The Polluter is Prosecuted and Penalized Principle

Abstract

In this thesis I will examine how we should treat blameworthy polluters in our efforts to tackle climate change. I will argue for a clearer distinction between blameless and blameworthy pollution and a harsher treatment for these blameworthy polluters. This implies, among other things, that current burden-sharing principles and proposals are insufficient for not adequately doing so. These findings will inform a new principle for ethical climate change policy: the Polluter is Prosecuted and Penalized Principle (PPPP). This principle defends the view that those who are blameworthy of polluting should be prosecuted and penalized.

Furthermore, while arguing for the PPPP, I will make the case for utilizing the criminal law when dealing with blameworthy polluters. I will defend a communitarian justification of criminal law and conclude that we should use the criminal law much more ambitiously. This means that we should see many more climate complaints on both a global and local level, and that we should integrate the criminal law in global climate change conventions built around fair principles, among which the PPPP.

By arguing for a harsher treatment for blameworthy polluters and a larger role for the criminal law with regards to tackling climate change, I aim to show that we should reframe how we see pollution. Pollution in our current times is not a regrettable side effect, nor something that you can compensate your way out of, but a crime worth prosecuting and penalizing.