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I make detailed proposals for a legal framework within which ecologi-
cally oriented policy-making might be conducted.
2.5 Ethical foundations for ecological law
The signi
c understanding of the natural world
and the mounting mass of evidence that current laws are inadequate for
restraining ecological degradation invite a reconsideration of how, ethi-
cally, we ought to behave in relation to the world around us. This has
been recognised in a substantial body of literature that has been pro-
duced since the early 1970s with the aim of developing ethical principles
to guide humanity
cant changes in scienti
s relationship with nature.
103
Much of this literature
has been concerned with the question of whether individual creatures,
species,ecosystemsortheentirebiospherecanbesaidtohavevaluein
themselves.
104
Different views on what the possession of intrinsic value
entails are presented in the literature, with some authors suggesting that
this may preclude us from harming the valued entity except to ful
'
lour
essential needs whilst others see it as one value to be considered along-
side others in decision-making.
105
Whatever consequences are understood to
ow from valuing nature
intrinsically, arguments that this is necessary have been at the forefront
of environmental ethics because of the widespread view that something
further than enlightened human self-interest is required for environ-
mental protection.
106
The argument consistently advanced against the
adequacy of such a valuation is that an anthropocentric viewpoint cannot
provide a reliable platform for protecting the environment because actions
that may yield economic and social bene
ts in the short-term will always
seem more desirable to us than seeking to preserve the environment in the
long-term interests of humanity.
107
It is suggested that this will particularly
be the case when the environmental consequences of our actions seem
remote or are hard to establish causally.
108
103
Curry,
149 provides a thorough overview of academic debate
over environmental values and of the different viewpoints of participants on why and
how the environment should be valued.
'
Ecological Ethics
'
,pp.61
-
104
105
Ibid
.
Ibid
., 52
-
4.
106
D. Wilkinson,
in J. Holder and
D. McGillivray (eds) Locality and Identity: Environmental Issues in Law and Society
(Aldershot: Ashgate, 1999), p. 19; Curry,
'
Using Environmental Ethics to Create Ecological Law
'
'
Ecological Ethics
'
,pp.61
-
6.
107
Wilkinson,
'
Using Environmental Ethics
'
,pp.18
-
19; Curry,
'
Ecological Ethics
'
,pp.62
-
3.
108
J. Alder and D. Wilkinson, Environmental Law and Ethics (Basingstoke: Macmillan
Press, 1999), p. 54.
