Read more
'This accessible book is highly recommended reading for all interested in international climate change, especially those seeking perspectives beyond the usual policy fare.' Friedrich Soltau, Division for Sustainable Development, United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs Climate change is the world's greatest challenge. Solutions to it can be found in global ethics With each passing year, the causes and consequences of climate change grow worse: more pollution from more people and more countries, leading to more adverse environmental changes and widening human suffering. The failure of governments to address climate change effectively has never been more evident. Making the connections between global ethics and climate change, and acting on those connections, has never been more urgent. Building on the ethical and political analyses of the first edition, this edition updates the science and impacts of climate change, exposes the increasing intensity of dangerous trends - particularly growing global affluence, material consumption and pollution - and highlights the intensifying moral dimensions of resulting changes to the environment. In so doing, the book shows readers how vital global justice will be to our common future. Alas, it is too late to stop climate change. It is not too late to reduce the untold injustices it portends. Key Features - Describes the role of ethics and justice in global affairs, helping readers to understand that climate change is not just a question of science and policy, but also one of morality and fairness - Examines the practical and ethical significance for climate change of the growing numbers of consumers around the world - Proposes a cosmopolitan approach to climate change that is more principled, more practical and more politically viable than failed policies attempted up to now Paul G. Harris is the author or editor of more than twenty books on global environmental politics, policy and ethics. He is the Chair Professor of Global and Environmental Studies at the Hong Kong Institute of Education. Cover image: (c) ionut jula/Shutterstock.com Cover design: [EUP logo] www.edinburghuniversitypress.com
List of contents
Preface
Introduction
Part I: The Challenge1. Global Climate Change
2. Justice in a Changing World
Part II: International Justice3. International Environmental Justice
4. International Justice and Climate Change
Part III: Global Justice5. Cosmopolitan Ethics and Justice
6. Affluence, Consumption and Atmospheric Pollution
7. Cosmopolitan Diplomacy and Climate Policy
8. The Unavoidability of Global Justice
References
Index
About the author
Paul G. Harris is the Chair Professor of Global and Environmental Studies at the Education University of Hong Kong. His work on global environmental politics and justice has been published widely in academic journals. Professor Harris is author or editor of many books, including Climate Change and American Foreign Policy (St. Martin's Press/Palgrave Macmillan, 2000), International Equity and Global Environmental Politics (Ashgate, 2001), The Environment, International Relations and U.S. Foreign Policy (Georgetown University Press, 2001), International Environmental Cooperation (Universtity Press of Colorado, 2002), Global Warming and East Asia (Routledge, 2003), Confronting Environmental Change in East and Southeast Asia (Earthscan/United Nations University Press, 2005), Europe and Global Climate Change (Edward Elgar, 2007), Environmental Change and Foreign Policy (Routledge, 2009), Climate Change and Foreign Policy (Routledge, 2009), The Politics of Climate Change (Routledge, 2009), World Ethics and Climate Change (Edinburgh University Press, 2010), China's Responsibility for Climate Change (Policy Press, 2011), Ethics and Global Environmental Policy (Edward Elgar, 2011), Environmental Policy and Sustainable Development in China (Policy Press, 2012), What's Wrong with Climate Politics and How to Fix It (Polity, 2013), the Routledge Handbook of Global Environmental Politics (Routledge, 2014) and, with Graeme Lang, the Routledge Handbook of Environment and Society in Asia (Routledge, 2014), among others.
Summary
World Ethics and Climate Change combines the science of climate change with ethical critique to expose its impact, the increasing intensity of dangerous trends, particularly growing global affluence, material consumption and pollution and the intensifying moral dimensions of changes to the environment.
