Ethical Climate Change Policy and the Individual Moral Challenge

The Moral Challenge of Dangerous Climate Change by Professor Darrel Moellendorf examines the moral values policy makers should consider when crafting international climate change policy.1 The book is written from a moral philosophy perspective, and one might wonder what philosophy can contribute to a conversation about policy. Yet as Moellendorf explains, climate change policy inherently concerns values, and values lie at the core of moral philosophy.2 The term “values” indicates an evaluation or explanation of worth and is used in this broad sense throughout this review.3 For example, allocating responsibility for climate change mitigation and adaptation between rich and poor countries is fundamentally a moral evaluation of fairness. Moellendorf’s work, which addresses various issues like poverty, the economics of future climate change costs, and sustainable development, is largely a success.4 By providing a thorough moral analysis of the policy implications of internationally agreed upon concepts, Moral Challenges is a valuable addition to the growing body of climate change scholarship. Moellendorf’s analysis largely focuses on the principles contained in the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).5 The UNFCCC is an international environmental treaty that provides a framework