Science in crisis times: The crucial role of science in sustainability and transformation
PLOS Sustainability and Transformation Journal
Authors: Paul Shrivastava, Louise Jackson, Thaura Ghneim-Herrera, Patrick Caron, Carlos Correa, Carlos Alvarez Pereira, Timothy Coombs, Oluchi Ezekannagha, Nick Ishmael-Perkins, Melissa Leach, Sélim Louafi, Gary E. Machlis, Julia Marton-Lefèvre, Alexander Müller, Janos Pasztor, Vivi Stavrou, Camilla Toulmin, and Sonja Vermeulen
In an era marked by the convergence of complex crises, the role of science in sustainability and transformative changes has never been more critical. A recent article in PLOS Sustainability and Transformation Journal, titled “Science in Crisis Times: The Crucial Role of Science in Sustainability and Transformation,” delves into this pressing issue. Authored by a distinguished group of experts, including former MAK’IT Scientific Officer Thaura Ghneim-Herrera and South Centre Executive Director Carlos M. Correa, the article draws from the insights of the 2022 MAK’IT conference “What Role for Science in Crisis Times? Outlook in the Health, Environment, and Agriculture Interconnected Areas”, held in University of Montpellier with the support of the South Centre, which brought together 18 international experts.
Knocking Down Business-related Human Rights Abuses with a Feather: Is the European Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive Sufficient to Tackle Corporate Impunity?
By Daniel Uribe
In April 2024, the European Parliament approved the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD), aiming to ensure that European firms and their partners uphold human rights and environmental standards in their supply chains. This Directive applies to large EU and non-EU companies, with a phased implementation starting in 2027. The CSDDD mandates the integration of due diligence in corporate policies and the development of transition plans aligned with the Paris Agreement. Despite these advancements, the Directive’s scope and civil liability provisions are limited to effectively hold corporations accountable for human rights abuses. The ongoing negotiations on an International Legally Binding Instrument on Business and Human Rights offer an opportunity to adopt common standards on due diligence and jurisdiction to improve access to justice and remedies for victims of corporate-related abuses.
Response to the Call for Inputs by the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights and the environment
“Should the interests of foreign investors trump the human right to a clean,
healthy and sustainable environment?”
South Centre
14 June 2023
To realize the right to clean, healthy & sustainable environment and reduce ISDS risks, States need to align their FDI policies with human rights, climate action and SDGs, including via reform of the international investment regime.
Antimicrobial Resistance, pharmaceuticals and environment
South Centre Virtual Workshop, 28 & 29 March 2023, 2:30-4:30 PM CET
The emergence and spread of resistant genes and pathogens among and between humans, animals and the environment is a global threat. Join to learn and share how civil society is tackling these issues and how to elicit ways such efforts might seed or scale more broadly such action.
This workshop is organized with the support of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the European Commission.
Free-riding and free driving are relevant problems undermining structural transformation in environmental matters. These two different trends of the markets give incentive to opportunistic and individualistic behavior that hinders the abilities of international markets to create positive environmental externalities. To the contrary, they might lead to monopolistic concentration and negative environmental externalities.
Law, instead of allowing them (through carbon markets compensations only, for example) should look for alternatives of structural transformation of markets. Both well know concepts as the common goods and newer ideas as the possibility of positive screening of transformative market alternatives (or transformed enterprises) might be really useful for such a goal and consequently for the production of positive environmental externalities.
Climate change and trade: what policies for environmental goods and services?
Carlos Correa, Executive Director, South Centre
International conference on “Climate Change and Sustainable Development”
26-27 March 2022, Cairo, Egypt
While the importance of protecting the environment in the context of trade policies is firmly recognized, a key question is the extent to which trade disciplines aimed at protecting the environment can reach their intended or declared objectives and affect the trade interests and economic growth prospects of developing countries. Developing countries are also among the most affected by climate change and, hence, they have a major interest in international action to address it. However, the intensification of environmental threats faced by developing countries is not of their making, and advancing an agenda -with no evidence that it would lead to reduced emissions- is likely to just disadvantage the developing world which has the least responsibility historically for today’s climate-related damages. Given this history, as well as the tight external constraints imposed on their efforts to mobilize resources, developing countries cannot be expected to either successfully mitigate climate change or adapt to climate change, without significant financial and technological support. The South Centre has been assessing the policy implications that the initiatives on trade and environmental sustainability will have for the Global South.
Discussions among eminent specialists will address new crisis scenarios related to health, environment and agriculture in their different dimensions, examine the complex science-policy-public interactions at play, and the role of science and scientists in the search for sustainable and long-lasting solutions for crisis resolution.
The conference will be organized in a hybrid format, with options for in-person and online attendance. Interpretation will be available in French and English.
Call for Papers for LEAD Journal Special Issue 2022
PLANETARY HEALTH IN TIMES OF CONVERGING CRISES – CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES
The Law, Environment and Development Journal (LEAD) Journal Special Issue 2022 will reflect on environmental issues in the context of the Stockholm Conference’s 50th anniversary and the COVID-19 crisis.
Reforming Responsibly: Why Governments Should Assess the Human Rights Impacts of Economic Reforms
ByDaniel Bradlow
The purpose of economic reforms is to change the structure and overall direction of an economy. They therefore will affect the amount and allocation of resources available to a country. This means that the reforms will also affect the human rights situation in the country. This requires impact assessments of each reform option before it is implemented.
Spotlight: Asia-Pacific and the Implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action
Regional Round-up on progress in implementing the Beijing Platform for Action in light of the upcoming 25th anniversary of the platform. Spotlight: Asia-Pacific
