Environmental Justice in African Philosophy

Environmental Justice in African Philosophy PDF

Author: Munamato Chemhuru

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2022-04-07

Total Pages: 162

ISBN-13: 1000567753

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This book focuses on environmental justice in African philosophy, highlighting important new perspectives which will be of significance to researchers with an interest in environmental ethics both within Africa and beyond. Drawing on African social and ethical conceptions of existence, the book makes suggestions for how to derive environmental justice from African philosophies such as communitarian ethics, relational ethics, unhu/ubuntu ethics, ecofeminist ethics and intergenerational ethics. Specifically, the book emphasises the ways in which African philosophies of existence seek to involve everyone in environmental policy and planning and to equitably distribute both environmental benefits (such as natural resources) and environmental burdens (such as pollution and the location of mining, industrial or dumping sites). This extends to fair distribution between global South and global North, rich and poor, urban and rural populations, men and women and adults and children. These principles of humaneness, relationships, equality, interconnectedness and teleologically oriented existence among all beings are important not only to African environmental justice but also to the environmental justice movement globally. The book will interest researchers and students working in the fields of environmental ethics, African philosophy and political philosophy in general.

African Philosophy and Environmental Conservation

African Philosophy and Environmental Conservation PDF

Author: Jonathan O. Chimakonam

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2017-10-04

Total Pages: 238

ISBN-13: 1351583263

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African Philosophy and Environmental Conservation is about the unconcern for, and marginalisation of, the environment in African philosophy. The issue of the environment is still very much neglected by governments, corporate bodies, academics and specifically, philosophers in the sub-Saharan Africa. The entrenched traditional world-views which give a place of privilege to one thing over the other, as for example men over women, is the same attitude that privileges humans over the environment. This culturally embedded orientation makes it difficult for stake holders in Africa to identify and confront the modern day challenges posed by the neglect of the environment. In a continent where deep-rooted cultural and religious practices, as well as widespread ignorance, determine human conduct towards the environment, it becomes difficult to curtail much less overcome the threats to our environment. It shows that to a large extent, the African cultural privileging of men over women and of humans over the environment somewhat exacerbates and makes the environmental crisis on the continent intractable. For example, it raises the challenging puzzle as to why women in Africa are the ones to plant the trees and men are the ones to fell them. Contributors address these salient issues from both theoretical and practical perspectives, demonstrating what African philosophy could do to ameliorate the marginalisation which the theme of environment suffers on the continent. Philosophy is supposed to teach us how to lead the good life in all its forms; why is it failing in this duty in Africa specifically where the issue of environment is concerned? This book which trail-blazes the field of African Philosophy and Environmental Ethics will be of great interest to students and scholars of Philosophy, African philosophy, Environmental Ethics and Gender Studies.

African Philosophy and Environmental Conservation

African Philosophy and Environmental Conservation PDF

Author: Jonathan O. Chimakonam

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2019-03-05

Total Pages: 254

ISBN-13: 9780367263065

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African Philosophy and Environmental Conservation is about the unconcern for, and marginalisation of, the environment in African philosophy. The issue of the environment is still very much neglected by governments, corporate bodies, academics and specifically, philosophers in the sub-Saharan Africa. The entrenched traditional world-views which give a place of privilege to one thing over the other, as for example men over women, is the same attitude that privileges humans over the environment. This culturally embedded orientation makes it difficult for stake holders in Africa to identify and confront the modern day challenges posed by the neglect of the environment. In a continent where deep-rooted cultural and religious practices, as well as widespread ignorance, determine human conduct towards the environment, it becomes difficult to curtail much less overcome the threats to our environment. It shows that to a large extent, the African cultural privileging of men over women and of humans over the environment somewhat exacerbates and makes the environmental crisis on the continent intractable. For example, it raises the challenging puzzle as to why women in Africa are the ones to plant the trees and men are the ones to fell them. Contributors address these salient issues from both theoretical and practical perspectives, demonstrating what African philosophy could do to ameliorate the marginalisation which the theme of environment suffers on the continent. Philosophy is supposed to teach us how to lead the good life in all its forms; why is it failing in this duty in Africa specifically where the issue of environment is concerned? This book which trail-blazes the field of African Philosophy and Environmental Ethics will be of great interest to students and scholars of Philosophy, African philosophy, Environmental Ethics and Gender Studies.

African Environmental Ethics

African Environmental Ethics PDF

Author: Munamato Chemhuru

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2019-05-30

Total Pages: 325

ISBN-13: 3030188078

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This book focuses on under-explored and often neglected issues in contemporary African environmental philosophy and ethics. Critical issues such as the moral status of nature, African conceptions of animal moral status and rights, African conceptions of environmental justice, African relational Environmentalism, ubuntu, African theocentric and teleological environmentalism are addressed in this book. It is unique in so far as it goes beyond the generalized focus on African metaphysics and African ethics by exploring how these views might be understood differently in order to conceptualize African environmental ethics. Against the background where environmental problems such as pollution, climate change, extinction of flora and fauna, and global warming are plain to see, it becomes useful to examine how African conceptions of environmental ethics could be understood in order to confront some of these problems facing the whole world. This book will be of value to undergraduate students, graduate students and academics working in the area of African Philosophy, African Environmental Ethics and Global Ethics in general.

Topics on Environmental Ethics

Topics on Environmental Ethics PDF

Author: Maduka Enyimba

Publisher: GRIN Verlag

Published: 2024-01-03

Total Pages: 52

ISBN-13: 334698821X

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Seminar paper from the year 2023 in the subject Philosophy - Practical (Ethics, Aesthetics, Culture, Nature, Right, ...), University of Calabar (Department of Philosophy), course: Environmental Ethics, language: English, abstract: This is a handbook on environmental ethics for students. It is a simple guide that introduces the students to some of the topical issues in environment philosophy. With this guide, students will now be spurred to read the major texts and authors in environmental ethics that have been referenced in the text. Students and teachers in environmental science, philosophy, African philosophy, and ethics will find this handbook very useful. The significance of evolving perspectives for environmental sustainability cannot be overemphasized. This is as a result of the damning consequences that environmental challenges are posing to the entire ecosystem. The African continent is not spared of the severe consequences that have come with an unhealthy relationship with the environment. This discourse seeks to undertake an exposition of the different African perspectives on the best form of relationship between humans and the environment. Pursuant to the fact that anthropocentric approaches have been held responsible for the many environmental crises evident today, perspectives from African environmental philosophers have proven to provide non-anthropocentric alternatives. Using the exploratory approach, this work examines African environmental models, namely, nature-relatedness, eco-bio-communitarianism, ecology through Ubuntu and the ukama theory. The paper concludes that there is need for an eclectic model that will build on the strengths of the various perspectives, since they all emphasize the communalist view that perfectly exemplifies traditional African worldview.

African Ethics

African Ethics PDF

Author: Munyaradzi Felix Murove

Publisher: University of Kwazulu Natal Press

Published: 2009

Total Pages: 492

ISBN-13:

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This is the first comprehensive volume on African ethics, centered on Ubuntu and its relevance today. Important contemporary issues are explored, such as African bioethics, business ethics, traditional African attitudes to the environment, and the possible development of a new form of democracy based on indigenous African political systems. In a world that has become interconnected, this anthology demonstrates that African ethics can make valuable contributions to global ethics. It is not only African academics, students, organizations, or those individuals committed to ethics that are envisaged as the beneficiaries of this book, but all humankind. A number of topics presented here were inspired by a Shona proverb that says, Ndarira imwe hairiri (One brass wire cannot produce a sound). The chorus of voices in African Ethics demonstrates this proverbial truism.

Elements of African Bioethics in a Western Frame

Elements of African Bioethics in a Western Frame PDF

Author: B. Tangwa

Publisher: African Books Collective

Published: 2010-11-01

Total Pages: 212

ISBN-13: 9956579858

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For millennia, Africans have lived on the African continent, in close contact with the diversities of nature: floral, faunal and human; and in so doing they have developed cultures, values, attitudes and perspectives to the problems, ethical and otherwise, that have arisen from the existential pressures of their situation. The problem, however, is that such values and perspectives do not necessarily form coherent ethical theories. Theory-making is a second order activity requiring a certain amount of leisure and comfort which the existential conditions of life on the African continent have not easily permitted in the retrospect-able past. The elements of African bioethics are to be found in its cultural values, traditions, customs and practices. These are research-able, highlight-able and usable by those who would. The bioethical problems of our current global existential situation are such that all possible solutions, no matter their provenance, ought to be tried. Western culturehas far too loud a voice combined with deaf ears in contemporary ethical discourse. But it should never be forgotten that other cultureshave their own word to say and that alternative values, ways of thinking and practices exist, and attempt should always be made to bring these out and to highlight them, if they could possibly contribute to the satisfactory solution of a global problem. This book brings together various papers on bioethical issues and problems, written at different times, some previously published, each of which attempts to bring out some Africanelements, perspective or concern. The African narrative style predominates through these essays but their framing conforms, more or less, to the Western paradigm for presenting academic issues.

Human Rights and the Environment in Africa

Human Rights and the Environment in Africa PDF

Author: Jean-Claude N. Ashukem

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2023-11-10

Total Pages: 408

ISBN-13: 1000997677

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The relationship between human rights and the environment, as evidenced by the recent UN Resolution on the human right to a healthy environment, is a topical, fascinating, uneasy, and increasingly urgent one. This timely collection explores the inextricable relationship between human rights and the environment as a critical lens for understanding and addressing key human rights and environmental issues confronting Africa. The work explores theoretical, philosophical, doctrinal, and empirical research to interrogate and provide clarity on how and whether the human rights-based approach to environmental protection and policy implications has been effective in enhancing environmental protection and sustainability in Africa. It brings together an elite group of African and international experts to investigate the increasing connectivity and problems with African human rights, environmental governance, and the quest for sustainability. The book is divided into thematic clusters, including: the right of vulnerable communities to sustainability; climate change, the right to development and natural resource governance; corporate environmental responsibility and sustainability; the philosophy of environmental ethics and theories of human rights approaches to environmental governance; procedural environmental rights; the role of the judiciary in environmental protection; and desertification. These themes provide a structure to investigate and clarify specific fundamental questions on Africa’s environmental governance paradigm. This innovative contribution provides an interdisciplinary approach to the philosophical interrelationship and use of human rights approaches to ensure and enhance environmental protection and sustainability. As such, the book will be of interest to African scholars, researchers and students in Human Rights Law, Environmental Studies, Political Science, Ecology and Conservation and Development Studies. It will also be a valuable resource for policymakers, governments, NGOs, practitioners, and all those interested in African environmental governance.