quarterly , Volume 5 , Issue 4 , October 1995 , pp. 735 - 752
Copyright
Copyright © Society for Business Ethics 1995

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Allen, Frank Edward. 1992. “Earth Movers: Five Who Will Shape the Course of the Rio Conference.” Wall Street Journal, May 29, p. A6.Google Scholar
Donaldson, Thomas. 1989. The Ethics of International Business. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Durning, Alan. 1992. How Much is Enough? The Consumer Society and the Future of the Earth. New York: W. W. Norton.Google Scholar
Galbraith, John Kenneth. 1984. The Affluent Society, 4th ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.Google Scholar
Jones, Dorothy V. 1991. Code of Peace: Ethics and Security in the World of Warlord States. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Kamm, Thomas. 1992. “Some Big Problems Await World Leaders at the Earth Summit.” Wall Street Journal, May 29, p. A1, A6.Google Scholar
Kamm, Thomas and Gutfeld, Rose. 1992. “Rio Summit Kicks Off With Calls For More Aid to the Third World.” Wall Street Journal, June 4.Google Scholar
Knickerbocker, Brad. 1992a. “World Leaders Gather at Rio for Earth Summit.” Christian Science Monitor, June 2, p. 1, p. 4.Google Scholar
Knickerbocker, Brad. 1992b. “Summit Wrangles Over Money, North-South Split.” Christian Science Monitor, June 4, p. 1, p. 4.Google Scholar
Knickerbocker, Brad. 1992c. “The World from Rio de Janeiro.” Christian Science Monitor, June 10, p. 3.Google Scholar
Piel, Gerard. 1992. Only One World: Our Own to Make and to Keep. San Francisco: W. H. Freeman.Google Scholar
Shiva, Vandana. 1991. The Violence of the Green Revolution. London: Zed Books.Google Scholar
Stevens, William K. 1992. “Rio: A Start on Managing What’s Left of This Place.” New York Times, May 31, Sec. 4, p. 1.Google Scholar
United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED). 1992a. Convention on Biological Diversity, 5 June.Google Scholar
United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED). 1992b. Agenda 21. Document No. A/CONF.151/26.Google Scholar
United Nations World Commission on Environment and Development. 1987a. Environmental Protection and Sustainable Development: Legal Principles and Recommendations. London/Dordrecht, Netherlands: Graham and Trotman/Martinus Nijhoff Publishers.Google Scholar
United Nations World Commission on Environment and Development. 1987b. Our Common Future. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
World Development Report 1991. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar