Although man’s incessant efforts to improve his living conditions and amass more wealth have meant an increasing use of natural resources, international concern over the environment was not an important issue until the emergence of the ecology movement in the late 1960s – even if a limited sense of collective responsibility in this area emerged in the 13th century.

The concept of collective environmental responsibility, as it stands today at the beginning of the 21st century, has its roots in the principles set by George Perkins Marsh in 1864. In his book Man and Nature (revised in 1874 as The Earth as Modified by Human Action), Marsh notes that “man can control nature for good as well as for bad purposes,” that “wisdom is the quest for the balance of nature” and that his generation “should shoulder the responsibility of the coming generations’ welfare.” These principles constitute the pillars of sustainable development as endorsed by the international community in the first decade of the 20th century and underscored at the beginning of this century.

It is generally accepted that the modern environmental movement began in the 1960s as a reaction to the use of pesticides and toxic chemicals in the US, a subject tackled by Rachel Carson in her book Silent Spring, published in 1963. At the same time, concern over the environment was growing in northern Europe, especially in Norway and Sweden where fishing was a common pastime. Citizens of these two countries began to pressure their governments to take serious measures to combat pollution as the occurrence of dead fish floating on the surface of lakes increased and as news reached them of the disastrous effects of pollution on the other side of the Atlantic. As a result of this pressure, Swedish politicians, asserting that pollution was not an issue that could be dealt with by states individually, in 1967 requested that the UN hold an international conference on the environment. The UN approved the motion and decided to convene a conference in Stockholm in June 1972.

The results of a study on the limits of development made by the Club of Rome in 1971 appeared during the preparation for this conference, concluding that the continuous use of natural resources would eventually bring the development process to an end. The findings of this study raised much debate in scientific circles, with the opposing camp asserting that the quick pace of technological development would allow for solutions to be found to reduce the pollution resulting from the use of raw materials and eventually lead to the discovery of alternative materials. The study served to alert the world to the danger of the overuse of natural resources and the need for international collaboration to form a framework for handling environmental issues.

It is worth noting that many consider that the modern environmental movement really began at the end of the second world war as a result of the US use of nuclear weapons in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. There was much concern as the world perceived the fruits of scientific advances being used for destruction. This concern mounted with further environmental disasters such as the spread of Minamata disease in Japan and the increasing frequency of accidents related to transportation of toxic substances and oil excavation.

Despite the growth of the international environmental movement and increased interest in the environment within the UN and its specialised agencies, the UN Conference on the Human Environment, held in Stockholm in 1972, faced problems as developing countries objected to the treatment of environmental issues as an international concern. Until that time, industrial societies had approached environmental protection as a matter of limiting pollution, which they saw basically as a technical problem. The developing countries thus viewed with suspicion the sudden call from the rich nations for an end to environmental destruction, which they interpreted as an attempt to stop the development of their industries. The developing nations objected to the cost of the latest “environment friendly” equipment they were expected to purchase from the industrialised nations, and were fearful that environmental standards would be used as a weapon to block their exports to the developed world.

The Stockholm conference focused on the close relation between development and environment. The preparatory studies and the discussions that took place during the conference concluded that the poverty and backwardness of the developing countries stemmed from their misuse of natural resources, resulting in poor economic growth and limited social development. As a result, citizens were forced to find any way to make a living, even if this was to be achieved through the plundering of natural resources. The conference thus proposed a new approach to the problem, based on the consideration and treatment of the social and economic factors behind environmental problems.

This represented a marked shift from the previously endorsed technology-oriented approach to environmental problems. The Stockholm conference redefined the objectives of development as the raising of living standards (through improved education, housing, health care, cultural facilities, etc) as opposed to defining it as growth in GDP and capital accumulation. The term “environment” was redefined also, to become “the dynamic reservoir of natural and social resources that are available to meet human needs.” So, while development would naturally involve the use of these resources to enhance or at least maintain levels of human welfare, it became clear that the achievement of development targets and the protection of the environment complemented one another. The Stockholm conference indeed led to the quest for a new, more comprehensive concept of development; one based on the limitations of available natural resources, in which environmental considerations were paramount, and which at the same time would provide real opportunities for social and economic development.

Consideration of ecological development, development without the destruction of natural wealth, development substitutes, and lifestyles continued until the concept of sustainable development was reached at the UN Conference on Environment and Development, popularly known as the Earth Summit, held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. Sustainable development depends on economic growth, social development and protection of the environment.

After the Stockholm conference, a number of non-binding agreements were concluded to address cross-border environmental problems. The following three decades witnessed the signing of a number of regionally and internationally binding agreements for environmental protection, leading consequently to the formation of a new branch in international law, international environmental law.

This obviously was not the first attempt to draft international environmental law. In the early 19th century, the countries of the River Rhine endeavoured to protect salmon breeding grounds in the north Atlantic, aware that individually they would be unable to do so. And between the two world wars, in the 1920s and 1930s, the League of Nations attempted to draft an international agreement to protect against pollution of the sea by ships. Although these attempts failed, they can be seen as the beginning of a trend that, after the second world war, brought into being a number of agreements on the protection of natural resources.

In the last four decades, each country has drafted its own environmental law, while the international community has established a set of general guidelines. These include the “Polluter Pays Principle” (PPP), which urges businesses to refrain from polluting the environment, and the principle of common responsibility. This notion of common responsibility, however, has been the cause of disagreement between developing and developed countries. The developing countries assert that the level of environmental damage caused in the past by development in the industrial nations must be assessed, and paid for accordingly. The developed countries, for their part, maintain that the future is as relevant as the past, given that the developing nations are home to 80% of the world’s population and that their development will thus be the cause of considerable environmental damage. This difference of opinion highlights that the approach to environmental problems differs in the North and the South, and that the only solution is international cooperation.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the concept of the total sovereignty of the state began to change as the international community started to discuss human rights, the use of natural resources and shared environmental problems. The binding international agreements that resulted depended on a degree of intervention in what had previously been purely internal affairs.

Environmental matters in the Arab world

The Arab world faces serious environmental problems resulting from economic and social underdevelopment, as well as from the development processes being implemented, which often fail to consider environmental impact. The prime environmental problems are represented in the scarcity and poor quality of drinking water, the limited area of agricultural land and its misuse, desertification, the negative consequences of the increasing consumption of energy, pollution of coastal areas, deterioration of urban environments, and the treatment of solid, liquid and industrial waste.

This situation is not the result of an absence of legislation or concerned institutions. The Arab countries are all party to international agreements that address environmental problems related to water, desertification, coastal pollution and energy consumption. In Egypt, for instance, there exists an environmental affairs authority, a minister of state for environmental affairs and a special law for the environment, issued in 1994. The problem is rather that throughout the Arab world legislation relating to the environment is not firmly implemented.

Environmental action has developed greatly in the Arab region in the last two decades, and in the 1990s in particular. However, national environmental institutions still lack adequate human and financial resources, which makes it difficult to execute environmental policies and to implement environmental laws.

Given that the lack of attention to the environment in the Arab world is primarily the result of the weak implementation of law, we should ask ourselves the following questions:

- Is the problem the content of the relevant legislation or the absence of popular participation in its formulation?

- Is the problem the result of the legislation itself or merely its poor implementation?

- Are the sanctions stipulated in the legislation sufficient to guarantee its implementation or do we need to increase environmental awareness and find ways to encourage popular involvement in the implementation process?

- Are Arab university graduates qualified to handle environmental affairs when they enter the job market?

- Is the judiciary aware of the dangers brought about by the lack of concern of executive bodies over the environmental impact of large national projects?

The deteriorating state of the Arab environment necessitates serious consideration of these and other questions. Preserving the right of the Arab individual to live in a sound environment will require a number of decisive measures and the introduction of a scientific approach to resolve these mounting problems.

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