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Climate change is a complex collective action problem on a global and intergenerational scale. All sorts of otherwise unproblematic activities become morally questionable due to their contribution to the accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. All sorts of pre-existing vulnerabilities increase the danger that changes in climatic patterns result in humanitarian catastrophes. Climate change thus poses challenges for normative theory as such. There are ethical questions such as: How to balance the right to development and poverty reduction with our duties to reduce greenhouse gases for the sake of future generations? There are conceptual questions like: How are we to understand normatively significant responsibility in the context of complex collective action problems? There are questions relating to ethical guidelines in circumstances of risk and uncertainty. Finally, there is the question of to how to motivate people to do the right thing where there is so much distance in time and space between those incurring the costs of combatting climate change and those most benefitting from preventing it. This links to policy questions as to what kind of political institutions are realistic, legitimate, and efficient in providing climate protections. There are particular challenges which require us to reassess our approaches to ethics in international relations: How are we to deal with the situation that those who hold the most power and have the greatest capacities for realising an effective global climate policy have the least incentives to do so? How are we to assess the relevant normative concerns when they involve issues more complex than those enshrined in the minimal ethical consensus of formal human rights? In particular, what kind of normative framework is suitable to evaluate across cultural differences issues as distinct as raising energy prices, job losses, increased risks relating to extreme weather events, threats to cultural traditions (e.g. Inuit relying on a particular quality of snow and Americans used to going for a Sunday drive in a powerful car), and the loss of statehood for low lying Small Island States doomed by raising sea levels? This chapter will not attempt to answer any of these questions. Instead it will analyse the different strands of these interconnected questions and present an overview of the current approaches. To do so, the first section briefly presents the current understanding of climate science that forms the background of the debate and explains which features are deemed as normatively significant. The second section identifies the different (yet interconnected) angles of debates on justice in the context of climate change. The third section takes a look at the different theories of justice most prominent in influencing the current debates and their shortcomings. The forth section hones in on the particular role of international relations in the latest approaches to climate justice focusing on the need for discursive and relational approaches to justice. The final section concludes this chapter highlighting the importance of continued commitment to the values underlying human rights in the context of demands for mutual recognition and a better understanding of the global public sphere. ; European Commission Horizon 2020

There are important differences between 1985 and today in the way we think about the subject of international ethics as political scientists, the resources we have available for students, and in the attitudes of students toward ethical issues. This paper compares the experience of teaching international ethics in 1985 with teaching the same course in the twenty-first century. The current environment is more accepting of international ethics as a field of academic inquiry, and much richer in terms of resources. Adapted from the source document.

Holbach is a largely forgotten figure of the history of ideas. Yet his work was influential on a number of historical thinkers, notably Marx. Famous for his materialistic atheism, Holbach has much to contribute to other fields, and this article details his contribution to international ethics, as well as its applicability in contemporary debates. By reviving his utilitarian theory, this article seeks to rehabilitate a subtle understanding of this ethical theory and contribute to a growing literature on eighteenth-century utilitarian thought and its applicability to contemporary international relations. This article introduces the utilitarian theory of Holbach, detailing the role that virtue ethics plays within it and showing the relative contribution of Holbach to utilitarian debates, notably against the thought of Bentham. Lastly, it applies Holbach's complex conception of self-interest to the field of international ethics, showing the challenges he raises to realist and liberal theories of international relations, as well as the normative theories of Walzer and Rawls.

Environmental degradation can no longer be handled by means of traditional local remedies in the face of the current global environmental crisis. The author outlines specific ways to overcome the crisis through international means, obliging each individual nation to reduce its own hazardous production, while enjoining a collective effort to confront the challenge of global environmental deterioration. Only through policy-making based on the recognition of shared danger and international commitments to reduce damage can we achieve a shared moral responsibility for environmental protection.