Ecocide

The term ecocide is used in different contexts. Ecocide means:

the extermination of a people through the ecological destruction of their natural foundations of life, as has happened, for example, with several indigenous peoples in the Brazilian rainforest (cf. genocide ). Creeping ecocides can also occur without the influence of foreign peoples or powers if a population does not recognize long-term ecological trends or its own contribution to the destruction of ecology and has no spatial alternatives or opportunities to import missing resources.
the forced abandonment of a people's cultural independence through the ecological destruction of their cultural landscape (cf. ethnocide ).
the sometimes fatal long-term consequences of the use of warfare agents , which, among other things, can lead to genetic damage, as happened in Vietnam for example (see Agent Orange ).
the general environmental degradation caused by industrial civilization caused by disruption of the ecological balance due to massive pollution . The American evolutionary biologist and biogeographer Jared Diamond predicts the end of our societies today if ecological awareness loses the race against environmental degradation and the destruction of resources.
Attorney Polly Higgins reported that the Rome Statute , the authoritative document of the International Criminal Court (ICC), originally included the crime of ecocide, but that it had been dropped in the final drafting phase. At the UN Climate Change Conference in Cancún in 2010 , she submitted a proposal to the UN International Law Commission , in which ecocide was defined as “extensive loss, damage or destruction of ecosystems in a certain area, so that the peaceful welfare (originally: enjoyment) of the inhabitants is severely impaired was or will ".

Web links

European citizens' initiative to introduce an ecocide directive

Individual evidence

^ Gunnar Heinsohn : Lexikon der Genölkermorde , p. 96 and p. 272, Hamburg 1998
↑ Cf. the example mentioned by Jared Diamond (2005) of the decline of the Nordic settlements in Greenland due to climate deterioration, soil depletion and lack of wood.
↑ That doesn't work on a cow skin . In: Die Zeit , No. 46/2005
↑ Between collapse and the turn of the epoch - On the significance of ecocide for the present ( Memento from May 15, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
↑ Polly Higgins: Eradicating Ecocide . Laws and Governance to Prevent the Destruction of Our Planet. 2nd Edition. Shepheard-Walwyn (Publisher) Ltd, London 2015, ISBN 0-85683-508-0 (English, 202 pages).

[1] Gunnar Heinsohn : Lexikon der Genölkermorde , p. 96 and p. 272, Hamburg 1998

[2] Cf. the example mentioned by Jared Diamond (2005) of the decline of the Nordic settlements in Greenland due to climate deterioration, soil depletion and lack of wood.

[3] That doesn't work on a cow skin . In: Die Zeit , No. 46/2005

[4] Between collapse and the turn of the epoch - On the significance of ecocide for the present ( Memento from May 15, 2007 in the Internet Archive )

[5] Polly Higgins: Eradicating Ecocide . Laws and Governance to Prevent the Destruction of Our Planet. 2nd Edition. Shepheard-Walwyn (Publisher) Ltd, London 2015, ISBN 0-85683-508-0 (English, 202 pages).