Between anthropocentrism and ecocentrism: doctrinal approaches to the criminalization of ecocide at the international level
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: In the article were analyzed key approaches to understanding the environment using the example of establishing the relationship between the task of mitigating negative consequences and human activity during armed conflicts – namely, through the example of the Vietnam War and the use of chemical weapons during one of its operations, which gave impetus to the development of environmental jurisprudence. Such approaches can be traced from philosophical ones – such as environmental ethics, environmental justice, deep and social ecology, the animal rights movement, and ecofeminism – to legal ones, specifically the approaches through human rights, rights of nature, and rights of future generations. In this context, a distinction was made between anthropocentric and ecocentric lenses for analyzing environmental harm, where preference is given either to understanding it through harm to people and the impact on human groups, or attention is focused on the consequences for the environment per se. Furthermore, the author explored the vision of ecocide as a form of genocide in foreign doctrine, using the example of the rights of Indigenous Peoples in Australia, Kenya, and the Americas. A conclusion was drawn regarding the further prospects and challenges of such regulation, particularly its inadequacy and focus on harm to a human group. However, it was noted that such an approach may become relevant for Ukraine as well, using the example of an indigenous people like the Crimean Tatars, and therefore may require further development. Next, the article analyzed the groups of approaches to the criminalization of ecocide proposed by foreign doctrine – namely, the Incremental school, the Relational Ontology school, the Social Utility school, and the Ecocentric Priority school. Using these as examples, the divergence between anthropocentric and ecocentric approaches in doctrine was shown. The potential elements of the international crime – in particular, the level of intent (the subjective element) – depend on the approaches proposed by these schools. Attention was also drawn to the challenges in choosing the ecocentric direction – namely, their application to the already ordered system of international criminal law, including concerning new categories of victims.
Author: A. O. Puhach
Institution: Yaroslav Mudryi National Law University
Language: English
Topic: Environmental law and policy
Subfield: Law
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W7116656487