Cambridge University Press The Human Right to a Healthy Environment

The absence of a globally recognized right to a healthy environment has not prevented the development of human rights norms relating to the environment. Indeed, one of the most noteworthy aspects of human rights law over the last twenty years is that UN treaty bodies, regional tribunals, special rapporteurs, and other human rights mechanisms have applied human rights law to environmental issues even without a stand-alone, justiciable human right to a healthy environment. In The Human Right to a Healthy Environment, a diverse set of scholars and practitioners, all of whom have been instrumental in defining the relationship between human rights and the environment, provide their thoughts on what is, or should be, the role of an international human right to a healthy environment. The right to a healthy environment could be a capstone to this field of law, could help to provide structure to it, or could move it in new directions. Review 'In assembling this collection of essays, John H. Knox and Ramin Pejan have sought to deliver 'a continuing conversation on the relationship between human rights and the environment'. They have succeeded admirably in generating a wide-ranging and diverse debate about a topic which loses none of its relevance in a world where climate change and global environmental destruction threaten the future of humanity itself.' Alan Boyle, Edinburgh University'The right to breathe is surely the most fundamental of all rights, and the state of our planet must be placed at the heart of the human rights issue. The Human Right to a Healthy Environment advances this critical cause and supports the often deadly work of countless environmental defenders around the world. Its message is simple: we have both a moral and a legal imperative to act.' Erik Solheim, Head of UN Environment Book Description This book considers and clarifies many different facets of the international human right to a healthy environment. About the Author John H. Knox is Henry C. Lauerman Professor of International Law at Wake Forest University, North Carolina, he has written extensively on human rights and environmental issues. The first UN special rapporteur on human rights and the environment, he has led the effort to understand and promote the application of human rights to environmental issues. He won the Francis Deák Prize for scholarship in 2003. Between 1999 and 2005, he chaired a national advisory committee to the US Environmental Protection Agency, and from 2008 to 2012 he was of counsel to the Center for International Environmental Law.Ramin Pejan is a staff attorney at Earthjustice's International Program, based in San Francisco. He is also an adjunct clinical professor at the University of California, Irvine, School of Law, in its International Justice Clinic. Prior to Earthjustice, Ramin worked for the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and the United Nations Environment Programme on the links between human rights and environmental issues. From 2010 to 2012, Ramin worked in Bushbuckridge, South Africa, as legal counsel for the Association for Water and Rural Development, a non-profit organization focusing on water resource management issues in rural South Africa.