The central doctrine of sufficientarianism is that there is a certain threshold below which people are said to be objectively "badly-off," and that providing benefits to people who fall into this category has a special moral urgency. A big part of sufficientarianism's success as a theory, then, relies on the ability to define the threshold in a manner that is non-arbitrary and that justifies a large difference in moral consideration between people who are on opposite sides of the threshold. This thesis examines some attempts to define such a threshold, and eventually concludes that no such threshold is available to us. However, while sufficientarianism may not work as a theory, sufficiency thresholds remain useful due to their practical ability to give useful instruction to policy makers in order to assist in resource distribution and the promotion of social justice. / Graduate

This thesis takes its point of departure in the change of emphasis in the field of environmental and sustainability education (ESE) towards the inclusion of social and human development issues. The theoretical frames of the thesis are poststructural and postcolonial theories, from which different writings, central concepts and approaches are drawn. The thesis also builds on a pragmatist and anti-essentialist approach which argues that we socially construct the meaning of right and wrong and what works better in our lives on the current problematic or situation. The results are presented in four studies and the thesis has three purposes. The first purpose is to describe and investigate theoretical perspectives that take a critical stand on and offer alternatives to universal and consensus-oriented approaches. This purpose is the central focus in the first and second studies. The first study examines the re-emergence of classical cosmopolitanism and contemporary views of the perspective with the intent of discussing its potential for the development of education for sustainable development (ESD). The second study aims to clarify the philosophical problem of addressing universally sustainable responsibilities and values in environmental and sustainability education. The second purpose is to investigate teachers’ ethical reflections in a first-hand intercultural experience. This purpose is dealt with in the third study, where seven Swedish upper secondary school teachers facing particular conflicts of interest and moral situations during a study visit to Central America are interviewed. The third purpose is to investigate how teachers deal with the complex issues of intragenerational equity or social justice in their teaching. This is dealt with in the fourth study, which explores how teachers integrate issues of social justice into their teaching of global sustainability. My hope is that this thesis will contribute to the discussion about how teachers can develop a conscious and critically informed approach to the teaching of environmental and sustainability issues and also contribute to theoretical and philosophical discussions about universalism, normativity and global ethics within environmental and sustainability education research.

京都大学 / 0048 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(地球環境学) / 甲第22615号 / 地環博第194号 / 新制||地環||38(附属図書館) / 京都大学大学院地球環境学舎地球環境学専攻 / (主査)教授 宇佐美 誠, 教授 佐藤 淳二, 准教授 岩谷 彩子, 教授 出口 康夫 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Global Environmental Studies / Kyoto University / DGAM

<p>This thesis was successfully defended on December 16th, 2013 at McMaster University.</p> / <p>In response to humanitarian crises within sovereign nation-states, many voices in global politics have begun to frame their arguments in terms of a responsibility to uphold basic human rights. The most prominent example of this theme is found in the idea of the responsibility to protect, an international framework for crisis response developed by an international commission and consolidated at the United Nations. A major challenge to this frame of thinking is the traditional disjuncture between the concept of ethico-political responsibility, on the one hand, and nation-state sovereignty on the other. A critical investigation of the ethical and political impulses articulated within the doctrine of the responsibility to protect demonstrates that much of the emergent consensus surrounding the responsibility to protect framework is premised on ideational and normative ambiguity. Part of the reason for this is the complexity of the idea of ‘responsibility’. This project seeks to explain some of the contestation of the responsibility to protect by first developing, and then applying, a conceptual framework that differentiates between monological impulses of ‘being responsible’ and more socially embedded practices situated within relational regimes of accountability and answerability.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

This thesis examines interfaith work from a general perspective and through the Swedish interfaith project “Tillsammans för Sverige”. They are based in a famous youth center in Stockholm. The examination has two aims. The first is to identify the main characteristics of interfaith work and how they correspond with daily practice. The second aim looks at the relevance of human rights in interfaith work and how the connection between the two can be clarified.  The results are based upon the author’s experiences through a fieldwork study and an enquiry made among the people involved in the project. Key words: interfaith work, Tillsammans för Sverige, global ethics, human rights

L’état actuel des travaux ne rend pas compte de l’ampleur des questions philosophiques et des enjeux moraux suscités par l’apparition sur la scène internationale des réfugiés climatiques. Il est pourtant urgent de leur accorder une protection à travers des accords internationaux. Les philosophes qui se sont penchés sur le sujet ont été induits en erreur tant par la multiplicité des termes employés que leur absence de définitions. Ce travail critique la tendance actuelle des militants écologistes à vouloir englober des populations aux problèmes divers sous le terme de réfugié. Banaliser l’emploi du terme de réfugié n’est pas seulement fallacieux mais également dangereux. A terme, les militants se tourneront vers la Convention de Genève pour revendiquer que les populations déplacées soient considérées comme des réfugiés. Or la Convention de Genève n’est pas un outil adéquat pour remédier au sort de ces populations. De plus, on ne peut élargir le statut de réfugié pour inclure ces populations sans risquer de perdre sa crédibilité et son efficience. Suivre la pente qu’emprunte les militants nous mènerait à accorder le même traitement aux réfugiés climatiques et aux réfugiés politiques, ce qui est une erreur. Notre hypothèse est que les habitants des petits pays insulaires à l’inverse des autres populations ont besoin d’un élargissement de la Convention de Genève. Nous arguerons que nous avons des devoirs et des responsabilités envers eux que nous n’avons pas envers les réfugiés politiques. Pour défendre ce point de vue, il faut définir clairement ce qu’est un réfugié climatique et justifier cette appellation. Nous devrons donc confronter la notion de réfugié climatique à d’autres notions concurrentes. Une fois les termes définis, nous envisagerons les enjeux éthiques à travers le prisme des questions de justice globale. Nous verrons que pour déterminer qui devrait remédier au sort des réfugiés climatique, il ne suffit pas de se référer à la responsabilité causale. Cela nous mènera à arguer que bien que séduisant, le principe pollueur-payeur n’est pas un outil adéquat pour guider la réflexion. Nous serons également amenés à nous interroger sur la pertinence d’une institution environnementale globale. / Current works on the forced migration area does not reveal the magnitude of the philosophical and moral issues raised by the appearance of climate refugees on the international scene . Yet it is urgent to provide protection to them through international agreements. Philosophers who have studied the subject have been misled by both the multiplicity of terms and the lack of definitions. This work criticizes the current trend set by environmental activists who want to include people with various issues under the term of refugee. Trivializing the term of refugee is not only misleading but also dangerous. Eventually, the activists will turn to the Geneva Convention to demand that displaced populations be treated as refugees. But the Geneva Convention is not an appropriate tool to address the plight of these people. Moreover, we can not extend the status of refugees to include those people without losing the credibility and efficiency. Following the path taken by activists would lead us to give equal treatment to climate refugees and political refugees, which is a mistake. Our hypothesis is that the inhabitants of small island countries, in contrast to other populations require a broadening of the Geneva Convention. We shall argue that we have duties and responsibilities to them that we do not have to political refugees. To defend this view, we must clearly define what a climate refugee is and justify this term. We must therefore confront the notion of climate refugee to other competing concepts. Once the terms are defined, we will consider the ethical issues through the prism of global justice issues. We will see that it is not enough to refer to causal responsibility to determine the members who should address the plight of climate refugees. This will lead us to argue that although attractive, the polluter pays principle is not an appropriate tool to guide our reflection. We will also be led to question the relevance of a global environmental institution.

The purpose of this study is to seek to an answer to the question of what constitutes a tenable model for global ethics. This is done in part by a critical engagement with four different models of global ethics; two proposals from political philosophy and two contributions from theological ethics. The models analyzed in the study are: (1) the capabilities approach as developed by Martha Nussbaum, (2) Seyla Benhabib’s discourse ethics and model of cosmopolitan federalism, (3) David Hollenbach’s model of the common good and human rights, and (4) the model for responsibility ethics and theological humanism as developed by William Schweiker. These models contain different understandings of global justice, human rights, and sustainable development. The study works with six primary problems: (1) Which are the main moral problems associated with different processes of globalization? (2) What should be the response to these problems, in the form of a normative ethical model? (3) What is the relation between global ethics and universalism? (4) What kind of institutional vision for the international arena does a tenable global ethic promote? (5) Given the human diversity and global pluralism, what would be a reasonable view of the human being included in a global ethic? (6) What kind of ethical theory is sustainable for global ethical reflection? These questions also form the basis for the analysis of the models. The study uses a set of criteria in order to assess the answers that the models offer for these questions. These criteria also constitute the framework within which the author’s contribution to the discussion of global ethics is phrased. The criteria are founded on an idea of what characterizes global ethical reflection. The contention is that a tenable global ethic should be relevant, and it should also be related to a reasonable view of human beings and a plausible ethical theory. Together these support the criterion of communicability, which argues that a global ethic should above all be communicable, i.e. capable of enabling cross-cultural communication. A central argument which this study makes is that a kind of ethical contextualism is more reasonable than an epistemological universalism.

The idea of writing this essay begun as an attempt to enter into the current discussion about the theory and ethics of sustainability. The essay aims to compare the meaning of sustainability with two ethical theories that are currently used in developmental and environmental issues, namely the theories of Martha Nussbaum and Peter Singer, and see how coherent these theories are with the concept of sustainability. In order to achieve the essays aims, the study will have to discuss first issues regarding the ‘meaning of sustainability’ and discuss the challenges in its conceptualisation to finally outline a reasonable framework meaning for sustainability. The paper contributes in this way in forming consistency between what the conceptualisation of sustainability represents and how ethical systems could be more coherent with these conceptualisation efforts. This essay aims to answer how deontological and utilitarian perspectives provide guidance regarding sustainability and if these perspectives are coherent with sustainability as a concept. The essay understands coherence as ideas or structures that are logically compatible and that logically support each other. This study concludes that there is a possibility to delineate a coherent meaning for sustainability as a two-level meaning structure; one formal meaning where we found the principle of sustainability and without which, we would not be talking about sustainability and a second level, called the substantive meaning, where four main ethical relations arise, and where obligations and responsibilities appear. The study also concludes that there are certainly fundamental moral ideals and moral ideas embedded in sustainability that have the potential to be agreed upon in a global consensus. The formal meaning of continuance (sustainability moral ideal) gives in turn some fundamental moral ideas (normative relations) at a second level of definition. Additionally, the study shows that it is not self-evident which ethical model is more or less coherent with sustainability but the results indicate that a strong, coherent and egalitarian idea about the value of life, whether as flourished and functional as opportunities and interests, on which many of today's ethical systems are based on, can help an ethical system to be more coherent with the meaning of sustainability.

L’état actuel des travaux ne rend pas compte de l’ampleur des questions philosophiques et des enjeux moraux suscités par l’apparition sur la scène internationale des réfugiés climatiques. Il est pourtant urgent de leur accorder une protection à travers des accords internationaux. Les philosophes qui se sont penchés sur le sujet ont été induits en erreur tant par la multiplicité des termes employés que leur absence de définitions. Ce travail critique la tendance actuelle des militants écologistes à vouloir englober des populations aux problèmes divers sous le terme de réfugié. Banaliser l’emploi du terme de réfugié n’est pas seulement fallacieux mais également dangereux. A terme, les militants se tourneront vers la Convention de Genève pour revendiquer que les populations déplacées soient considérées comme des réfugiés. Or la Convention de Genève n’est pas un outil adéquat pour remédier au sort de ces populations. De plus, on ne peut élargir le statut de réfugié pour inclure ces populations sans risquer de perdre sa crédibilité et son efficience. Suivre la pente qu’emprunte les militants nous mènerait à accorder le même traitement aux réfugiés climatiques et aux réfugiés politiques, ce qui est une erreur. Notre hypothèse est que les habitants des petits pays insulaires à l’inverse des autres populations ont besoin d’un élargissement de la Convention de Genève. Nous arguerons que nous avons des devoirs et des responsabilités envers eux que nous n’avons pas envers les réfugiés politiques. Pour défendre ce point de vue, il faut définir clairement ce qu’est un réfugié climatique et justifier cette appellation. Nous devrons donc confronter la notion de réfugié climatique à d’autres notions concurrentes. Une fois les termes définis, nous envisagerons les enjeux éthiques à travers le prisme des questions de justice globale. Nous verrons que pour déterminer qui devrait remédier au sort des réfugiés climatique, il ne suffit pas de se référer à la responsabilité causale. Cela nous mènera à arguer que bien que séduisant, le principe pollueur-payeur n’est pas un outil adéquat pour guider la réflexion. Nous serons également amenés à nous interroger sur la pertinence d’une institution environnementale globale. / Current works on the forced migration area does not reveal the magnitude of the philosophical and moral issues raised by the appearance of climate refugees on the international scene . Yet it is urgent to provide protection to them through international agreements. Philosophers who have studied the subject have been misled by both the multiplicity of terms and the lack of definitions. This work criticizes the current trend set by environmental activists who want to include people with various issues under the term of refugee. Trivializing the term of refugee is not only misleading but also dangerous. Eventually, the activists will turn to the Geneva Convention to demand that displaced populations be treated as refugees. But the Geneva Convention is not an appropriate tool to address the plight of these people. Moreover, we can not extend the status of refugees to include those people without losing the credibility and efficiency. Following the path taken by activists would lead us to give equal treatment to climate refugees and political refugees, which is a mistake. Our hypothesis is that the inhabitants of small island countries, in contrast to other populations require a broadening of the Geneva Convention. We shall argue that we have duties and responsibilities to them that we do not have to political refugees. To defend this view, we must clearly define what a climate refugee is and justify this term. We must therefore confront the notion of climate refugee to other competing concepts. Once the terms are defined, we will consider the ethical issues through the prism of global justice issues. We will see that it is not enough to refer to causal responsibility to determine the members who should address the plight of climate refugees. This will lead us to argue that although attractive, the polluter pays principle is not an appropriate tool to guide our reflection. We will also be led to question the relevance of a global environmental institution.

This Diploma Thesis deals with two universalistic conceptions, represented by the Swiss Catholic Theologist Hans Küng and his work Global Ethics, and the Civil Religion. In the first part of my text, I bring in the personality of Hans Küng, his work, ideas and the book Global Ethics which received great acclaim on international forum, Churches and society. Küng draws up three basic theses: No world peace without peace among religions. No peace among religions without dialogue between the religions. No dialogue between the religions without accurate knowledge of one another. These theses express the need for a dialogue, being able to formulate viable visions of the future. In the second part of my work, I introduce a less known notion of the Civil Religion with its transformations and development throughout the history. It is a concept exceeding the border of sociology, political science, philosophy and theology, examining the formative processes of the society and its religious reference speech. It penetrates the academic discourse especially in the period between the 1960s and 1980s, as represented e.g. by the American sociologist Robert Bellah. In the third part of my text, I compare both the universalistic conceptions and try to find out where they intersect and in which respect each of them has...