In my previous posts on the crime of ecocide -- Post 1, Post 2 -- I argued the theoretical/normative case against the IEP's decision to subject lawful acts to anthropocentric cost-benefit analysis via the "wantonness" requirement. In this post, I want to bracket the issue of whether the definition of ecocide should distinguish between lawful and unlawful acts and question...
In my previous post, I criticised the Independent Expert Panel for the Legal Definition of Ecocide (IEP) for endorsing a definition that is unjustifiably anthropocentric. In particular, I criticised the idea that "knowingly" causing a substantial likelihood of either widespread or long-term severe environmental damage is not criminal unless it is "wanton," defined as "reckless disregard for damage which would...
As a teenager, I read Angela Davis, CLR James, Edward Said, Kwame Nkrumah, and Malcolm X. From a young age, I was perplexed by the contingency of global living standards, failing to comprehend why much of my national community (in Egypt) was mired in squalor while my adopted ones were swaddled in comfort. Each thinker linked contemporary privilege to historic...
[Dr. Dalia Palombo is a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Business Ethics, University of St. Gallen.] Imperialism and Transnational Human Rights Litigation How to hold multinationals to account for human rights abuses? This is a question that has tormented scholars, litigators and advocates. It is difficult to answer because the term “multinational” does not exist in law. From the legal perspective, a multinational is a conglomerate of...
[Gabrielle Holly is a Senior Adviser in the Human Rights and Business Department at the Danish Institute for Human Rights and an experienced commercial disputes practitioner. You can find her on twitter at @Gabriellellell.] In recent years we have seen tremendous momentum behind moves to introduce mandatory human rights due diligence obligations in law, both at the national level and at the international...
[Penelope A. Bergkamp is a graduate from the National University of Singapore and KU Leuven, and law practitioner in Brussels.] Corporate liability and supply chain liability (SCL) in particular are experiencing a rapid and dramatic revolution. Supply chain liability (“SCL”) is the liability of a multinational corporation for damages caused by its business partners, often in developing countries. The term business partners refers to any business partner,...
[Paul Mougeolle is a representative of the association Notre Affaire à Tous, legal researcher for the NGO Global Legal Action Network (GLAN) and Ph.D. candidate at University of Paris Nanterre and University of Potsdam.] A wind of change is currently blowing in climate change litigation. Plaintiffs secure pioneering wins before the highest courts of Colombia, the Netherlands, Ireland, France and Germany. On the 26th of May...
[Jindan-Karena Mann is a PhD Researcher at the University of Amsterdam and Nicky Touw is a PhD Researcher at the Open University of the Netherlands.] The North Mara gold mine in Tanzania has been under scrutiny for many years now. Reports paint a picture of ongoing corruption, environmental harms, and human rights violations, including the excessive use of force by private security and police forces working with the mining...
I have been eagerly awaiting the results of the Independent Expert Panel for the Legal Definition of Ecocide (IEP), which includes a number of excellent lawyers and some close friends. The exercise has always been largely symbolic: even if 2/3 of states parties are willing to support an ecocide amendment, which is unlikely, an amendment to Art. 5 of the...
[Radu Mares is an Associate Professor, Raoul Wallenberg Institute of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law at Lund University (radu.mares@rwi.lu.se)] The last two decades marked a dramatic expansion of civil liability cases against parent companies. In this period, transnational litigation offered a way to get around the legislative inaction or slowness. Indeed, civil liability principles already exist in all home states. They apply to both natural...
[Ekaterina Aristova is a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights. Carlos Lopez is a Senior Legal Advisor at the International Commission of Jurists.] Past decades saw an emerging trend towards reliance on civil liability claims to address business-related human rights abuses. A movement that had initial impetus from the United States of America has now expanded to other continents, especially to Europe. The...
[Ahmed Abofoul is a Research Assistant at Kalshoven-Gieskes Forum on International Humanitarian Law and a Guest lecturer of Public International Law at Al-Azhar University – Gaza. He worked as a Research Assistant to Dr. Robert Heinsch and Dr. Giulia Pinzauti in submitting their amicus curiae observations in the Situation in the State of Palestine to the Pre-Trial Chamber I of the International Criminal Court] Introduction: The Palestinian people...