Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-fscjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-31T19:52:12.220Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Give it up for climate change: a defence of the beneficiary pays principle

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 June 2012

Edward A. Page
Edward A. Page*
Affiliation:
Department of Politics and International Studies, Warwick University, Coventry, UK
*
E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article focuses on the normative problem of establishing how the burdens associated with implementing policies designed to prevent, or manage, climate change should be shared amongst states involved in ongoing international climate change negotiations. This problem has three key features: identifying the nature and extent of the burdens that need to be borne; identifying the type of agent that should be allocated these burdens; and distributing amongst the particular ‘tokens’ of the relevant ‘agent type’ climatic burdens according to principles that none could reasonably reject. The article defends a key role in climatic burden-sharing policy for the principle that states benefiting most from activities that cause climate change should bear the greatest burden in terms of the costs of preventing dangerous climate change. I outline two versions of this ‘beneficiary pays’ principle; examine the strengths and weakness of each version; and explore how the most plausible version (which I call the ‘unjust enrichment’ principle) could be operationalized in the context of global climate governance.

Keywords

global justiceclimate changeunjust enrichmentremedial responsibility
Type
Original Papers
Information
International Theory , Volume 4 , Issue 2 , July 2012 , pp. 300 - 330
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

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

Adger, Neil. 2010. “Climate Change, Human Well-being and Insecurity.” New Political Economy 15(2):275–292.Google Scholar
Allen, Myles R.Lord, Richard. 2004. “The Blame Game: Who will pay for the Damaging Consequences of Climate Change.” Nature 432:551–552.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anwander, Norbert. 2005. “Contributing and Benefiting: Two Grounds for Duties to the Victims of Injustice.” Ethics & International Affairs 19(1):39–45.Google Scholar
Baer, Paul, Fieldman, Glenn, Athanasiou, TomKartha, Sivan. 2008. “Greenhouse Development Rights: Towards an Equitable Framework for Global Climate Policy.” Cambridge Review of International Affairs 21(4):649–669.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Birks, Peter. 2001. “Unjust Enrichment and Wrongful Enrichment.” Texas Law Review 79:1767–1794.Google Scholar
Boden, Tom, Marland, GreggAndres, Robert. 2011. Global, Regional, and National Fossil-Fuel CO2 Emissions. Oak Ridge, TN: Oak Ridge National Laboratory; doi 10.3334/CDIAC/00001_V2011.Google Scholar
Butt, Daniel. 2007. “On Benefiting from Injustice.” Canadian Journal of Philosophy 37(1):129–152.Google Scholar
Butt, Daniel 2009. Rectifying International Injustice: Principles of Compensation and Restitution Between Nations. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Caney, Simon. 2005. “Cosmopolitan Justice, Responsibility, and Global Climate Change.” Leiden Journal of International Law 18(4):747–775.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Caney, Simon 2006. “Environmental Degradation, Reparations, and the Moral Significance of History.” Journal of Social Philosophy 37(3):464–482.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Caney, Simon 2009. ‘Justice and distribution of greenhouse gas emissions.’ Journal of Global Ethics 5(2):125–146.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Caney, Simon 2010. “Climate Change and the Duties of the Advantaged.” Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy 13(1):203–228.Google Scholar
Conway, ThomasTans, Peter. 2012. “Recent Global CO2.” In Trends in Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide. Boulder, CO: United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association, http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/global.htmlGoogle Scholar
Dellink, Rob, Den Elzen, Michael, Aiking, Harry, Bergsma, Emmy, Berkhout, Frans, Dekker, ThijsGupta, Joyeeta. 2009. “Sharing the Burden of Financing Adaptation to Climate Change.” Global Environmental Change 19:411–421.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Den Elzen, Michael, Schaeffer, MichaelLucas, Paul. 2005. “Differentiating Future Commitments on the Basis of Countries’ Relative Historical Responsibility for Climate Change.” Climatic Change 71:277–301.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
European Union. 2009. “Decision No 406/2009/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 April 2009 on the Effort of Member States to Reduce Their Greenhouse Gas Emissions to Meet the Community's Greenhouse Gas Emission Reduction Commitments up to 2020.” Official Journal of the European Union, L140, 52:136–148.Google Scholar
Feinberg, Joel. 1990. The Moral Limits of the Criminal Law: Vol. 4: Harmless Wrongdoing. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gergen, Mark P. 2001. ‘What Renders Enrichment Unjust?’, Texas Law Review 79(7):1927–1980.Google Scholar
Gosseries, Axel. 2004. “Historical Emissions and Free-Riding.” Ethical Perspectives 11(1):36–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Honoré, Tony 1999. Responsibility and Fault (Oxford: Hart Publishing).Google Scholar
KleinRichard, and Saleemul Huq Richard, and Saleemul Huq. 2007. ‘Inter-relationship between adaptation and mitigation,’ in Martin Parry (ed.), Climate Change 2007: Impacts, Adaption and Vulnerability. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 746–777.Google Scholar
Klimchuk, Dennis. 2007. “The Scope and Structure of Unjust Enrichment.” University of Toronto Law Journal 57(4):795–817.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kunte, Arundhati, Hamilton, Kirk, Dixon, John, Clemens, Michael. 1998. Estimating National Wealth: Methodology and Results. Environment Department Papers (No.57). Washington, DC: World Bank.Google Scholar
Meyer, LukasRoser, Dominic. 2010. “Climate Justice and Historical Emissions.” Critical Review of Social and Political Philosophy 13(1):229–253.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, David. 2001. “Distributing Responsibilities.” The Journal of Political Philosophy 9(4):453–471.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, David. 2009. “The Tanner Lectures on Human Values.” In The Tanner Lectures on Human Values, edited by Grethe B. Peterson, 119–156. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press.Google Scholar
Neumayer, Eric. 2000. “In Defence of Historical Responsibility for Greenhouse Gas Emissions.” Ecological Economics 33:185–192.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Oxfam International. 2009. Hang Together or Separately? How Global Co-operation is Key to a Fair and Adequate Climate Deal at Copenhagen (Oxfam Briefing Paper 128). London: Oxfam International, http://www.oxfam.org/sites/www.oxfam.org/files/bp128-hang-together-separately-summary-0906.pdf.Google Scholar
Page, Edward A. 2006. Climate Change, Justice and Future Generations. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Page, Edward A. 2008. “Distributing the Burdens of Climate Change.” Environmental Politics 17(4):556–575.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Page, Edward A. 2011. “Climatic Justice and Atmospheric Burdens.” The Monist 94(3):412–432.Google Scholar
Parfit, Derek. 1984. Reasons and Persons. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Parry, Martin, Canziani, OsvaldoPalutikof, Jean. 2007. “Technical Summary.” In Climate Change 2007: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability, edited by M. Parry, O. Canziani, J.P. Palutikof, P. van der Linden and C. Hanson, 23–78. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Parry, Martin, Lowe, JasonHanson, Clair. 2009. “Overshoot, Adapt and Recover.” Nature 458:1102–1103.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Posner, EricWeisbach, David. 2010. Climate Change Justice. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Shue, Henry. 1993. “Subsistence Emissions and Luxury Emissions.” Law & Policy 15(1):39–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shue, Henry 1999. “Global Environment and International Inequality.” International Affairs 75(3):531–545.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shue, Henry 2011. “Face Reality? After You! – A Call for Leadership on Climate Change.” Ethics and International Affairs 25(1):17–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Singer, Peter. 2002. One World: The Ethics of Globalization. London: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Solomon, Susan, Qin, DaleManning, Martin. 2007. “Technical Summary.” In Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis, edited by S. Solomon, D. Qin, M. Manning, M. Marquis, K.B. Averyt, M. Tignor, H.L. Miller, and Z. Chen, 19–91. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Stamas, Maria. 2010. “Cromer v. Murphy: The Fifth Circuit Grapples with Its Role in Hearing Climate Change Tort Claims.” Ecology Law Quarterly 37:711–720.Google Scholar
Starkey, Richard. 2011. “Assessing Common(s) Arguments for an Equal per Capita Allocation.” The Geographical Journal 177(2):112–126.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stern, Nicholas. 2007. The Economics of Climate Change: The Stern Review. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). 1992. United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Geneva: UNFCCC, 1–24, http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/convkp/conveng.pdf.Google Scholar
UNFCCC. 2011. “The Cancun Agreements: Outcome of the work of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Long-term Cooperative Action under the Convention” (Decision 1/CP.16). Geneva: UNFCCC, pp. 1–31. Accessed May 15, 2012. http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/2010/cop16/eng/07a01.pdf.Google Scholar
UNFCCC. 2012. Report of the Conference of the Parties on its seventeenth session. Durban, November 28 to December 11, 2011. Geneva: UNFCCC. http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/2011/cop17/eng/09a01.pdf.Google Scholar
Weinrib, Ernest J. 1987. ‘Causation and Wrongdoing?’, Chicago-Kent Law Review 63(3):407–450.Google Scholar
World Bank. 2010a. The Economics of Adaptation to Climate Change: A Synthesis Report. Washington, DC: World Bank.Google Scholar
World Bank 2010b. World Development Report 2010: Development and Climate Change. Washington, DC: World Bank.Google Scholar
World Bank 2011. The Changing Wealth of Nations: Measuring Sustainable Development in the New Millennium. Washington, DC: World Bank.Google Scholar
World Resources Institute (WRI). 2012. Climate Analysis Indicators Tool. Washington, DC: WRI, http://cait.wri.org.Google Scholar