Sovereignty over natural resources and its implications for climate justice

Abstract

In the current international system, sovereign states hold extensive rights over the natural resources in their territories. How are sovereign rights in natural resources justified? What are the implications of these rights for the demands of climate justice, which pertain to the use and management of natural resourcesfor example, rainforests? This article reviews five theories of territorial rights, in contemporary political and legal philosophy, and the justifications that they provide for territorial jurisdiction over natural resources. It is argued that insofar as the philosophical-normative perspectives justify sovereigns' jurisdiction over natural resources within their borders, they also give rise to limits on the legitimate and permissible exercise of the jurisdictional prerogative. This theoretical proposition is then illustrated in the case of international climate-justice obligations of rain-forest-rich countries.

Illicit activity and scarce natural resources in the supply chain: A literature review, framework, and research agenda

“…Even when information on illegal activity is obtained, there is often a problem with effectively enforcing existing laws related to natural resource extraction (Barbier, 1993; Le Gallic, 2008; Vogel & Raeymaekers, 2016). Some research suggests that there is a widespread distrust of regulators (Thomas et al, 2017), while others contend that there are limits on the legitimate and permissible exercise of jurisdiction and control over natural resources (Banai et al, 2016). Mbzibain and Tchoudjen (2021) state that natural resource monitoring is ineffective and impacted by limited funding and regulators' lack of focus.…”

Climate justice and territory

“…Here the key issue is how much control over the territory the state actually needs to remain self‐determining and not violate other requirements, like global justice. For Banai (2016), the best justifications for the territorial sovereignty of states over these sites also give rise to legitimate constraints on how that sovereignty ought to be exercised (see also Vanderheiden, 2017).…”

From Human-Nature Dualism Towards More Integration in Socio-ecosystems Studies

“…The institutions guaranteeing the sovereignty of a society over its territory, such as nation states, also place humans in a position of responsibility for the development of their living space and the fair and sustainable management of natural resources. In political philosophy in particular, the allocation of territorial rights over natural resources through the sovereignty of nations is controversial (Banai, 2016;Dahbour, 2019): unsustainable governance of natural resources, land grabbing by private foreign investors (Jurkevics, 2021), and the oppression of indigenous peoples (Finley-Brook & Thomas, 2011) are some of the most problematic effects of the national sovereignty principle. In practice, human-centered territorial approaches recurrently adopt a rather dual vision, focusing their analysis on man-made (e.g.…”