Chapter VI.36: Environmental principles in international climate change law

Abstract

This chapter discusses the emergence of environmental principles in the field of international climate law, with a focus on the UNFCCC and the Paris Agreement. In addition, the discussion of international climate law principles by scholarship is reviewed, thereby focusing on International Law Association findings and the so-called Oslo Principles. This scholarly discussion provides elaborated and varying ideas on the potential meaning and application of the principles as referred to in the climate treaties. Furthermore, the role of national case law in view of international climate law principles is briefly highlighted, with specific attention to the possible bottom-up emergence of a new climate law principle for dealing with global climate change in domestic courtrooms. Finally, the conclusion points at the guiding nature of principles, and, in view of this, at the importance of the use of methodology in legal scholarship when discussing the content and role of the principles.