Ecological Integrity and Global Governance

Global Environmental Governance has many flaws as is commonly known, but this book uncovers their root cause. Summarizing much of her impressive lifework, Laura Westra makes a strong case for ecological integrity as a fundamental principle to guide law and governance. Governments and decision-makers ignore this book's vital message at their peril. - Klaus Bosselmann, University of Auckland, New Zealand. With this new book, Laura Westra has added to her prodigious output of scholarly work on the topic of ecological integrity. She continues to give meaning to the vital concept, this time with an emphasis on its importance to law and global governance. Most of Westra's past work on ecological integrity, including on environmental ethics, policy and law, human rights and global justice is interwoven throughout this masterful analysis. - Kathleen Mahoney, University of Calgary, Canada. Laura Westra offers an impressive multidisciplinary discussion of the concept of ecological integrity aimed at developing it as a working legal category in the making of a cosmopolitan and yet practical ecology of law. This is the best kind of contribution that a philosopher can offer to the challenges of Anthropocene. A must-read. - Ugo Mattei, co-author of Plunder: When The Rule of Law is Illegal and of The Ecology of Law. The sustainability of the human enterprise hangs on entangled threads of ecological integrity and social justice swinging precariously in the void yet to be occupied by effective global governance. Laura Westra's latest book weaves the safety net of science, ethics and international law the world community needs to save itself from itself. - William Rees, University of British Columbia, Canada. Westra has followed the scientific, ethical, philosophical, legal, social, local, and global dimensions of ecosystem integrity across three decades. She is on the front lines in her clarion call that ecosystem integrity is foundational for respecting life on this wonderland Earth. - Holmes Rolston III, Colorado State University, USA. The lack of consideration for ecological integrity is the key to explain how states and corporations disregard human rights, public health, as well as problems posed by forced migrations, food and water deprivation and climate change. This book is not radical, but radically logical and even balanced in its proposals. - Tullio Scovazzi, University of Milano-Bicocca, Milan, Italy.