Human Rights And The Environment In Africa

This book brings together original and novel perspectives on major developments in human rights law and the environment in Africa. Focusing on African Union law, the book explores the core concepts and principles, theory and practice, accountability mechanisms and key issues challenging human rights law in the era of global environmental change. It, thus, extend the frontier of understanding in this fundamental area by building on existing scholarship on African human rights law and the protection of the environment, divulging concerns on redressing environmental and human rights protection issues in the context of economic growth and sustainable development. It further offers unique insight into the development, domestication and implementation challenges relating to human rights law and environmental governance in Africa. This long overdue interdisciplinary exploration of human rights law and the environment from an African perspective will be an indispensable reference point for academics, policymakers, practitioners and advocates of international human rights and environmental law in particular and international law, environmental politics and philosophy, and African studies in general. It is clear that there is much to do, study and share on this timely subject in the African context.

The relationship between human rights and the environment, as evidenced by the recent UN Resolution on the human right to a healthy environment, is a topical, fascinating, uneasy, and increasingly urgent one. This timely collection explores the inextricable relationship between human rights and the environment as a critical lens for understanding and addressing key human rights and environmental issues confronting Africa. The work explores theoretical, philosophical, doctrinal, and empirical research to interrogate and provide clarity on how and whether the human rights-based approach to environmental protection and policy implications has been effective in enhancing environmental protection and sustainability in Africa. It brings together an elite group of African and international experts to investigate the increasing connectivity and problems with African human rights, environmental governance, and the quest for sustainability. The book is divided into thematic clusters, including: the right of vulnerable communities to sustainability; climate change, the right to development and natural resource governance; corporate environmental responsibility and sustainability; the philosophy of environmental ethics and theories of human rights approaches to environmental governance; procedural environmental rights; the role of the judiciary in environmental protection; and desertification. These themes provide a structure to investigate and clarify specific fundamental questions on Africa’s environmental governance paradigm. This innovative contribution provides an interdisciplinary approach to the philosophical interrelationship and use of human rights approaches to ensure and enhance environmental protection and sustainability. As such, the book will be of interest to African scholars, researchers and students in Human Rights Law, Environmental Studies, Political Science, Ecology and Conservation and Development Studies. It will also be a valuable resource for policymakers, governments, NGOs, practitioners, and all those interested in African environmental governance.

This book explores African domestic and regional responses and approaches to environmental protection and sustainability. Written by African experts, the collection consists of five parts covering the whole of Africa. It provides broad coverage of specific themes, including environmental constitutionalism, climate change, gender and the environment, wildlife trade, environmental justice, and human displacement. The key aims are first, to explore theoretical and empirical studies to interrogate and provide clarity on academic discourse on how and whether environmental human rights approaches and policy implications have effectively enhanced environmental protection and sustainability at African domestic levels. Second, to investigate and present innovative solutions on how African domestic legal regimes deal with environmental justice, natural resources governance, refugees’ environmental rights, and climate-induced displaced persons. Finally, to propose innovative legal and institutionalised solutions to Africa’s ecological realities by determining the legal and regulatory gaps on environmental human rights issues on the continent. The collection will be a valuable resource for researchers, academics, and policymakers in human rights law, environmental law, political science, ecology and conservation, environmental management, disaster management, and development studies.

Populations in Africa are vulnerable to both the direct and indirect adverse effects of climate change that are of human rights significance. The urgency for states in Africa to implement climate interventions while they face developmental challenges, however, raises questions of ‘justice’ or ‘fairness’ between the developed and the developing states. Consequently, interrogating how the human rights paradigm may respond to negative implications of climate change and its ‘fairness’ is important as states continue to engage with the climate change standard setting. This edited volume critically interrogates human rights paradigm as an intervention to secure climate change justice for vulnerable populations; analyses regional protection against human rights consequences of climate change; and assesses emerging interventions based on domestic regulatory frameworks on climate change in selected states in Africa.

This book considers and clarifies many different facets of the international human right to a healthy environment.

"This book explores African domestic and regional responses and approaches to environmental protection and sustainability. Written by African and international experts, the collection consists of five parts covering the whole of Africa. It provides broad coverage of specific themes, including environmental constitutionalism, climate change, gender and the environment, wildlife trade, environmental justice, and human displacement. The key aims are, first, to explore theoretical and empirical studies to interrogate and provide clarity on academic discourse on how and whether environmental human rights approaches and policy implications have effectively enhanced environmental protection and sustainability at African domestic levels. Second, to investigate and present innovative solutions on how African domestic legal regimes deal with environmental justice, natural resources governance, refugees' environmental rights, and climate-induced displaced persons. Finally, to propose innovative legal and institutionalised solutions to Africa's ecological realities by determining the legal and regulatory gaps on environmental-human rights issues on the continent. The collection will be a valuable resource for researchers, academics and policymakers in human rights law, environmental law, political science, ecology and conservation, environmental management, disaster management, and development studies"--

Focusing on contemporary debates in philosophy and legal theory, this ground-breaking book provides a compelling enquiry into the nature of human dignity. The author not only illustrates that dignity is a concept that can extend our understanding of our environmental impacts and duties, but also highlights how our reliance on and relatedness to the environment further extends and enhances our understanding of dignity itself.

EPDF and EPUB available Open Access under CC-BY-NC-ND licence. This volume brings together an international team of contributors to provide a much-needed examination of climate litigation in Africa. The book outlines how climate litigation in Africa is distinct as well as pinpointing where it connects with the global conversation.