Environmental Injustice, Human Rights Violation and Development in Africa
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2015-06
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
Most of Africans are in the precarious development conditions. They are living in extreme poverty and famine, malnutrition, poor economic facilities and opportunities, and in various political and social deprivations. These development constraints or barriers are typically backed by the experience of various environmental injustices, which contribute to human rights violations and to risks to sustainable human development. In this study, I expound that various instances of environmental injustice have the implication of human rights violations. In this regard, this thesis critically discusses the major instances of environmental injustice such as land grabbing, overexploitation of natural resources, toxic waste dumping (including POPs and e-wastes) and climate change injustice, and thereby reveals how they one way or another impact on different human rights including the right to life and security, the right to health, the right to food, the right to property, the right development, the right to culture and the right to live in a clean and healthy environment as well as on women’s and children’s rights. Hence, ensuring the meaningful enjoyments of human rights and achieving humane development in this continent strongly need avoiding environmental injustices that are jeopardizing the lives and livelihoods of millions of Africans. Thus, in this continent, abating or remedying these injustices, I concede, needs human rights approach to environmental justice and its meaningful implementation. Moreover, this study explores the rationale of mainstreaming human rights that already subsumed the issues of environmental justice in development policies and programmes. This is, I argue, very important not only to practically implementing human rights and the principles of environmental justice (principles that are crafted from human rights perspective) in development paradigm, but also to enhance sustainable human development and to ensure safe, healthy and sustainable environment. This is due to the fact that, in the arena of development, the quest of both human rights and environmental justice indorse political freedoms (such as people’s freedom of expression and participation in issues that affects their lives), equity and justice, inclusion, democracy and good governance, the principle of free, prior and informed consent, fair and just compensation, international legal remedies, empowerments of poor and marginalized societies, healthy and sustainable environment and so forth
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Philosophy