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Bush, pollution, delusions: did he really say that?

The timing of these two stories was interesting. First, George Bush reported as signing off from the G8 with the line: ‘Goodbye from the world’s biggest polluter‘. Picked up the Independent, Telegraph and across the blogs; Climate Progress or, perhaps, the Greenpeace US blog probably says it best:

193 days, 19 hours, 22 minutes until Bush finally stops leading my country.

Can you still suffer from delusions of grandeur even if you have legitimate claim to being the most powerful individual, within the foremost institution, on the planet? As others have pointed out, the reason why the U.S. has not acted on climate change could well be to do simply with the fact that George Bush finds it funny. Did it stop there? More »

Tags: Bush, climate change, G8, media reporting

Ecuador first nation to give rights to nature

Missed in the mass coverage of the G8, on Monday this week the Ecuadorian assembly approved a draft rewrite of its country’s constitution that would give enshrined rights to its nature and ecosystems within Ecuadorian territory.

This is, potentially, a pretty big story. Read the full draft of the rights given to nature. A couple of highlights:

Every person, people, community or nationality, will be able to demand the recognitions of rights for nature before the public organisms (courts and government agencies).

The State will apply precaution and restriction measures in all the activities that can lead to the extinction of species, the destruction of the ecosystems or the permanent alteration of the natural cycles.

To do so at a national level is unprecedented, but it has happened elsewhere at regional level. For example, the Tamaqua Borough Council in Pennsylvania, which in September 2006 recognised the rights of nature. In the US it’s called ‘Wild Law’.

Here is Lovelock (1994) on the point in relation to climate change: “We must, in our own interest, theorise that the planet is at least as important as we are. If we continue to pollute and destroy for our own interest, we could bring about the end of the Pleistocene and the dawn of a new hot earth. First in our thoughts should be the need to avoid perturbing Gaia and exacerbating its present instability.”

The Ecuadorian vote to ratify the draft will come some time in August/September. A good friend of mine is down there at the moment working on some environmental projects, so I’ll try to get hold of him and get some local views on the issue.

Tags: climate change, Ecuador, green, media reporting, nature rights