243
Earth trusteeship is a term combining the morality of guardianship with the
strong origins and rhetoric of enforcement associated with trusteeship as a legal
concept. By transferring moral discourses around guardianship into strong and
binding international law, there is an opportunity to overcome the current disconnects between problematic state practices and systematic change.
This chapter aims to show that Earth trusteeship, while undisputedly a challenge
to unfettered state sovereignty, does not act entirely in opposition to it, and in fact
can draw on its foundations for strong actions in favour of ecological sustainability.
However, the current structures that surround state sovereignty are inadequate for
facing ecological challenges, therefore need to be reframed and implemented in an
eco-centric, rather than anthropocentric way.
Firstly, we need to distinguish state sovereignty from other international institutions and describe how it is affected in states’ practice. It will then identify the
shortcomings of these arrangements, before introducing earth trusteeship as a means
to rectify environmental tensions in both domestic and international law. This can
be forwarded by assurances that the current systems, such as those supported by the
United Nations, do not entirely exclude trusteeship concepts, and in fact are structured in such a way that they may be beneficial to their implementation.
2 Institutional Barriers of Environmental Trusteeship
2.1 State Sovereignty
The current paradigm of sovereign nation states was established by the Treaty of
Westphalia in 1648. Subsequently, the United Nations framework and its founding
documents have upheld the concept as part of the modern international system.
Article two of the UN Charter prescribes state sovereignty as the primary means by
which the organisation operates.
The main reference point for this theory is that states are representatives of their
citizens and governments are elected by those citizens, instigating a form of social
contract (Horn 2016). Nationality becomes the main identity of individuals within
states, and of individual states within the international system (Bosselmann 2015,
p. 72), so generally speaking states exclusively pursue their own interests
(Bosselmann 2016, p. 24). As a result, international law, including international
environmental law, operates through a system of multinational environmental agreements, subject to each state’s sovereign decision to follow them.
From this, the system can be described as individualistic, fragmented, economyfocused, and utilitarian by its very nature (Bosselmann 2016, pp. 29–31), and falls
short of any cohesive governance of the global commons or Earth as a whole. At UN
level, there have been attempts to rectify this by promoting guiding doctrines, such
as the ‘common heritage of mankind’, but these have remained limited by states
strongly upholding their property rights and as such are generally passive, if not
The Role of Trusteeship in Earth Governance
Earth trusteeship is a term combining the morality of guardianship with the
strong origins and rhetoric of enforcement associated with trusteeship as a legal
concept. By transferring moral discourses around guardianship into strong and
binding international law, there is an opportunity to overcome the current disconnects between problematic state practices and systematic change.
This chapter aims to show that Earth trusteeship, while undisputedly a challenge
to unfettered state sovereignty, does not act entirely in opposition to it, and in fact
can draw on its foundations for strong actions in favour of ecological sustainability.
However, the current structures that surround state sovereignty are inadequate for
facing ecological challenges, therefore need to be reframed and implemented in an
eco-centric, rather than anthropocentric way.
Firstly, we need to distinguish state sovereignty from other international institutions and describe how it is affected in states’ practice. It will then identify the
shortcomings of these arrangements, before introducing earth trusteeship as a means
to rectify environmental tensions in both domestic and international law. This can
be forwarded by assurances that the current systems, such as those supported by the
United Nations, do not entirely exclude trusteeship concepts, and in fact are structured in such a way that they may be beneficial to their implementation.
2 Institutional Barriers of Environmental Trusteeship
2.1 State Sovereignty
The current paradigm of sovereign nation states was established by the Treaty of
Westphalia in 1648. Subsequently, the United Nations framework and its founding
documents have upheld the concept as part of the modern international system.
Article two of the UN Charter prescribes state sovereignty as the primary means by
which the organisation operates.
The main reference point for this theory is that states are representatives of their
citizens and governments are elected by those citizens, instigating a form of social
contract (Horn 2016). Nationality becomes the main identity of individuals within
states, and of individual states within the international system (Bosselmann 2015,
p. 72), so generally speaking states exclusively pursue their own interests
(Bosselmann 2016, p. 24). As a result, international law, including international
environmental law, operates through a system of multinational environmental agreements, subject to each state’s sovereign decision to follow them.
From this, the system can be described as individualistic, fragmented, economyfocused, and utilitarian by its very nature (Bosselmann 2016, pp. 29–31), and falls
short of any cohesive governance of the global commons or Earth as a whole. At UN
level, there have been attempts to rectify this by promoting guiding doctrines, such
as the ‘common heritage of mankind’, but these have remained limited by states
strongly upholding their property rights and as such are generally passive, if not
The Role of Trusteeship in Earth Governance