Africa is a continent characterised by deepening environmental degradation and
increasing loss of natural resources. This has had an adverse effect on human health
and well-being in the region. Environmental degradation has also made it impossible
for average Africans to enjoy the human right to environment guaranteed under the
continent-wide African Charter, and the constitutions and laws of most African
nations. Several factors are responsible for perpetuating this state of affairs, namely
poverty, lack of political will to enforce or adopt environmental regulations, and weak
institutional capacity. An opportunity to reverse this trend has been offered by the
adoption of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by all United Nations
member States in 2000. The MDGs are eight developmental goals with time-bound
targets. However, the MDGs are not legally binding despite their global adoption.
Despite this inherent legal weakness, the MDGs still have important normative value
as they provided a framework for holding governments accountable to their
millennium anti-poverty commitments vis-à-vis instituting sound socio-economic
reform and strengthening good governance.
This thesis proposes that the role of the MDGs in guiding or stimulating national and
international policy reform towards the realisation of the right to environment in
Africa is, as a framework of accountability, they can be used to promote good
governance and socio-economic reform, two ingredients that are essential to creating
the enabling environment for implementing the right to environment in Africa. This
thesis is therefore an in-depth analysis of this role. The purpose of this analysis is sixfold.
First, to provide an overview of the concepts as well as the research
methodology used in this study; second, to determine whether there is an established
human right to environment in Africa; third, to analyse the extent to which the right
has been realised as well as the factors responsible for the non-realisation; fourth, to
discuss the relationship between the achievement of the MDGs and realisation of the
right in Africa; fifth, to analyse how the MDGs can guide or stimulate policy reform
towards the realisation of the right; and sixth, to analyse the major policies adopted
for the achievement of the MDGs in Africa to ascertain how they would contribute to
the realisation of the right to environment in the region.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:wits/oai:wiredspace.wits.ac.za:10539/7678 |
| Date | 15 March 2010 |
| Creators | Amechi, Emeka Polycarp |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | application/pdf |
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