Anthropologists point out that part of what makes humans unique amongst species is communication to be able to undertake unilateral, coordinated action towards certain ends. In the face of climate change and biodiversity loss, our limits have become apparent. This may be because humans are also hardwired towards prioritising risks that they can sense using their evolutionary instincts – generally short-term and visible. See more and more people wearing masks, and progressively emptier public spaces, and the message gets through. Evolutionary psychologists tell us this makes us bad at decisions that require long-term planning horizons and indirect threats, and at making sacrifices without immediate or tangible reward. Therefore, it is critical to have leaders that can foment institutional, technological and behavioral change towards climate change mitigation and adaptation, even if certain stakeholders are resistant. The pandemic has shown us that we are indeed capable of acting swiftly, decisively and effectively on a major threat to our wellbeing.

The type of reaction needed is made difficult when our fates are being decided in a multilateral system in which ambition is decided by the lowest common denominator – bad faith actors that are always countries with fossil fuel resources. These countries operate under undue corporate influence and the consideration of short-term election cycles, and where democracy is frayed or missing, the impulse to stay in power. This has resulted not in years, but decades, of delayed action on the biggest existential threat humankind has ever faced. Never has the phrase ‘we are only as strong as our weakest link’ been more applicable, than to global-scale threats such as pandemics and climate change.

One such bad-faith actor has steered the course of our reaction to climate change. When COVID-19 was largely seen as a China-limited issue, the U.S. Republican party vocally denied that coronavirus would ever be a threat. One of their members wore a gas mask on the floor of their lower house to mock the concern of the opposition party, while Donald Trump called the virus a hoax. This has mimicked their attitude to climate change, which Trump has also called a hoax. These are the political machinations of a government of the world’s superpower, the same superpower that has pulled out of two international climate agreements (both the results of years and decades of painstaking negotiations) and consistently lowered ambition in international climate change negotiations. To illustrate, we may right now have been chasing a 1.5C instead of a 2C temperature rise curtailment goal: in 2018, at international climate change negotiations, the United States, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Russia objected to ‘welcoming’ the IPCC report detailing the importance of this revised goal, nixing any downstream increases in ambition. The United States has had the economic and financial clout to influence other countries in collectively bend the curve but has consistently and overall failed to do so.

Instead, Post-Paris agreement, rich world institutions are still growing the fossil fuel economy, by subsidising and funding it, all while viable alternatives exist. Moreover, the logic driving the growth (and inequality) imperative is based on outdated economics. An enormous amount of waste and inefficiency, duplication and redundancy exists in the name of economic growth, based on models that treat the environment and atmosphere as expendable input and waste sinks, and capital as the chief measure of concern in accounting.

Eventually, once climate change has manifested to a degree where its impacts are irrefutable, and should there be democratic process left in a sufficient number of institutions, our global publics will demand action. The goal should be to pre-empt this theoretical point of action-upon-manifestation, to look at the exponential growth curves of active COVID-19 cases and plot in our minds the potential for the same trajectory of runaway with climate. This is where clima-tude comes to bear, as it proves to us that we are capable of evolving as a species, to perceive risks that the early-evolved parts of our brains have an in-built bias against, and to take action on what may seem like faith alone. Just as we cannot see a virus and we act on the faith of what virologists tell us, so too should we act on the faith of climate scientists, climate economists, risk assessors and security specialists.

Ultimately, the lessons with COVID-19 are that the value of sacrifice is an easy calculation to make, and that global cooperation is vital in countering a global threat. Countries are cooperating to beat back the spread of the virus, and the moment we are having right now is what it feels like to fight a common enemy. Cooperation means sharing information, resources, technological and institutional know-how. Italy is warning the rest of Europe that they are not taking the COVID-19 threat seriously enough, China is sending medical staff to Italy, factories are being retrofitted to produce hand-sanitiser. The likelihood that we will take necessary action, confident that others are like-minded and dedicated, is vastly increased by a  culture of cooperation, rather than a retreat into our lagers and stooping to hamstering – whether with toilet paper during the pandemic, or status-signaling conspicuous consumption all the while. In the context of climate change, carrying on with business as usual is a race to the bottom of perceived self-preservation.

Underscoring this cooperation is the reality that we share a planet, and in the language of epidemics, our movement and interaction affects everyone, just as in the language of climate and global change, so too does our impact on this planet. How interconnected we are, will become visible beyond this pandemic, through drought-induced drops in food production, increased terrorism risk and conflict that inevitably draws in countries. The same rising ocean will lap further and further up our shores, as the same strain of demagogue will attempt to take advantage of the fear generated amongst publics.

There is by now an iconic cartoon in which an audience member asks a presenter ‘What if it’s a big hoax and we create a better world for nothing?’. One noteworthy 2018 study has found that creating this better world will save us, not cost us, $26 trillion by 2030 if we act meaningfully on climate change (not considering the incalculable benefit of preventing deaths and reducing general misery). The biggest losers will be the short-term profits of the fossil fuel industry and its investors. Provided there is effective policy to help us cross the bridge, such as a just transition for relevant industries, and measures to soften the blow of temporarily increasing prices as we transition off of fossil fuel technology, halt and reverse deforestation, and shift to regenerative agriculture, the rest of us will gain in every sense of the word. Using positive framing, the pandemic could get us communally energised to tackle climate change, to fill the uncertainty that has come to define the last few years with pursuit of a common goal – to overcome an existential crisis. In the sentiment of emerging green (new) deal policy proposals, the climate crisis allows us an opportunity to defeat other global ills, notably biodiversity loss, poverty, and gender and economic inequality. We know, as with COVID-19, that it won’t be easy, but that we will come out the other side happier, safer and more prosperous – as will the whole future of humanity. Moreover, we can hustle far, far faster than we have been told we can. Let’s get through this pandemic with our covid-tude, and during the next decade of struggle lying before us, let’s show some clima-tude.

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This pandemic and the nature of our response to it, is unprecedented within our lifetimes. Affected societies have adopted a mode of solidarity and sacrifice towards achieving an explicit goal – mitigate and ultimately stop a novel virus, which threatens to overwhelm global society. Conceptually, one could take the last part of this sentence, replace ‘a novel virus’ with ‘climate change’, spread out the timeline and have it remain a meaningful statement.

It would be unrealistic to propose that we observe the same behaviour of isolating ourselves and press the hibernate button on economic activity. Instead, I am proposing that we all (emphasis on all) take seriously a threat that a different set of experts tell us is very real, is happening right now, and has a window of opportunity within which to act meaningfully.

The two crises are intertwined in at least one important way: given that climate change and biodiversity loss increase the risk of pandemic, COVID-19 stands figuratively as the smallest within a set of Russian dolls, nested inside the progressively larger dolls of global change (a term describing climate change, biodiversity loss, overhunting, altered biogeochemical cycles, invasive species and other planetary-scale changes caused by humans). Naturally, however, there are also fundamental differences between pandemics and climate change, perhaps the most obvious being that pandemics target the physiological health of our species, rather than directly undermining the basis of our livelihoods, security and well-being: ecosystems and the free services they provide, and the chemical and physical properties of the atmosphere, land and oceans. Pandemics are short-lived, even as their effects have lasting ramifications, while climate change is enduring and potentially irreversible. While the pandemic is primarily a public health crisis, climate change is a public health crisis and then some. Pandemics have immediate, visible effects – hospital beds filling up, running out of stock of ventilators and diagnostic kits, the race for vaccine development. Climate change occurs frame-by-frame and is difficult to tease apart from historically occurring phenomena: natural disasters, socio-political tensions, famine. Lastly, meaningful action on climate change involves systemic changes to infrastructure and institutions, permanent and deep change that not only deals with the crisis but gears the whole of our societies to be sustainable, so as to avert future crises.

However, similarities can be drawn, and lessons learnt. People have experienced firsthand that the world does not implode if our lifestyles change quite suddenly – even as the most vulnerable are having a hard time of it – and that we have the resources and flexibility to adapt. While the situation could not go on such as it is, and need not, what we can take from this experience is that the blueprints we have for our societies as they are now, are not set in stone. The economy would not wither if we don’t build that highway that shaves six minutes off average commuter times, and our life support system does not hinge on consumerism and indulgence. Many people can work and pay bills and communicate effectively and need not travel across the country or across continents to achieve the same results. We still go on breathing, living, nurturing and loving, albeit loving from a distance. Where governments are supporting the most vulnerable of their populations, everyone can still access the essentials – food, water, medicine, even online education. We feel united, as we would fighting climate change, knowing that our sacrifice is eminently worth it.

Changing our lifestyles in response to crisis measures, with the retention of what is truly important for our wellbeing, is possible. Psychologists tell us that beyond a minimum level of wellbeing, it is not our suite of behaviours or goods consumption in of themselves, but rather the fact that the society around us has access to them, that drives us to feel an associated sense of dependency. In other words, we have wiggle room in more ways than what we may have perceived we did, and perhaps our limits of satisfaction are largely delineated by how much our peers have. During the COVID-19 crisis, we are more satisfied being cooped up in our houses knowing that others are, too. Meaningful action on climate change, to the wealthy and well-off, may feel like a sacrifice – frequent holidays abroad, buying imported foods, owning an SUV. To most of the rest of us, our lifestyles would not change as much as we are led to believe by professional climate change deniers and their equally ugly metamorphosis, climate change minimisers. This industry, which has been core to influencing public perception, and the political lobbying industry which has stymied a transition off of fossil fuels, has been funded by the well documented and continuing flow of billions of dollars, courtesy the fossil fuel industry.

If the politics shifted meaningfully, it would mean the domino-like declarations of climate emergencies across countries. This would place us on a war-like footing, as the science tells us is now necessary. If societies were then required to make adjustments to their lifestyles, while keeping the fundamentals of what creates a good life, change may well be far more acceptable. Knowing it was vital not only to our children’s, but also to our own survival, and that we were all making adjustments together, could give us the same resoluteness we now possess in changing our behaviour to kill the virus. With targeted policy, there would not likely be real drops in quality of life, and even putting aside the value of a safe climate system, in many instances changes could directly improve wellbeing – riding a bike and beefing up your cardiovascular health, paying less for electricity with government support to install solar panels on your roof, growing food in your back yard as a family- or friend-based activity and a form of green exercise. This could be part and parcel of clima-tude, the attitude required not only to deal with a crisis, but to actively improve your own and others wellbeing in the process.

While the above examples are of a personal and community nature, clima-tude must permeate into the regional, national and international spheres. Individual lifestyle changes alone are simply insufficient. But individual and community action can help galvanise connections with like-minded individuals and organisations, and spur powerful, broad-based action (a marketing trick Greenpeace has been using). This process is reflected in the pandemic, where action scales from the individual, to local municipalities, and right up to international organisations such as WHO and the UN. Nothing less than a global effort is required to tackle both pandemics and climate change.

IPCC scientists definitively told us in 2018 that we have just a short window to address climate change, by now amounting to a fall in emissions of 7.6% per year between now and 2030, to stand a chance of limiting global warming to below a 1.5°C rise in temperatures. They tell us that this would require ‘‘rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society’’. This threshold is regarded as the ‘safe limit’, even though millions are currently unsafe and dying because of climate change and coal pollution. We have the technological and financial resources to achieve this, but up until now have lacked the political will. In a well-functioning democracy, the electorate is the lever which generates this political will. A ruling party that fails in mobilising resources to fend off the spread of COVID-19, will fail in their re-election bid. The franchise, and other tools in our civic toolbox, are the most fundamental means we have in realising our collective power to deal with climate change. We will only be in this position for a limited period of time, and we have already seen the results of even a slight lag in confronting COVID-19. Will you be able to look back in 2035 or beyond, when widespread food and water shortages emerge, crises to make COVID-19 look tame, and say that you did everything reasonable in your power to help avert that situation? Perhaps the next decree to stay in our homes comes not due to a pandemic, but to wars that originate out of geopolitical tensions, driven by multiple, interacting climate change impacts. If pandemics can happen again, so can wars between blocs of countries, developed and developing.

Part 2 will follow soon.

The post From covid-tude to clima-tude (part 1/2) appeared first on Global Change Ecology.

At the centre of her proposal is the doughnut, a simple visual tool expressing the safe space  of social and planetary boundaries. The empty space outside of the doughnut consists of a breach of nine planetary boundaries, while the empty space in the centre of the doughnut represents a breach of commonly accepted social foundations. Between social and planetary boundaries exists an ecologically safe and socially fair space in which humanity can experience true wellbeing, both now and into the future.

Recently, Kate Raworth, in tandem with Rethinking Economics – the international student movement for pluralism in economics education –launched a competition for the public to come up with the 8th way to think like a 21st century economist. The article below is the last of three entries submitted by Steven Myburgh, a student in the GCE program.

Use money creation for good: from hoarding the money for the private casino, to reclaiming the money for shared goals.

In the past, the injection of money into an economy has been linked to expansion of materials and energy systems, using natural ‘resources’ – this has been shown to be untenable on a number of fronts. Rather, should at least a portion of money creation be harnessed according to global social and environmental deficits, growth can instead be linked to growth of resource-use efficiency and (re-)growth of natural capital, instead of GDP growth per se.

For decades, neoliberalist entities have advanced their trifecta of deregulation, privatisation and liberalisation. One result was the 2008 financial crisis, with the reckless finance industry being bailed out by taxpayers everywhere. Many argue that such cycles are inevitable when private banks have no significant controls on being able to create money – with neither the reserve ratio (the portion of reserves banks should hold onto rather than lend out, should there be one) or asset liquidity requirements (dictating how quickly one can cash out an investment) mattering much. In addition, central banks either bail out distressed banks or assume their liabilities. This has allowed the financial industry to create convoluted and complex financial instruments with which to gamble, under a system of privatised profit and socialised debts.

When banks loan to the private sector, common good is largely an accident on the way to making a profit, which is a rather inefficient means of generating it – especially when, on longer time lines that nobody in business circles has any incentive to project, making a profit erodes this common good.

So how is greed in the finance sector reigned in? While monetary reform ideas abound, I believe an important strategy would be to probe to what extent the money creation process is fair. In other words, is the flow of newly-created money associated with rent seeking, or the ability to charge for something you yourself were charged substantially less for? Of course, there is a place for private banks, to recognise opportunities which the public sector is not equipped to, and in this way to take risks in spurring the development of new goods and services that stand to benefit the real economy. Any limits placed on them should therefore be contained at the level before finance becomes speculatory. While ideally, regulation should control this, the reality is that the finance industry use their resources to nudge politicians in many countries in the direction of deregulation.

Public banking and grant-making organisations

Many advocate that alongside private banks, or even instead of them, public interest banks, grant-making organisations and government programs should be utilising new money created by central banks in our economies. Instead of loans given out on the basis of sufficient confidence in seeing their return with interest, they say, we should empower actors that can democratically loan and allocate it according to social and environmental criteria. Where there is limited possibility of generating a financial return, grant-making organisations and spending on government social and environmental programs fill the gap.

This is a broadening of the concept of sovereign money creation, where the government receives this new money to pump into public benefit programs. These public entities have vastly differing mandates to private banks. For example, they can have as aim to pursue profit in natural capital terms. When a public interest bank is assessing a potential project, they can assess it in terms of return on investment, but also in terms of how much carbon it stands to sequester, how much water it will retain, how much habitat it will create and so on. In the farther reaches of creative thinking, the value of certain financial instruments could be backed by levels of natural capital, such as the conservation status of endemic species and intactness of ecosystems.

Similarly, a public interest bank could aim for human wellbeing, as expressed by a number of metrics: genuine progress indicator; those related to the SDGs; and  those expressed by the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. There stands to be much synergy between environmental projects and social outcomes, for example, livelihoods in the eco-tourism sector, and forests that capture rainwater and protect downstream communities from flooding.

One such example of a public interest bank might be a green bank, or a bank that has as its model to lend for green retrofitting of existing businesses: to generate their own solar and wind power, to ensure their operations are energy and material efficient, and re-use their own waste in a circular manner. It need not only be businesses: a household may want to install water-efficient showerheads, solar thermal geysers, insulate their homes, and generate their own compost, but be deterred by steep interest rates offered by conventional consumption loans.

We know where we need to pour money into, in order to enter into the safe space of the doughnut. The latest International Energy Agency report has stated that to align with key climate goals, a renewable energy revolution would cost $1.7 trillion per year by 2050, with savings of 6 trillion annually from reduced pollution costs, better health and lower environmental damage. In 2014, the UN estimated the financing gap to realise the SDGs at $2.5 trillion per year in developing countries. The Institute for Global Prosperity at University College London has published the UK’s first report on Universal Basic Services, calculating that in order to provide citizens with free housing, food, transport and IT, the country would require £42 billion annually.

By allowing money to work toward social and environmental goals, we add genuine value, as opposed to value that may one day vanish, come the first continental megadrought or the rise of an authoritarian government in response to climate change induced migration. Ultimately, sovereign money creation for the common good would positively affect private banking as well. Prioritising investor confidence in profit-making above all else is not a tenable approach to building an economy – it has come at too great a cost, and proved unable to tackle inequality or protect the planet. If money is power, we need to take it back.

The post The 8th Way to Think Like a 21st Century Economist – Part 3 of 3 appeared first on Global Change Ecology.

At the centre of her proposal is the doughnut, a simple visual tool expressing the safe space  of social and planetary boundaries. The empty space outside of the doughnut consists of a breach of nine planetary boundaries, while the empty space in the centre of the doughnut represents a breach of commonly accepted social foundations. Between social and planetary boundaries exists an ecologically safe and socially fair space in which humanity can experience true wellbeing, both now and into the future.

Recently, Kate Raworth, in tandem with Rethinking Economics – the international student movement for pluralism in economics education –launched a competition for the public to come up with the 8th way to think like a 21st century economist. The article below is the second of three entries submitted by Steven Myburgh, a student in the GCE program.

Internalise the cost of ‘externalities’: from nature as dead-or-alive resource to full-cost accounting.

Traditional economic accounting breaks nature down into its component raw materials, to be fed into the economic system to create an output. In doing so, it ignores how bio-geo-chemical cycles interact with living organisms and abiotic elements to produce natural capital, and indeed how their integrity allows for an economic system to occur in the first place. Thus, this eighth way to think is related to the second: the embedded economy is a subset of the whole earth system, and not the other way around.

When inputs are combined and outputs produced, waste, pollution and depletion of natural capital most often result. Waste might be that which enters landfill (it represents inefficiency and squandered resources), pollution might be nitrogen fertiliser runoff that causes harmful algal blooms in downstream waterways, and depletion of natural capital might be soil erosion. These are termed externalities, and as such are largely not accounted for in our economic systems. While environmental management ensures the worst of certain types of pollution are ameliorated or prevented, it could be argued that the definition of pollution is far too narrow, for example not considering combined effects (synergism) of chemicals and metals in the environment. Similarly, waste is associated with materials that are not highly valued in the marketplace, even though, outside of short-term economic cycles, their future scarcity looms large in many instances. Lastly, depletion of natural capital is in some cases effectively irreversible or causes irreversible damage, at least in timescales that matter to humans and their progeny. One such case of damage is the extinction of species that call many of these ‘natural resources’ home – one may think of palm oil, the tropical rainforests in Sumatra, Indonesia and the critically endangered Orangutan.

I propose that the eight way to think should be to internalise the full spectrum of economic ‘externalities’ into our economic accounting systems, through the use of full-cost accounting and associated regulations. We do not have to start from scratch, there are a number of existing initiatives. Perhaps the most advanced, in terms of its adoption by national economic systems, is the United Nations initiative SEEA, or the System of Environmental-Economic Accounting, which attempts to accurately model the interrelationship between the environment and economies, as environmental stocks change in relation to socio-economic status.

A closely related concept is that of Ecosystem Services, which are defined as the direct and indirect contributions of nature to human wellbeing, and include the provision of direct goods (such as food), the regulation of systems we rely on (such as the climate system), protection from natural hazards, and many more aside. These methodologies combine biophysical assessments with economic measurements and calculations, and increasingly methods from the humanities and social sciences – and provide the potential to inform policymakers of the value of nature alive, functioning and intact, rather than dead, disassembled and liquidated.

While these ideas contain much promise, they remain largely voluntary. To be effective, they would operate within national and international legislation that was effective at stemming the loss of biodiversity and mitigating climate change.

Three zones of human activity

The doughnut speaks to the following 21st century aim: meeting the needs of all within the means of the planet. I believe to comprehend how we do this, it is useful to conceptualise three zones of human activity. Firstly, we have the zone of liberty, where our liberties are defined by their not impinging on the liberties of others. Here, we may follow the religion, marry the person, speak the language of our choosing. And as long as an activity or action was in the zone of liberty, we could practice the livelihood we wanted. Now, I skip to the third, which is the outer shell of the doughnut, and represents the natural bounds we must stay in. An example may be keeping intact a certain percentage of each ecosystem type, and ensuring that there is sufficient connectivity between core protected areas for migration. Here, ecologists and other natural scientists are vital in delineating the red lines that will preserve nature, including both biodiversity and biogeochemical systems that maintain nature. These red lines will give humanity a strong basis with which to preserve our natural capital, preventing its depletion.

The second zone, then, is the zone of adaptive management between the first zone of liberty and the third no-go zone, and relates to economic processes that do cause damage or use limited resources, though damage that can be ameliorated, and use related to a renewable resource. If non-renewable resources are concerned, use should be at a rate relevant to the rate at which technology is developing to reduce or eliminate their use.  In the case of damage being caused, as an example, should the building of a hospital be planned in an area that has a particular rare flower growing on it, a comparable parcel of land that can act as habitat for that same flower should be restored. This zone relates to flexible market mechanisms, such as cap and trade. Thus, full-cost accounting relates to the first zone – to make certain what we practice is true liberty – and the second zone – to manage our production processes in light of where the boundary of the red lines lie, and to quantify the cost and qualify the nature of repair related to the temporary damage or use.

It may be apparent that the eight way of thinking, on its surface, focuses on nature. More holistic and accurate accounting measures, taken in the context of legislation that reflects these zones of human activity, could work on the inside shell of the doughnut as well. There is overwhelming evidence that  protected ecosystems, restoration of ecosystems, climate change mitigation and adaptation and sustainable agriculture, stand to secure peoples wellbeing, including their economic livelihoods. The logic of this is elegantly simple: natural capital produces high returns if it is not liquidated.

Once we can account for the cost of invasive species that spread as a result of the forestry industry, for the amount of soil erosion that industrial agricultural practices cause, for the financial cost associated with every extra gigaton of carbon dioxide equivalent we emit, we can then draw those red lines (some of which would be dynamic over time). And those red lines equate with green jobs: jobs to fell the invasive species, jobs to work on the organic and sustainable farms that require more hands than conventional operations, jobs to erect and maintain solar power installations and wind turbines.

The post The 8th Way to Think Like a 21st Century Economist – Part 2 of 3 appeared first on Global Change Ecology.

At the center of her proposal is the doughnut, a simple visual tool expressing the safe space  of social and planetary boundaries. The empty space outside of the doughnut consists of a breach of nine planetary boundaries, while the empty space in the center of the doughnut represents a breach of commonly accepted social foundations. Between social and planetary boundaries exists an ecologically safe and socially fair space in which humanity can experience true well-being, both now and into the future.

Recently, Kate Raworth, in tandem with Rethinking Economics – the international student movement for pluralism in economics education –launched a competition for the public to come up with the 8th way to think like a 21st century economist. The article below is the first of three entries submitted by Steven Myburgh, a student in the GCE program.

Use law to shape the doughnut: from hollow economic promises to a strengthening of  economic, social and cultural rights.

Economics does not happen in a vacuum, it is shaped by the policy derived from laws that pertain to civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights, as well as from international trade laws – to mention two of the most significant legal areas, and the two  that I will argue we should relate to economics. The economics profession has long claimed to be value-neutral, but the reality is that economic ‘logic’ is used to justify policies that have ramifications in every realm of life, including in the delivery (or lack thereof) of rights of all kinds. 

As an example, many economists have long held that allowing the rich to get richer would result in benefits trickling down to everyone else, until an IMF study rubbished this theory in 2015. Though it can be obscured through biophysical and socio-cultural layers of complexity, economic policy breaches many of our current social and environmental laws and protections. This is seen, as just one devastating example, in the premature deaths of millions around the world annually, due to fossil fuel-caused pollution. Issues such as these beg the question: what will the mechanisms be, to drive a shift for humanity to enter the sweet spot, the doughnut? 

Since the Paris agreement’s adoption in 2015, and despite their voicing public support for its goals, the fossil fuel majors have borrowed $1.9 trillion from 33 global banks: used overwhelmingly to expand fossil fuel infrastructure. We know we can’t rely on those who profit under a legal system that lets them off the hook, to bring the change we need. As this example shows, whatever the mechanism for entering the doughnut, it would only be realised on the multilateral level – if nations agreed to a floor of standards, to curtail a race to the bottom where a country loses out in investment and employment terms if they do not competitively ‘cut red tape’. 

I argue that there is existing international legal architecture and a set of institutions that needs to be updated, strengthened and streamlined for the 21st century. The realisation of the full spectrum of what should be current and future human and nature rights is vital, in order for us to enter the safe space of the doughnut as a trading, interconnected global society. 

Economic, social and cultural rights 

While civil and political rights are relatively well established (albeit in decline in some regions), economic, social and cultural rights have some way to go – sadly, the United States stands alone as the only major developed country not to have ratified the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, even while some countries and regions have used the treaty to inform their own relevant legislation over the past five decades.

Economic, social and cultural rights are the basic conditions required for people to lead free and dignified lives, and indeed include many of the doughnut indicators, such as access to education, housing, food (and water), social security, energy and health services. They are important because they give expression to the reality that our species is reciprocating and interdependent by nature. Law recognises that such rights may not be immediately fulfilled, but requires states to work toward the fulfillment of these rights. Thus, economic, social and cultural rights provide a strong driver for governments to experiment, perhaps through the introduction of increasingly popular ideas such as Universal Basic Services and Full Employment programs. These ideas are especially valid in light of the fourth industrial revolution and the need for a just transition for communities dependent on old forms of energy generation. 

Trade law and other initiatives

Trade intimately influences the setting of social and environmental standards, through a proliferation of bilateral and multilateral trade agreements. Many commentators suggest that international trade law, as regulated by the World Trade Organisation, should align with global environmental treaties, in concert with these treaties themselves becoming legally binding and thus acquiring the associated enforcement teeth. A body of academics suggest this would be an opportunity to tackle the fragmentation (and thus limited effectiveness) of  global environmental governance. A majority of nations having the requisite suite of harmonised rights in place, would ensure that a reasonable standard is set for international trade, where every mining company, every agricultural sector and every forestry corporation would be held to the same labor, environmental, and prior and informed consent standards that each one of their competitors is, no matter in which country they do business.

In addition to a push by civil society to secure the next frontier of rights – economic, social and cultural – there are a handful of legal efforts that stand to have positive implications for our present and future societies, including our economic systems. Ecocide law advocates for a legal duty held by governments to protect citizens from dangerous industrial practices, such as the emissions of greenhouse gases by fossil fuel majors. The Treaty on Transnational Corporations and Human Rights, now being refined by a UN Intergovernmental Working Group, was the result of a global campaign to end the impunity of the strongest of economic multinational and transnational actors in developing countries. The Rights of Nature movement advocates for the granting of inalienable rights to nature, by uprooting the legal classification of nature as ‘property’,  and granting it the legal right to ‘exist, persist, maintain and regenerate its vital cycles’, in the light of anthropogenic threats. While some progressive constitutions, such as South Africa’s, recognise the right to a healthy and clean environment, this is still based on an anthropocentric view with limited interpretation and effectiveness, even in terms of human well-being. Its corollary, an effort by some to strip corporations of their status as legal persons, exposing actual people to responsibilities and implications concerning the effect of their decisions on people and planet. In addition, these efforts are also intimately tied to the idea of the rights of future generations, or the unborn: in order to persist on this planet, future generations will require for the planet to be livable.

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