Calley, Hulme and Ong advocate for the more encompassing phrase “marine
security” to discuss contemporary threats posed to the marine environment, not
necessarily limited to the military universe or to the intervention of armed forces,
but which do impact the levels of individuality, community, globality that a security
threat requires. Examples of marine security threats include ocean acidity in the
context of climate change, geoengineering, illegal, unreported and unregulated
(IUU) fishing, and dumping of hazardous wastes offshore, to name but a few. In
light of these global-scale challenges, the very conception of the sovereign state as
the sole provider of security is antiquated. It makes more sense from a political and
legal perspective to embrace a broader understanding of “marine (environmental)
security”, so as to steer international multi-player initiatives towards minimizing all
sorts of harms to the world oceans, not just traditional military threats, before largescale destruction of marine habitats, ecosystems and resources reach a point of no
return to human lives planetwide.
One ought to admit that environment-based measures that allegedly foster marine
security efforts may disguise other interests. It has been so in the realm of international trade law, and others. However, a realist would claim that such practice is not
an exclusivity of environment-based measures; it has also been common in military
security-based strategies in the past, which have dressed up as security action, when
in fact they cloaked fundamental economic and geopolitical interests. The “humanitarian” intervention in Iraq by the United States in 2003 could be summoned as an
example of such disguise, one that has not hampered governments worldwide to
design and implement further military actions to tackle traditional threats.
168 That
well-intentioned and well-marketed state actions may disguise individual interests is
a truism in international law and politics, but the advancement of such interests must
occur within the boundaries of existing rules and in light of a ponderation of
applicable legal principles.
To dismiss every coastal state measure which reasonably limits certain freedoms
of the high seas for the sake of promoting environmental protection based on
scientific evidence and best-available data would be to declare the premature failure
of UNCLOS. For one, because the Convention anticipated a few environmental
threats to the ocean, namely pollution and depletion of living resources, thus
elevating at a pioneering moment the ocean protection as an important legal good
to be safeguarded—albeit from an anthropocentric perspective.
169 That a aprioristic
168 A philosophical critique to the military interventions effected in Iraq, Afghanistan and in other
parts of the world is advanced by Danilo Zolo (2010), chap. 27.
169 Contemporary theories on the environment usually refer to two possible ethics towards the
environment. The historically dominant one is anthropocentrism or homocentrism, which sees
society as superior to nature, thus instrumentalizing natural elements to enable a better life for
human collectivities. The other ethics is known as “biocentric” or ecocentric, which as the name
suggests, focuses on nature and postulates that all living and non-living resources have intrinsic
value. Such resources are not means to an end, but ought to be conserved for their role in the overall
smooth functioning of nature systems that enable human life on the planet. Basically, those ethics
underpin the action of individuals, institutions, governmental agencies and other societal actors. As
6.4 Coastal States’ Jurisdictional Expansion from an Environmental Perspective:. . .
177
security” to discuss contemporary threats posed to the marine environment, not
necessarily limited to the military universe or to the intervention of armed forces,
but which do impact the levels of individuality, community, globality that a security
threat requires. Examples of marine security threats include ocean acidity in the
context of climate change, geoengineering, illegal, unreported and unregulated
(IUU) fishing, and dumping of hazardous wastes offshore, to name but a few. In
light of these global-scale challenges, the very conception of the sovereign state as
the sole provider of security is antiquated. It makes more sense from a political and
legal perspective to embrace a broader understanding of “marine (environmental)
security”, so as to steer international multi-player initiatives towards minimizing all
sorts of harms to the world oceans, not just traditional military threats, before largescale destruction of marine habitats, ecosystems and resources reach a point of no
return to human lives planetwide.
One ought to admit that environment-based measures that allegedly foster marine
security efforts may disguise other interests. It has been so in the realm of international trade law, and others. However, a realist would claim that such practice is not
an exclusivity of environment-based measures; it has also been common in military
security-based strategies in the past, which have dressed up as security action, when
in fact they cloaked fundamental economic and geopolitical interests. The “humanitarian” intervention in Iraq by the United States in 2003 could be summoned as an
example of such disguise, one that has not hampered governments worldwide to
design and implement further military actions to tackle traditional threats.
168 That
well-intentioned and well-marketed state actions may disguise individual interests is
a truism in international law and politics, but the advancement of such interests must
occur within the boundaries of existing rules and in light of a ponderation of
applicable legal principles.
To dismiss every coastal state measure which reasonably limits certain freedoms
of the high seas for the sake of promoting environmental protection based on
scientific evidence and best-available data would be to declare the premature failure
of UNCLOS. For one, because the Convention anticipated a few environmental
threats to the ocean, namely pollution and depletion of living resources, thus
elevating at a pioneering moment the ocean protection as an important legal good
to be safeguarded—albeit from an anthropocentric perspective.
169 That a aprioristic
168 A philosophical critique to the military interventions effected in Iraq, Afghanistan and in other
parts of the world is advanced by Danilo Zolo (2010), chap. 27.
169 Contemporary theories on the environment usually refer to two possible ethics towards the
environment. The historically dominant one is anthropocentrism or homocentrism, which sees
society as superior to nature, thus instrumentalizing natural elements to enable a better life for
human collectivities. The other ethics is known as “biocentric” or ecocentric, which as the name
suggests, focuses on nature and postulates that all living and non-living resources have intrinsic
value. Such resources are not means to an end, but ought to be conserved for their role in the overall
smooth functioning of nature systems that enable human life on the planet. Basically, those ethics
underpin the action of individuals, institutions, governmental agencies and other societal actors. As
6.4 Coastal States’ Jurisdictional Expansion from an Environmental Perspective:. . .
177