This volume returns to one of the major themes of the Global Ecological Integrity Group: the interface between integrity as a scientific concept and a number of important issues in ethics, international law and public health. The main scholars who have worked on these topics over the years return to re-examine these dimensions from the viewpoint of global governance.

The connection between environment and health has been well studied and documented, particularly by the World Health Organization. It is now being included in some legal instruments, although for the most part caselaw does not explicitly make that connection. Neither the right to life nor the rights to health or to normal development are actually cited in the resolution of cases and in judges' decisions. This volume makes the connection explicit in a broad review of human rights and legal issues associated with public health and the environment. It will be particularly useful as many legal instruments emphasize the right to 'development' without fully discussing the necessary safety and public health aspects, and the respect for the ecology of any area where such 'development' (often unwanted by local or indigenous communities) is to be located. Climate change is another pressing variable that is considered, and several chapters address the interface between human health and ecological conditions. Overall the book integrates perspectives from a wide range of disciplines, including ethics, ecology, public health and epidemiology, and human rights and law.

'The ecological challenge demands a paradigm shift in our thinking about the human-environment relation. Reconciling Human Existence with Ecological Integrity provides a ?state of the art? account of work on ecological integrity - and offers a compelling vision for the future.' Derek Bell, Senior Lecturer at the School of Geography, Politics and Sociology, University of Newcastle ?A book of vast scope and richness ...If policymakers around the world took notice of this insightful set of messages, we would all live with greater happiness, health, and wellbeing, with a brighter future for our children and grandchildren.' Lawrence O. Gostin, O?Neill Professor of Global Health Law, Georgetown University Law Center ?This book attempts to do in theory what the world needs to do in practice. It is an ecological master plan that shows how we can not only survive but also flourish.' James P. Sterba, President of the American Philosophical Association, Central Division Ecosystems have been compared to a house of cards: remove or damage a part and you risk destroying or fundamentally and irreversibly altering the whole.Protecting ecological integrity means maintaining that whole - an aim which is increasingly difficult to achieve given the ever-growing dominance of humanity. This book is the definitive examination of the state of the field now, and the way things may (and must) develop in the future. Written and edited by members of the Global Ecological Integrity Group - an international collection of the world's most respected authorities in the area - the book considers the extent to which human rights (such as the rights to food, energy, health, clean air or water) can be reconciled with the principles of ecological integrity. The issue is approached from a variety of economic, legal, ethical and ecological standpoints, providing an essential resource for researchers, students and those in government or business in a wide range of disciplines.

The global ecological crisis is the greatest challenge humanity has ever had to confront, and humanity is failing. The triumph of the neo-liberal agenda, together with a debauched ‘scientism’, has reduced nature and people to nothing but raw materials, instruments and consumers to be efficiently managed in a global market dominated by corporate managers, media moguls and technocrats. The arts and the humanities have been devalued, genuine science has been crippled, and the quest for autonomy and democracy undermined. The resultant trajectory towards global ecological destruction appears inexorable, and neither governments nor environmental movements have significantly altered this, or indeed, seem able to. The Philosophical Foundations of Ecological Civilization is a wide-ranging and scholarly analysis of this failure. This book reframes the dynamics of the debate beyond the discourses of economics, politics and techno-science. Reviving natural philosophy to align science with the humanities, it offers the categories required to reform our modes of existence and our institutions so that we augment, rather than undermine, the life of the ecosystems of which we are part. From this philosophical foundation, the author puts forth a manifesto for transforming our culture into one which could provide an effective global environmental movement and provide the foundations for a global ecological civilization.

This book introduces the Original Nation scholarship to examine the historical genealogy of the nation’s struggles against the state. A fundamentally different portrait of history, geography, politics, and the role of law emerges when the perspective of the nation and peoples is placed at the center of geopolitical analysis of global affairs. In contrast to traditional and canonical state-centric narratives, the Original Nation scholarship offers a diametrically distinct “on-the-ground” and “bottom-up” portrait of the struggle, resistance, and defiance of the nation and peoples. It exposes persistent global patterns of genocide, ecocide, and ethnocide that have resulted from attempts by the state to occupy, suppress, exploit, and destroy the nation. The Original Nation scholarship offers a powerful and widely applicable intellectual tool to examine the history of resilience, emancipatory struggles, and collective efforts to build a vibrant alternative world among the nation and peoples across the globe.

This original book analyses and reimagines the concept of sustainable development in international law from a non-Western legal perspective. Built upon the intersection of law, politics, and history in the context of Africa, its peoples and their experiences, customary law and other legal cosmologies, this ground-breaking study applies a critical legal analysis to Africa's interaction with conceptualising and operationalising sustainable development. It proposes a turn to non-Western legal normativity as the foundational principle for reimagining sustainable development in international law. It highlights eco-legal philosophies and principles in remaking sustainable development where ecological integrity assumes a central focus in the reimagined conceptualisation and operationalisation of sustainable development. While this pioneering book highlights Africa as its analytical pivot, its arguments and proposals are useful beyond Africa. Connecting global discourses on nature, the environment, rights and development, Godwin Eli Kwadzo Dzah illuminates our current thinking on sustainable development in international law.

The Earth Charter is a declaration of fundamental ethical principles for building a just, sustainable and peaceful global society, with ecological integrity as a major theme. This book provides a series of analyses of ecological integrity as it relates to the Earth Charter, social movements and international law for human rights. It is shown how the Earth Charter project began as a United Nations initiative, but it was carried forward and completed by a global civil society initiative. The drafting of the Earth Charter involved the most inclusive and participatory process of its time ever associated with the creation of an international declaration. This process is the primary source of its legitimacy as a guiding ethical framework. The Earth Charter was finalized and then launched in 2000 and its legitimacy has been further enhanced by its endorsement by over 6,500 organizations, including many governments and international organizations. In the light of this legitimacy, an increasing number of international lawyers recognize that the Earth Charter is acquiring the status of a soft law document. The book also shows the strong connection between ecological integrity and social justice, particularly in the defence of indigenous people, and includes contributions from both the North and the global South, specifically from Central and South America.