Chapter 6 - Environmental Dignity Rights

Summary

ABSTRACT

The threats to human rights caused by environmental degradation – including those caused by climate change – are increasingly evident. And yet, there continues to be confusion and a lack of consensus about how human rights will be affected, as demonstrated at the recent climate talks in Paris. Taking better advantage of the role of constitutionally-instantiated dignity rights can help to diffuse this dissonance. Most of the effects that environmental degradation have on people can be seen in threats to their ability to live in dignity, including the ability to fully develop one's personality, to live in a community and to claim other rights. The right to dignity, though rooted in international law, is recognized in most of the world's constitutions and a robust jurisprudence of dignity rights has been developing in many countries. We conclude that environmental outcomes – including climate change – can and should be informed by dignity rights and corresponding jurisprudence, a synthesis we call “environmental dignity rights.”

“Man has the fundamental right to freedom, equality and adequate conditions of life, in an environment of a quality that permits a life of dignity and well-being, and he bears a solemn responsibility to protect and improve the environment for present and future generations.”

– Stockholm Declaration on the Human Environment

The importance of dignity as a founding value of the new Constitution cannot be overemphasized. Recognizing a right to dignity is the acknowledgement of the intrinsic worth of human beings: human beings are entitled to be treated as worthy of respect and concern.

– S v. Makwanyane and Another, Constitutional Court of South Africa

INTRODUCTION

Environmental outcomes can and should be informed by the concept of dignity. Human dignity is an elemental value that presupposes that every human being has equal worth. It emphasizes the fundamental value and equality of all members of society – humans are not only endowed with dignity, but each is endowed with an equal quantum of dignity. In the words of the United Nation's Declaration on Human Rights, “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.” Where dignity is recognized, each person's dignity is inalienable, irreducible and infinite.