Global Climate Justice

OPTION 2: GLOBAL CLIMATE JUSTICE

Global climate conferences, such as the one that took place in Paris attempt to bring the world’s
nations together to find a fair solution to a problem that is global in scope. Some nations emit more
greenhouse gases than others, some have done so much longer than others, some are considerably
richer than others, some are more likely to bare the brunt of climate change disasters than others.
Every participating nation has a significant stake in the outcome, but they have yet to agree on a fair
solution. Perhaps no country has as much at stake as the Maldives, which faces an existential threat
–swallowed by the rising seas until it disappears.
The debate on global climate justice concerns several key issues. Perhaps the most pressing is that
of what we should do right now? How should we, as a world, reduce our emissions to levels
sufficiently low to avoid even greater rises in temperature? In one sense, we – or perhaps our
descendants – are in this problem together. We share this planet and its environment. In another
sense, however, different nations face quite different problems. Developed nations have achieved
their levels of prosperity through a period of industrialization and modernization in which they
released most of the greenhouse gasses currently in the atmosphere. Developing nations, such as
China and India, are still in the process of trying to raise hundreds of millions of people out of
desperate poverty. They have been remarkably successful, but development has also made them
the world’s #1 and #3 CO2-emitting nations. The picture is complicated by the fact on a per capita
basis, it is countries like Qatar and Kuwait that release the world’s highest emissions (US is #12,
China #55, India #133). In addition, nations are in different stages of development, have different
cultural traditions, and face geographically different environmental challenges.

In one sense, this is certainly a political problem. Nations will attempt to strike bargains in the
interests of their citizens. It is difficult, however, to imagine any workable political solution that
would not rest on principles of distributive and retributive justice.
In the film, The Island President, The president of the Maldives attempts to convince other
world leaders to reduce their emissions in order to save his island nation from disappearing
under rising seas. Write a letter to this president that argues for what you believe would be
the most just way for the world’s nations (think in terms of countries’ responsibilities, not
those of companies or individual citizens) to allocate amounts of CO2 emissions.
Your letter should do the following:
(i) Present (and correctly explain) 3 of the 6 principles under consideration (these are
listed on the last slide of the PowerPoint presentation) that you believe give us the
most plausible approaches to that problem and describe what is attractive about
each approach.
(ii) Apply each approach
a. Note any expected or possible consequences (negative/positive, short term/long
term).
Use the limited information you have, so that you don’t spend much time providing the
reader with information. Focus on your arguments instead. Assume that some form of
enforcement exists to punish any country that does not abide by the principle.
If you’re going to use Utilitarianism, remember its position on wealth inequality
from our economic justice discussions.
b. Note any rights or obligations the approach upholds or violates.
(iii) Determine which approach you believe offers the most just solution to the problem and
justify why we should adopt it over the other approaches considered in your paper.
a. Your justification should deal with the following:
 Whether to consider a country’s per capita or total emissions as the more
important factor
 What to do about historical emissions
 What to do about the fact that industrialization (and economic stability) seems
to require more pollution and that wealthier countries have already done this
(e.g. the US), while others (far less wealthy) are in progress (e.g. China), and
others (very poor) have barely started.
b. You may also recommend some sort of combination of approaches, but if so, make
sure that you’re very clear about what that combination is and which principle has
priority when. For example, a principle that would say that we should use
utilitarianism, but also retributivism, would be very unclear (they recommend very
different paths) unless you gave the reader a specific way to connect those two.
Your response may make use of the following facts (or others) about the United States and
China, the world’s leading developed and developing greenhouse gas emitters. You do not
need to do any further research:

United States China India

Annual total GHG
emissions in metric tons
(2014)

6673.4497 (#2)
14.75 % of world
total

12454.7110 (#1)
27.51% of world
total

2870(#3)
6.43% of world
total

Annual per capita
emissions in metric tons
(2013)

19.9 8.5 2.3

Percentage of world total
of historical carbon
missions (1850-2011)

27% 11% 3%

Population (2017) 324 Million
(4% of world)

1.4 Billion
(19% of world)

1.3 Billion
(18% of world)

Average Annual Income
by GDP (2018) (IMF) $62,606 $9,608 $ 2,036