The Cambridge Handbook Of The Sustainable Development Goals And International Law Volume 1

In 2015, the United Nations established seventeen Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) that aimed 'to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all' by 2030. The chapters within this collection address each of these SDGs, considering how they relate to one another and international law, and what institutions could aid their implementation. Development has been a contentious topic since the decolonization period after World War II, and issues surrounding sustainable development are necessarily impacted by the multifaceted relationship between the Global South and Global North. Confronting the context and challenge of sustainable development, this collection outlines how the international economic system problematizes the attainment of the SDGs. Introducing a novel, cosmopolitan approach, this book offers new ways of understanding sustainable development and suggests potential solutions so that we might finally achieve it.

"The Cambridge Handbook on the Sustainable Development Goals and International Law was sparked by our curiosity about how a remarkable set of global policy goals for a wide range of areas - the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) - adopted by the UN General Assembly in 2015, might relate to and influence international law. We also asked ourselves how could the relevant areas of international law promote or hamper the achievement of the SDGs and the overarching aim of attaining sustainable development? To explore this further, we engaged colleagues who were willing to join us on this exciting journey, and we thank them for their most insightful contributions to this volume. The chapters in this Handbook highlight the multifaceted relationship between the SDGs and international law as well as how international law might need to change in order to support the achievement of the SDGs and the realization of sustainable development. Our journey towards this result turned out to be bumpier than expected, given the COVID-19 pandemic. Most of us needed to turn to online teaching, some faced other setbacks, and the three-day workshop, originally planned for June 2020 in Stockholm, was cancelled. What had been planned as an author's retreat to exchange ideas and further develop first drafts of the chapters - at Stockholm University and at the Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities (Vitterhetsakademien) - had to be turned into an online workshop. While regretting that we could not meet in person, the two-day online workshop was a vibrant occasion for exchanging ideas and active collaboration. All the authors engaged enthusiastically and with creativity and humour. Taking into account the almost twenty hours of time difference between participants as well as the drawbacks of an online environment, the workshop was remarkably fun and fruitful and achieved more than we could have wished for. We have now completed this exciting journey, including a couple of "intellectual roller coaster" moments, and we are delighted with the result"--

"Despite the global endorsement of the Sustainable Development Goals, environmental justice struggles are growing all over the world. These struggles are not isolated injustices, but symptoms of interlocking forms of oppression that privilege the few while inflicting misery on the many and threatening ecological collapse. This handbook offers critical perspectives on the multi-dimensional, intersectional nature of environmental injustice and the cross-cutting forms of oppression that unite and divide these struggles, including gender, race, poverty, and indigeneity. The work sheds new light on the often-neglected social dimension of sustainability and its relationship to human rights and environmental justice. Using a variety of legal frameworks and case studies from around the world, this volume illustrates the importance of overcoming the fragmentation of these legal frameworks and social movements in order to develop holistic solutions that promote justice and protect the planet's ecosystems at a time of intensifying economic and ecological crisis"--

Building on the previously established Millennium Development Goals, which ran from 2000-2015, the 2015 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) provide the UN with a roadmap for development until 2030. This topical book explores the associated legal and normative implications of these SDGs, which in themselves are not legally binding.

This book explores the methods through which international law and its associated innovative global governance mechanisms can strengthen, foster and scale up the impacts of treaty regimes and international law on the ability to implement global governance mechanisms. Examining these questions through the lens of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the book looks at environmental, social and economic treaty regimes. It analyses legal methodologies as well as comparative methods of assessing the relationship between the SDGs and treaty regimes and international law. Contradictions exist between international treaty regimes and principles of international law resulting in conflicting implementation of the treaty regimes and of global governance mechanisms. Without determining these areas of contest and highlighting their detrimental impacts, the SDGs and other efforts at global governance cannot maximize their legal and societal benefits. The book concludes by suggesting a path forward for the SDGs and for international treaty regimes that is forged in a solid understanding and application of the advantages of global governance mechanisms, including reflections from the COVID-19 pandemic experience. Addressing the strengths, gaps and weaknesses related to treaty regimes and global governance mechanisms, the book provides readers with a comprehensive understanding of this increasingly important topic. It will be of interest to students, researchers and practitioners with an interest in sustainability and law.

Despite the global endorsement of the Sustainable Development Goals, environmental justice struggles are growing all over the world. These struggles are not isolated injustices, but symptoms of interlocking forms of oppression that privilege the few while inflicting misery on the many and threatening ecological collapse. This handbook offers critical perspectives on the multi-dimensional, intersectional nature of environmental injustice and the cross-cutting forms of oppression that unite and divide these struggles, including gender, race, poverty, and indigeneity. The work sheds new light on the often-neglected social dimension of sustainability and its relationship to human rights and environmental justice. Using a variety of legal frameworks and case studies from around the world, this volume illustrates the importance of overcoming the fragmentation of these legal frameworks and social movements in order to develop holistic solutions that promote justice and protect the planet's ecosystems at a time of intensifying economic and ecological crisis.

This volume analyses key theoretical, institutional and legal aspects of intergenerational equity and justice in multi-level sustainable development treaty implementation.