The climate crisis is one of the biggest challenges humanity has ever faced, posing severe threats to people around the world. Increased awareness about this crisis as well as a growing call for a more sustainable world can be noted not only by scientists and activists but also in the political and economic sector as well as within religious communities. Making Ecocide - the destruction of the planet - an international crime could be a crucial step in tackling the climate crisis. Research has shown that communication is a powerful tool to create awareness and shape public opinion about sustainable development and the environment. Sustainability communication is a small but growing field in media and communication research (Weder et al. 2021: 2). However, research on audiences of sustainability communication, particularly on specific groups other than the general public, has been scarce.  This study analyzes spiritual and religious leaders’ perceptions of the Ecocide Law, their understanding of the mediated communication through the interreligious coalition ‘Faith for Ecocide Law’, and the influence of the communication on their attitudes and behavior towards the support of the law. For this purpose, semi-structured qualitative interviews were conducted with religious and spiritual leaders in Sweden. The results illustrate that the Ecocide Law is perceived as a powerful tool to fight environmental degradation and is highly supported by the religious leaders that were examined. Their support is motivated by worldviews, beliefs, values, and an understanding of nature as part of the holy creation, as well as humanity’s responsibility to protect it. Additional factors such as thorough pre-existing knowledge about environmental issues, sociodemographics, and a close relationship with nature influenced the perceptions and understanding of the communication. Furthermore, media technologies turned out to play only a small role as the informants, albeit frequent media consumers, became aware and supportive of the Ecocide Law through face-to-face communication with leading Ecocide Law activists. A thorough search of the existing academic literature indicates that this study is amongst the first to examine religious leaders’ perceptions of the Ecocide Law as well as the coalition Faith for Ecocide Law and of the communication on their digital platforms (LinkedIn, YouTube, Website) and emphasizes the need for sustainability communication to more specifically target key actors that can influence decision-making for sustainable development. Therefore, this study lays the ground for further research.

The difficulty garnering compensation for environmental destruction from climate change and armed conflicts has made states and organizations question whether international legal systems can protect the environment during peace or war. The case study compares how Ukraine, Azerbaijan, and the United Nations Environment Programme frame the environmental implications of Russia's invasion of Ukraine and Armenia's occupation of Azerbaijan. The aim is to explore how states invoke environmental war crimes or environmental concerns to gain advantages in conflict resolution and whether international organizations change or adapt to help states obtain environmental justice. The results are obtained by combining the theory of environmental conflicts described by Fisher (2022a) and the national/international climate and security discourse described by McDonald (2018). The case study uses framing analysis to identify environmental problems in speeches, statements to the media, letters, reports, and press releases. The main findings indicate that Ukraine has gained more support in its fight for environmental justice than Azerbaijan. Although both states used similar frames and tactics in their environmental drivers, Ukraine's ability to continuously prove its seriousness about environmental destruction sets it apart from Azerbaijan. As terms like ecocide and eco-terror become more internationally recognized, states can use them to push international organizations to make legal changes about environmental justice. However, there is also a risk that states use the need for environmental justice to improve their international reputation in the aftermath of an armed conflict.

Le traitement des inégalités environnementales globales doit se faire en tenant compte de la différence d’impact des pays dans l’avènement de la crise environnementale. Ces inégalités n'impliquent pas seulement des injustices de redistribution liées au partage du fardeau environnemental ou des injustices historiques liées aux passifs écologiques coloniaux et aux émissions historiques de gaz à effet de serre du Nord. Elles impliquent également des injustices de participation et de reconnaissance. L’approche distributive et l’approche corrective des injustices environnementales ne permettent pas de réparer l’ensemble de ces injustices. Pour surmonter leurs limites et leurs défauts, nous proposons de recourir au paradigme de la justice restauratrice. L'approche restauratrice comporte deux avantages principaux. Le premier est qu’elle permet de prendre en compte la nature multidimensionnelle des injustices environnementales et de se recentrer sur un large éventail de besoins de justice des victimes étatiques et non étatiques : besoin de réparation des injustices historiques, besoin de reconnaissance, besoin de participation, besoin de redistribution et besoin d'assistance. Le second est qu’elle inscrit le processus de justice dans une logique transformatrice qui permet de prévenir les injustices futures. Dans cette optique, nous proposons l'institutionnalisation d'une « démocratie écologique mondiale » par le biais de la transformation du Programme des Nations Unies pour l'environnement (PNUE) en une institution écologique, démocratique, et dotée d'une souveraineté supranationale. / The treatment of global environmental inequalities must take into account the difference in the impact of countries in the advent of the environmental crisis. These inequalities do not emphasize only redistribution injustices related to the sharing of environmental burdens or historical injustices related to colonial ecological liabilities and historic greenhouse gas emissions from the Northern countries They also imply injustices of participation and recognition. The distributive approach and the corrective approach to environmental injustices do not make it possible to repair all these injustices. The use of the paradigm of restorative justice could allow to overcome their limitations and defects. The restorative approach has two main benefits. The first one is to consider the multidimensional nature of environmental injustices and to refocus on a wide range of justice needs of state and non-state victims : need for redressing historical injustices, need for recognition, need for participation, need for redistribution and need for assistance. The second advantage is the consideration of the process of justice into a transformative logic for the prevention of environmental injustices. With this aim in mind, we propose the institutionalization of a "global ecological democracy » through the transformation of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) into an ecological and democratic institution with supranational sovereignty.

Kriget i Ukraina har nu pågått i mer än ett år och medfört stort lidande, framför allt för den ukrainska civilbefolkningen. Detta krig orsakar även omfattande skador på miljön och olika icke-mänskliga aktörer inom denna. Vilket övervakas och rapporteras av både ukrainska myndigheter och internationella forskare. Kriget är mycket välbevakat av internationell massmedia, vars rapporter gällande kriget och effekterna av det utgör det grundläggande materialet för denna kritiska diskursanalys. Syftet med denna analys var att identifiera vilka värden som diskuterades av media och om krigets miljöpåverkan inkluderades i denna diskussion. Vidare syftade en fördjupning inom analysen till att undersöka om det fanns kunskapsluckor i mediediskursen gällande krigets miljöpåverkans potentiella effekter på de värden som bedömdes som centrala i diskursen. Analysen genomfördes på ett material bestående av 10 texter som hämtats från Svenska Dagbladets ledarsida. Inom analysen identifierades 10 värden; Hälsa, Ekonomi, Kultur, Politik, Internationell handel, Miljö, Religion, Samhällsfunktioner, Mänskliga rättigheter och Krigsförbrytelser. Analysen gjordes utifrån ett teoretiskt ramverk baserat på politisk ekologi, posthumanism samt teorier kring diskurs respektive ecocide som begrepp. Detta pekade på att samtliga 10 värden diskuterades ur ett rent antropocentriskt och humanistiskt perspektiv. I den fördjupade analysen diskuteras det faktum att det förekommer kunskapsluckor i diskursen, och att potentiella miljörelaterade hot har identifierats som relevanta gällande diskursen för 7 av de 10 värdena. Hälsa, Mänskliga rättigheter, Ekonomi, Internationell handel, Politik, Miljö och Krigsförbrytelser. Hoten förekommer främst i form av omfattande kemiska föroreningar samt topografiska och hydrologiska störningar. Vidare diskuteras även möjligheterna för lagföring av krigsförbrytelser i form av grova miljöbrott via den juridiska definitionen av ecocide. / The war in Ukraine have now been waged for over a year and caused great suffering, especially for the civilian population. But it also causes great damage to the en-vironment and non-human actors within it. Which is being monitored and reported by both Ukrainian authorities and international researchers. The war is well covered by international media, whose reports regarding the war and its effects is the material for this Critical Discourse Analysis. The objective of this study was to identify what values were being discussed by the media, and if the environmental ef-fects were portrayed. The analysis further explored the more in-depth question regarding if the environmental effects of the war could pose a risk to the values that were deemed central within the media discourse. The analysis was conducted upon a material consisting of 10 texts, collected from the editorial pages of the newspaper Svenska Dagbladet. During the analysis 10 values were identified: Health, Econ-omy, Culture, Politics, International Trade, Environment, Religion, Community func-tions, Human rights, and War crimes. The analysis was conducted using a theoretical framework consisting of political ecology, posthumanism and theories regarding the terms discourse and ecocide. The analysis pointed to the fact that all 10 values were discussed from a purely anthropocentric and humanism-based perspective. Within the in-depth analysis the discussion states that there are knowledge gaps in the discourse, and that potential environmental threats can be identified as relevant to the discourse regarding 7 of the 10 values. Health, Human rights, Economy, International Trade, Politics, Environment, and War crimes. The threats mainly consist of extensive chemical pollution and topographic and hydrological disturbances. Furthermore, the discussion also includes the possibilities of prosecution of war crimes in the form of large scale environmental crime, through the juridic definition of ecocide.

Cette thèse interroge le statut juridique de la nature à travers une analyse théorique. Réfléchir sur le statut de la nature revient à questionner la singularité du lien qui lie l’homme à la nature : s’agit-il d’une mise en rapport induisant une échelle de valeur avec la hiérarchie qui l’accompagne, ou plutôt d’une mise en relation sans hiérarchie mais avec des liens d’interdépendance ? Finalement l’idée est de sortir d’une logique dualiste séparant l’homme de la nature. La nature est réifiée par le droit. Objet du droit, défini par et pour l’homme, elle est qualifiée de chose, de bien ou encore de patrimoine. Mais cette thèse est avant tout le constat d’une évolution du statut de la nature, qui ne peut plus être considérée aujourd’hui seulement comme un objet. L’évolution socio-politique accompagne un mouvement tendant à sa subjectivisation progressive. S’opère alors un rééquilibrage « désacralisant » l’homme quand il persiste à se couper du reste de la nature / This thesis questions the legal status of nature through a theoretical analysis. Reflecting on the status of nature is tantamount to questioning the singularity of the link between man and nature: is it a relationship that induces a scale of value with a subsequent hierarchy, or rather a relationship without hierarchy but with links of interdependence? Eventually, the idea is the idea is to escape from a dualistic logic separating man from nature. Nature is first reified by law. Object of law, defined by and for men, nature is considered as a thing, a good or an heritage. But this thesis is above all the observation of an evolution of the status of nature which can no longer be considered today only as an object. The socio-political evolution accompanies a movement aiming at the progressive subjectivization of nature. A rebalancing then occurs, "desacralizing" man as he persists in cutting himself from the rest of nature

<p>The UN Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm 1972 has been recognized as bringing political attention to environmental problems. Researchers have acknowledged the importance of NGO activities during the conference, initiating a trend of engagement of NGOs in official global meetings. But NGOs were not permitted to speak at the plenary or participate in working groups in the official Conference. The influence of NGOs could still be substantial but in another arenas delivering perceptions, knowledge and information to the general public and officials, directly or through the intense media coverage of the conference. NGOs engaged in these parallel activities and individuals in the official initiating process are central to this research. </p><p>The purpose of this study is to analyze how Swedish NGOs and their related networks influenced environmental discourses during and following the UN conference on the human environment in Stockholm 1972. The purpose is also to analyze how they in turn were effected by the conference process and the context in which NGOs function. </p><p>This study is concerned with how social movements became engaged in official global meetings and the effects of this process. It is a study of the interrelations between intergovernmental discourse framing and activist influence. To understand this we take in consideration what motivated the actions of relevant actors, how actors selected strategies to obtain there purposes and how diverse frames of understanding emerged.</p>

The UN Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm 1972 has been recognized as bringing political attention to environmental problems. Researchers have acknowledged the importance of NGO activities during the conference, initiating a trend of engagement of NGOs in official global meetings. But NGOs were not permitted to speak at the plenary or participate in working groups in the official Conference. The influence of NGOs could still be substantial but in another arenas delivering perceptions, knowledge and information to the general public and officials, directly or through the intense media coverage of the conference. NGOs engaged in these parallel activities and individuals in the official initiating process are central to this research. The purpose of this study is to analyze how Swedish NGOs and their related networks influenced environmental discourses during and following the UN conference on the human environment in Stockholm 1972. The purpose is also to analyze how they in turn were effected by the conference process and the context in which NGOs function. This study is concerned with how social movements became engaged in official global meetings and the effects of this process. It is a study of the interrelations between intergovernmental discourse framing and activist influence. To understand this we take in consideration what motivated the actions of relevant actors, how actors selected strategies to obtain there purposes and how diverse frames of understanding emerged.