Tricks under Trade: How International Trade Both Facilitates and is Facilitated by Corporate Environmental Crime in the Waste and Hydrocarbon Sectors

Abstract

Legal scholarship in the realm of international economic law has a blind spot: the practice of international trade. Cargo and container shipping is the blood and guts of international trade, and it is fuelled by bunker oil – a hydrocarbon mixture of the dirtiest petroleum-based products. Worryingly, there is empirical evidence of bunkers being intentionally contaminated with waste oils. This fraudulent contamination violates numerous international, national, and EU rules on waste management and poses immense risks to the health of planet and people alike. These same acts of fraud are also extremely profitable, and they facilitate the smooth functioning of our global economy. The fraud is itself not just incentivised in the tight-margins reality of international trade, but it is facilitated by the lack of proper legislation and the vulnerability of the existing means of enforcement in the areas where there is legislation to comply with. Economic operators often use falsified documents to market fuel oil that should be considered as waste. Systematic wrongdoing of this kind is detrimental to the environment and risks eroding the rule of law in both its formal and substantive conceptualisations.

I. Introduction

There is a clear omission in the legal literature on international trade. This omission concerns the practice of trade itself. This practice is taken for granted as both premise and consequence of the agreements that are usually scrutinised by legal scholars. Even political scientists, who look past the texts of trade agreements and arrangements to the actors who generate them, seem to overlook the blood and guts of international trade, namely the movement of goods, commodities, and other substances across the globe. While international trade is not merely the movement of products and substances, a large portion of it is just that. ¹ It is partly those products or substances that take centre stage in this contribution and, even more so, the means by which they are manufactured and then transported across rivers, seas and oceans. International trade agreements rarely problematise shipping, yet it is undisputed that, without shipping, there would be no international trade to speak of. Indeed, increases in volumes of international trade almost automatically mean increases in the volume of international shipping. Therefore, in a discussion on the nature of the rule of law in international economic law, which is the central topic of this special issue, ² considerations of the relationship between the rule of law and the practice of shipping should not be forgotten.

The contention in this article is that we cannot merely look at the texts of trade agreements and the therein explicitly agreed upon trade activities to make sense of the relationship between the rule of law and international economic law. Indeed, we must look at the prerequisites for those trade activities and how they fare in the face of increasing demands that the rule of law characterise international trade relationships; and in the face of a notion of the rule of law that more and more incorporates the demands of environmental protection and social justice.

This article reflects on results from empirical research that show systematic wrongdoing in industrial sectors that are essential to international shipping and are more generally connected to the practice of international trade. In many instances, these activities can be classified as crimes. Specifically, they involve the fraudulent mixing of hazardous waste oils into bunker fuel. Bunker fuel is the hydrocarbon substance that powers ships, i.e., the prerequisite for shipping and trade itself. ³ It is also important to note that Articles 18(1) and 21 of the Waste Framework Directive prohibit the mixing or dilution of hazardous waste with other waste. ⁴ The corollary of this principle is the obligation to separate hazardous waste already mixed with other waste where this is “technically and economically feasible” (Article 18(3)). This obligation has been incorporated into national law. The crimes indicated in this piece are violations of these EU and national rules.

The connection between international trade and crimes in the waste and hydrocarbon sectors can be understood through an organisational criminology lens, which helps us to unpack the regulatory and economic context that facilitates fraud and harm enacted by companies in the waste and bunker fuel industries. This contribution will consider what the findings of the empirical research mentioned above mean for the discussion being outlined in this special issue.

The article is made up of four sections. First, we consider the tension between profit and planet and how this materialises in the relationship between rule of law and international economic law. Then, we contemplate how this tension influences private actors. Second, we see the manifestation of this tension in international trade in practice. More specifically, we focus on shipping and the management of hazardous wastes as activities essential to trade. We look at how the actors within these sectors need to deal with the concomitant pressure to profit and to pursue environmental protection. Third, we see how mechanisms aimed at protecting the environment and resolving the abovementioned conflict of imperatives end up facilitating crime and environmental harm. Lastly, we reflect on how this crime-facilitative character of norms and legislation should problematise the way the rule of law is used to promote sustainability in international trade. Indeed, it is argued that the implementation of the rule of law may lead to the rise of risk-generating bureaucracies as opposed to contributing to social and environmental justice.

II. A bridge over troubled water? The rule of law and the tension between profit and planet

In this section, we explore the relationship between the rule of law and the criminological findings and analysis presented in the subsequent sections. Firstly, we outline the tension between profit and the protection of the environment. Then, we look at the role the rule of law may play in mediating that tension in the context of international economic relations. Finally, we see how that same tension plays out in the private sector.

Authors from several disciplines have come to agree that the ideal of unlimited economic growth and the connected mechanisms of resource extraction and energy generation as well as the procedures for manufacturing and distributing goods that characterise capitalism endanger the well-being of our planet. ⁵ There is little evidence to say that globalised capitalism is the cause of environmental degradation and the injustices that can be connected to such degradation. Nevertheless, there is some consensus regarding the incompatibility of the capitalism practiced today with the current understanding of environmentally friendly activities. ⁶ The perspectives on the relationship between economic growth and environmental conservation can be arranged on a wide spectrum. Some argue that a complete overhaul of the premises and structures of our economic system is the only way to reach acceptable levels of sustainability. ⁷ Others believe that capitalism itself and its promotion of technological innovation can deliver the solutions to our current climate- and resource-related troubles. ⁸

While academic and political debate seemingly leaves plenty of room for discussion, the fact is that, every day, choices are made at all levels of society to remedy the tension between the goals of profitability and conservation. At both international and national levels, laws are developed that demand increasingly large financial commitments to review or re-invent entire industrial sectors and make them less environmentally harmful. ⁹ In a formal sense, laws are beginning to rule environmentally sensitive activities taking place internationally, much like they have been regulating purely economic exchanges.

In his contribution to this special issue, Henri Culot examines the rule of law as a principle of governance that has numerous elements and sources. Culot delves into these different dimensions of the rule of law underlining how it is functional to the promotion of trade and investment. From that perspective, much like shipping and bunker fuel production, the rule of law provides a basis for flourishing trade relationships. ¹⁰

At the same time, de Sadeleer and Damjanovic distinguish between formal and substantive components of the rule of law: the former referring to “procedural characteristics of the legal order and the jurisdictional system” and the latter to “the moral requirements […] of the liberal democratic regime to which [the rule of law] is consubstantial.” ¹¹ When we see the rule of law from this angle, questions begin to emerge about how we should deal with international trade practices premised on activities that are harmful to the environment and even criminal in nature.

The fact of criminal or otherwise illegal activities taking place raises issues in the realm of enforcement of environmental rules, which can, at first glance, be connected to the formal component of the rule of law. ¹² When such illegal activities occur systematically, they indicate and contribute to the erosion of both legal certainty and the principle of legality, themselves two important sub-elements of the (formal) rule of law. ¹³ The problem here is that the practice of international trade appears to be at odds with the practice of the rule of law. While we generate measures through international treaties and national legislation to protect the environment, we also create incentives to harm the environment by insisting on growth in international trade.

The substantive component of the rule of law could provide a solution: trade should not come at the expense of upholding the moral values that underly the principles of legality and legal certainty. ¹⁴ Furthermore, if we accept a notion of the rule of law that promotes environmental justice, ¹⁵ we cannot tolerate international trade that is unjust from an environmental standpoint. By prioritising justice, we start to re-imagine how the rule of law might bridge the gap between international trade and environmental conservation.

At the most basic level, the rule of law functions in much the same way in the field of environmental protection as it does in any other legally regulated domain. Therefore, compliance with environmental rules - ensured through adequate enforcement procedures - is the way in which the rule of law leads to increased safeguarding of the environment. This positive relationship has even been demonstrated empirically through studies that show correlations between the rule of law and decreased pollution emissions. ¹⁶ However, complementary studies show how increased economic development, achieved partly through increased international trade, is actually detrimental to the environment. ¹⁷ What the literature in this field tries to grapple with is the dynamic between economic prosperity premised on trade liberalisation, the implementation of elements of the rule of law, and the ensuing impact on the environment.

The results are mixed: more economically prosperous countries, which also often display stronger adherence to the rule of law, end up doing more to protect the environment because they can both afford to prioritise the environment and they have the means to ensure compliance with environmental law. Countries that are less economically prosperous have fewer resources to dedicate to environmental protection in terms of enactment and enforcement of environmental law, but also in prioritising conservation above other societal needs. ¹⁸ Furthermore, trade liberalisation triggers specialisation in sectors in which countries have competitive advantages. If the latter are “largely derived from differences in environmental arrangements then the composition effect due to trade liberalisation will further damage the environment.” ¹⁹ At the same time, the more stringent a country’s pollution control policy, the less detrimental the effect of increased trade activities will be on the environment. ²⁰

Therefore, relying on a formal understanding of the rule of law can only take us so far in the path to ensuring a high standard of environmental protection, over and above increases in profit and international trade. Once more, the invocation of the substantive notion of the rule of law that insists not just on legality but also on justice might provide a way to balance out this see-saw between profit and planet in the context of international economic law. We return to this idea in the conclusion.

However, the see-saw between planet and people, on the one hand, and profit on the other is not merely visible at the level of states. Liberalisation has consequences and is ultimately aimed at facilitating the performance of private entities that carry out trade activities. These entities are subjected to the same underlying tension, which is not, as we have seen until now, unambiguously resolved through the enactment of rules that guide companies in choosing how to prioritise environmental and economic imperatives. In fact, businesses subject to laws that require innovative efforts and expenditure of resources to protect the environment are equally subject to the demands of capitalism, which reveals itself most starkly in the requirement that a firm be solvent to exist. ²¹

In the criminological literature, this type of tension has been linked to deviant, harmful, and criminal behaviour. Criminologists have applied the notion of “strain” to situations where there may be a conflict between goals or where the goals towards which an individual or an organisation strives towards are incoherent with the legitimate means supplied to them to reach those goals. ²² In the case at hand, this can be translated as follows: economic operators in the waste management sector can choose to profit more (or incur fewer losses) by engaging in illegal activities that are harmful to the environment; or they can choose to profit less (or incur greater losses) by engaging in legitimate and less environmentally harmful activities. The possibility to decide between these two alternatives generates frustration, thereby provoking the individuals and organisations involved to release that frustration. The theory holds that illegal opportunities may be appealing enough to invite the economic operators to take advantage of them. How appealing an opportunity may be, is contingent upon several factors. These factors may relate to the specific circumstances and characteristics of an individual or firm; however, some factors are also determined by the economic and regulatory reality in which such individuals and firms operate. ²³ These latter, structural circumstances are those of shipping, bunker fuel production, and waste management industries, in the context of international trade.

III. The routines and rituals of international trade

Three interconnected industries are central to the arguments outlined in this article: the waste (oil) management industry, the bunker fuel production industry and the (cargo and container) shipping industry. Each is discussed in turn and then the connections between these industries in the context of international trade are highlighted.

Waste management services are peculiar in their origin and character. The economic exchanges in this industry have been legally constructed. Industrialisation and urbanisation have led to the generation of new hazards – waste legislation has attached legal consequences and financial costs to the activities that are performed in respect of these new hazards. It has built a legal container that allows societies to manage the risks associated with substances now recognised as problematic. That legal container is the waste label as well as the processes connected to its application and removal. There is no ontological reality to waste – the lawmaker sets boundaries, and these boundaries generate costs and incentives for the economic actors subjected to them. The most basic effect of waste management rules is to bestow negative value on waste. They impose costs on waste generators through contracting specialised and authorised firms to supply waste management services. ²⁴

The framework on waste management has been articulated at the international, EU, and national levels: ²⁵ it provides the conditions according to which a substance classifies as waste. It also furnishes the conditions under which the waste label may be removed or under which the label may be avoided altogether. These conditions hinge partly on testable physical and chemical properties of the substances in question. However, the most important determinant of whether a substance is a waste or not is the subjective determination by its holder of the substance’s usefulness. ²⁶ And, while this subjective element is conditional upon requirements of legality, ²⁷ its mere existence shapes the waste sector and its relationship to overlapping industries.

Overlapping industries are industries of origin and destination of wastes. Waste oils, which we focus on here, come into existence by virtue of other industrial processes: Most commonly, refining procedures like the generation of fuels or products like pesticides or fertilisers – these are industries of origin. ²⁸ Waste oils can end up in other industrial processes, such as the generation of bunker fuel or the production of cement. The latter are industries of destination. The boundaries circumscribing waste management and distinguishing it from industries of origin and destination are subject to the will of the legislator, itself moulded by policy priorities and the evolving evidence regarding environmental and public health impacts connected to the release of certain substances into the biosphere as well as technological innovations that mediate that impact. ²⁹

Therefore, the contours of the waste oil industry are not fixed. They shift depending on production trends as well as changes in the acceptability of risks and hazards. Today, waste oils are generated in enormous amounts. The refining and use of petroleum has led to the emergence of “regimes of living” – much of our modern existence relies on either petroleum-containing products or petroleum-fuelled movement and manufacturing. International trade as it is performed today is dependent on the generation of waste oils. ³⁰ It could be argued that modern international trade, in fact, generates the need for costly waste oil management services.

Bunker fuel is made up of two components: the residues from the initial refining of crude oil and blend components, which are often residues from other procedures for petroleum refining or use. Some of the largest firms in the world are involved in the various stages of bunker fuel production and the market for the sale of bunker fuel is highly concentrated. ³¹

At the same time, the blend component market is very open and competitive as there are few clear limitations on what classifies as a suitable product. Legislation in the bunker fuel sector is sparse and the most important instrument for its regulation is the ISO 8217 Standard, which primarily focuses on chemical-physical properties of the final bunker fuel product. This Standard is not legally binding and is comprised of a set of parameters against which a batch of bunker fuel may be tested. These parameters indicate if the fuel is of sufficient quality for an engine to run on it. While Annex B to ISO 8127 does inform bunker fuel producers about best practices in how to manufacture this substance, which include avoiding the introduction of wastes, there is no way of testing whether this advice is complied with. Furthermore, there are virtually no legally enforceable, hard law rules that state how bunker fuel should be generated and what its permissible components are. ³² Traders, who purchase all the elements for the bunker fuel recipe from disparate sources and then determine the ratios for their mixing, accomplish the generation of bunker fuel. ³³

The world of oil extraction, refinement, and transport has always been closely associated to that of shipping. Shipping has been practiced for millennia, yet the character of shipping today is the product of the discovery of petroleum as a fuel source. International trade as we know it has been made possible because of fossil-fuelled international shipping. And burning fossil fuels has accelerated because of the breaking down of trade barriers assured by international economic law. Yet, the world of shipping is highly fragmented and the goal common to the diverse actors in this setting – ship owners, charterers, insurance companies, crews, port staff and authorities, to name a few – is that shipping remains a viable and profitable economic sector. ³⁴

Since the use of petroleum-based fuels became dominant in shipping, the practice of using “residues” for making bunker fuel has been equally widespread. This practice only recently started changing because of changing demands for petroleum substances and, most importantly for us, because of new discoveries regarding the environmental and human health impact of burning these residues and mixtures thereof. Simultaneously, companies entrusted with the task of handling residues have had to adapt to the widening of the concept of waste, especially in the EU where the framework for the management of waste has grown substantially in the last decades. Indeed, where, previously, a firm had been handling a substance that could be sold further as a blend component, it is now handling a hazardous waste oil for which it either needs to have a permit and technology to manage safely; or for which it needs to pay another appropriately equipped waste management firm to handle. And, whereas before a bunker fuel trader would have purchased a residue it will often, instead, have to purchase an appropriately-treated-former-waste. Because the obligation of “discarding” has changed over time, the boundary of waste management legislation and services has expanded to include activities that were previously unregulated. Therefore, the landscape of attractive legitimate opportunities for companies in the bunker fuel and waste oil management industries has shrunk – the previously acceptable paths to profit have been swept away and new ones laid in their stead. Yet, from a purely material and practical perspective, the same residues can still be burned as blend components of bunker fuel by ships. In fact, the engines of ships seem not discriminate as much as lawmakers when it comes to what substances power them. The riverbed where the residues flowed for decades may have been deviated from through the construction of new legal canalisations, but the old channels have not been closed.

To accommodate the new definitions applied to some of the substances that end up in bunker fuel, firms may choose to navigate along the old channels in practice while claiming to comply with the rules on paper. This is an act of fraud, which violates international and EU rules and classifies as a criminal offence in the Netherlands. ³⁵ In the criminological literature, this phenomenon is understood through the notion of de-coupling: the managers within an organisation adopt a façade that satisfies the needs of the regulatory environment and permits the continuation of “business as usual” at the level of operations. Through the use of inaccurate documentation, substances that should be classified and handled as hazardous wastes are, instead, labelled, traded, and used as products. ³⁶ These substance pass unobserved: it is entirely possible for the entities involved to be holders of these “products”. The illegal movement is hidden in plain sight. It is, therefore, not just imaginable but also understandable that a firm, faced with the combined imperatives of profit maximisation and environmental protection could choose to appear to be doing the latter while only ensuring the former.

The foregoing demonstrates how the practice of international trade, which is facilitated by international economic law, is premised on routines and rituals that are often problematic from the perspective of environmental conservation. Sometimes, they are even outright illegal. Yet, international trade is partly dependent on the smooth persistence of these same routines and rituals to continue functioning. International trade, in fact, both facilitates and is facilitated by the acts of fraud. The paragraphs below discuss this further.

IV. A crime-facilitative system at the intersection of symbiotic industries

It is easier to understand why illegalities occur in the waste oil and bunker fuel industries knowing that the routinised use of residues predates the current classification of hazardous substances as wastes. However, this fact is insufficient to explain criminogenesis. Indeed, the criminological literature makes it clear that an illegitimate opportunity for obtaining one’s goal is but one element in the equation. Another element is that this opportunity be appealing, accessible, and acceptable within the definitional universe of the potential offender. ³⁷ While no general statements can be made regarding the individual perceptions of employees and managers of firms in the bunker fuel and waste oil management industries, there is evidence stemming from the applicable legal framework that can open up the life-world of actors in these industries.

The cornerstone of waste management policy and practice in the EU and its Member States is the waste definition. Above, we saw how problematic this definition is because it is so malleable and will adapt to the peculiarities of the industries it enters. The term “to discard,” which is central to the determination of what is waste and what is not can have many meanings, ³⁸ themselves context-dependent and not absolute. The economic and technological break between industries of origin and destination of wastes that this legal notion threatens may end up softening on impact.

In the context of international trade, the already tenuous nature of the waste definition becomes even more uncertain. There are some international rules regarding the classification of certain substances as wastes, ³⁹ which also pre- and proscribe a range of procedures for the handling of these substances. Nevertheless, there are substances that are classified as wastes under EU rules but are not included within these international classifications. Indeed, there can be large differences across jurisdictions in the classification of wastes in the first place, but also in the interpretation of how such classification should be applied to a given substance. Equally problematic is the removal of the waste label – the conditions for a waste to become a product may be different in different jurisdictions. Not to mention the paradigmatic problem when considering cross border activities; namely, the disparities in enforcement of any rules on waste management. ⁴⁰

Therefore, it is unsurprising that ambiguousness is part of the DNA of waste management rules and procedures. In the criminological literature, this situation has been captured through the notion of “drift.” The boundaries of acceptable conduct are determined by society, as are the permitted exceptions to the acceptable conduct. The killing of another human being is universally forbidden; but the excuse of self-defence is equally universal. ⁴¹ Similarly, a substance is a waste unless it is a product. Waste management legislation allows for and regulates the exceptions to the application of the waste label. These exceptions rely on the potential use that can be made of a substance. We previously saw that residues that are considered hazardous wastes in the EU could materially be used as blend components in the manufacturing of bunker fuel. The matter of whether they should be used in this way is debatable and it is this debate-ability that opens the way for firms in the waste oil and bunker fuel sectors to drift from the definition of waste to that of product.

Equally problematic is the fact that the industry of destination of wastes is no more solidly held together through definitions designed to defends the environment. Bunker fuel is merely a conglomerate of hydrocarbons that must be blended to the tone of ISO 8217. Besides requirements on the concentration of a mere two types of pollutants, producers and consumers of bunker fuel need not concern themselves too much about what is going into this product nor what is coming out once it is burned. ⁴² Therefore, not only are the realms of waste management and bunker fuel production problematic, but they overlap in ways that their individual weaknesses become symbiotic in facilitating crime.

In organisational criminology, we speak of “crime-facilitative systems” when referring to industries that are structured in a way that facilitates criminal conduct. These industries are characterised by high incentives and opportunities for crime-commission as well as low risks of detection and punishment of crimes. ⁴³ The high incentives in the cases we are discussing now are twofold: first, there is the wish to alleviate the pressure and frustration that comes from the day-to-day requirement of maximising profits and avoiding losses in environmentally sensitive sectors that were outlined in Sections II and III above. Second, there is the fact that the pressure can materially be alleviated by fraudulent misrepresentation of economic activities that yield profits. Opportunity makes the thief is the maxim invoked by Sir Francis Bacon – the possibility of illegally benefitting constitutes an incentive for crime. The fact that this illegal prospect is widened as opposed to blocked by the applicable legal rules on waste management and bunker fuel production is the next opportunity that characterises the system we are discussing. The lack of universal agreement on what constitutes waste and of uniform enforcement of waste management rules across the globe is a further opportunity.

The asymmetry in enforcement is also a manifestation of the low risks involved in using wastes to make bunker fuel. It is one of four elements that lead to low risks of detection and prosecution for these acts of fraud. The other three are: (a) the fact that the same entities that label wastes and have expertise in applying this label are those who profit from conducting various waste management activities; (b) the fact that the documents accompanying wastes and other environmentally-risky substances are very easy to manipulate; (c) the fact that state agents who are supposed to monitor the waste sector often lack the knowledge, expertise, and resources to notice and uncover the fraud. ⁴⁴

V. Rule of law in international trade: Bureaucracy or justice?

The foregoing has shown how the activities that constitute the practice of international trade, and which are often not addressed in international economic law, are problematic from the perspective of environmental justice. Indeed, we have seen that the promotion of international trade leads to increasing pressures that can be alleviated by environmentally irresponsible activities. At the same time, the increasing pressures for environmental conservation, which slowly begin to characterise the discourse in international (economic) relations, ⁴⁵ are being addressed with inadequate and problematic measures. The legal framework on waste management, of which there are portions that are global in scope, has created a system whereby harm is avoided principally through the labelling and documenting of wastes and their movements. Labels and documents guarantee the free circulation of wastes – as well as that of other substances that could or should be defined as wastes. Risks are managed by checking these documents – by inhibiting individuals and organisations from handling hazardous substances labelled as such if they cannot do so safely. Yet, the same framework can be hijacked with ease: we become blind to risks because we trust the paperwork that has been devised to help us regulate them. We trust the entities that generate said paperwork. We remain ignorant to the material truth that the paperwork hides and are incapable of discovering the deception of which we are victims, of which our planet is the victim.

The rule of law – in its formal conceptualisation – has taken on the garb of a risk-generating bureaucracy in the waste and bunker fuel sectors. In fact, empirical evidence has shown that manipulating documents in these industries can be characterised not so much as an act of “covering up” illegalities, but rather as an instrumental step in completing a series of business activities. ⁴⁶ Documents are seen only as a necessary element in completing the transactions among companies handling the residues that make up bunker fuel. The notion that residues are acceptable components of bunker fuel wins over the concern that their use may lead to adverse environmental impacts. Therefore, even if we were to extend the existing framework that protects the environment from hazards linked to waste generation and management from the EU, we would not necessarily be guaranteeing any true measure of defence against harmful and criminal activities like those discussed in this article. In fact, we would merely be opening the way to the circulation of more fraudulent documents that would superficially purify the dirty dealings in hydrocarbons.

These are important aspects to reflect on in considering the relationship between international trade and the rule of law. The argument being made here is the following: Loyalty to the substantive rule of law, i.e., to the morals and norms we associate with it, should encourage a more penetrating examination of the legal regimes we put in place in the context of international trade. It may be too easy, given the complexities involved in safeguarding the environment, to claim that the formal rule of law has been established. The above warning against risk-generating bureaucracies stems from the superficiality that the emphasis on form or procedure may induce in this policy area. Achieving a formal rule of law must be seen as a necessary but insufficient step to reaching a series of milestones along the path to a sustainable global economy. The substantive rule of law gives those steps and milestones their proper meaning and purpose: each needs to withstand the more fundamental test of whether its consequences lead to justice. ⁴⁷

The latter cannot be attained through the meagre extension of regulatory regimes across borders or through the export of green norms. True pursuit of the rule of law needs to be rooted in a more fundamental process of institution building whereby commitment to environmental preservation and technical specialisation play a central role. The rule of law can only be upheld if a collective effort is made to rigorously apply legal standards in environmental matters, ⁴⁸ which includes setting up effective enforcement strategies and mechanisms. These strategies need to include hard law instruments to regulate the production and consumption of bunker fuel that are global in reach to reflect the worldwide use and impact of bunker fuel. Furthermore, cooperation in monitoring waste management activities needs to be improved and harmonised. This also means strengthening the powers and capacities of enforcement agencies to detect fraud and wrongdoing.

More fundamentally, another important point of intervention is the opening up of discourse at all levels of society regarding the true cost of a globalised consumer economy. The comfort and ease to which a small portion of the world has become accustomed is heavily premised on the discomfort and destruction of other people and our planet. We cannot aim for a rule of law in name only. Instead, we need to more thoroughly assess the reality of international economic relationships and trade practices to determine how to bring them into alignment with the formal and, especially, the substantive facets of the rule of law where private and public actors alike are accountable to law and where law is increasingly used as the means to protect both planet and people.