International Environmental Law and Asian Values
International Environmental Law and Asian Values
Legal Norms and Cultural Influences
Following decades of vigorous economic expansion, Asia isconfronting the environmental consequences of unfettered development.This poses a challenge because of the strong bias of prevailingcultural systems in the region toward the goal of lifting standards ofliving over achieving ecological sustainability.
This book juxtaposes international environmental norms and practiceswith relevant Asian policies and their applications in key areas. RodaMushkat examines the fundamental principle of public participation inenvironmental law-making, as well as the "rights approach,"against the emergence of democratic and human rights norms in theregion. The complex relationship between trade and the environment isalso discussed in light of the strong regional emphasis on economicgrowth, trade liberalization, and the aversion to conditionalities.Given regionalization processes in Asia-Pacific and elsewhere, thiswork seeks to establish to what extent such processes have led to theregionalization of international environmental law.
International Environmental Law and Asian Values concludesthat, although some gaps can be identified between internationalimperatives and regional responses, "Asian values" have notproved to be an insurmountable barrier to the spread of internationalenvironmental legal ideas. On the whole, the region is responding toimpulses emanating from the global arena rather than resisting themconsciously.
The analysis and conclusions of this comprehensive and original workwill be of considerable interest to scholars of international law andrelations, environmental policy, comparative culture, economicdevelopment, and social change.
The author usefully makes a presentation of the case for the universality of international environmental law with pragmatic considerations for implementation.
It does, indeed, add up to an interesting story which Muskat to her great credit presents as one that cries out for explanation.
Much has been written in the areas of human rights and democracy but less as to how these are impacted by Asian values and even less still about the relevance of these concepts to environmental law … This book offers a new and innovative approach to merging a number of topical debates in a way that will be instructive and supportive of the development of environmental law in the Asia Pacific region … [It] will likely also act as a useful guide in the development of this jurisprudence.
Foreword by Ved P. Nanda
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1 Culture and International Law
2 Cultural Relativism and the Asian Values Debate
3 Asian Values and Environmental Protection
4 A Regional Approach to International Environmental Norms?
5 Factors Affecting the Domestic Implementation of InternationalEnvironmental Law in the Asia Pacific Region
6 The Impact of International Trade
7 The Effects of Globalization on the Implementation ofInternational Environmental Law in the Asia PaciWc Region
8 Globalization of Norms and Regionalization of Implementation
Conclusion
Appendices
Notes
Index
Globalization and Local Adaptation in International Trade Law
Edited by Pitman B. Potter and Ljiljana Biuković
Good Governance in Economic Development
International Norms and Chinese Perspectives
Edited by Sarah Biddulph and Ljiljana Biuković
