Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Abstract

This article considers the phenomenon of ‘state-extinction’: a situation in which a state faces a very real and imminent threat of literal disappearance from the surface of the Earth. By looking at the case of sinking small island states, this article explores the role and meaning of territory to statehood, while advancing the idea that rather than as a claim-right to territory, the situation of sinking island states should be understood through a state-right to exist as a state – an internationally recognised political authority – in the system of states. If and when this is the case, states under the threat of physical state-extinction may have claims towards international community to continuing existence as political entities without necessarily having a right to new territory.

Keywords

Climate change Kant Locke small island states states territorial rights

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Alliance of Small Island States (2013a) Closing statement UNFCC ADP Bonn 2013 of June 13, 2013. Available at: http://aosis.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Closing-Statement-UNFCCC-ADP-Bonn-2013.pdf (accessed 29 January 2015).

Alliance of Small Island States (2013b) Small islands press release on conclusion of climate talks of June 14, 2013. Available at: http://www.aosis.org/small-island-press-release-on-conclusion-of-climate-talk (accessed 30 October 2013).

Anckar

(2002) Why are small island states democracies? The Commonwealth Journal of International Affairs 91(365): 375–390.

Anckar

(2004) Direct democracy in microstates and small island states. World Development 32(2): 379–390.

Arnold

(ed.) (2011) The Ethics of Climate Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Bartelson

(1995) A Genealogy of Sovereignty. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Bartelson

(2001) The Critique of the State. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Bell

(2004) Environmental refugees: What rights? Which duties? Res Publica 10: 135–152.

Byravan

Rajan

(2011) The ethical implications of sea-level rise due to climate change. Ethics and International Affairs 24: 239–260.

10.

Caney

(2005) Cosmopolitan justice, responsibility, and global climate change. Leiden Journal of International Law 18: 747–775.

11.

Chapman

(2013) Entire nation of Kiribati to be relocated over rising sea level threat. The Telegraph, 7 March 2013. Available at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/australiaandthepacific/kiribati/9127576/Entire-nation-of-Kiribati-to-be-relocated-over-rising-sea-level-threat.html (accessed 30 January 2015).

12.

Crawford

(2007) The Creation of States in International Law. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

13.

Cripps

(2013) Climate Change and the Moral Agent: Individual Duties in an Interdependent World. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

14.

Dietrich

Wündisch

(2014) Territory lost – Climate change and the violation of self-determination rights. Moral Philosophy and Politics. Epub ahead of print 11 October 2014. DOI:10.1515/jmpp-2013-0005.

15.

Doyle

(1983) Kant, liberal legacies and foreign affairs. Philosophy & Public Affairs 12(3–4): 205–235; 323–353.

16.

Dryzek

Norgaard

Schlosberg

(2013) Climate-Challenged Society. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

17.

Frost

(1996) Ethics in International Relations: A Constitutive Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

18.

Gardiner

Caney

Jamieson

. (eds) (2010) Climate Ethics: Essential Readings. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

19.

Goodin

(2013) World government is here! In: Ben-Porat

Smith

(eds) Varieties of Sovereignty and Citizenship. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, pp. 149–165.

20.

High Court of New Zealand (HCNZ) (2013) Teiota vs. the High Executive of the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment [2013] NZHC 3125 (26 November 2013). Available at: http://www.nzlii.org/nz/cases/NZHC/2013/3125.html (accessed 26 June 2014).

21.

Jackson

(1991) Quasi-States: Sovereignty, International Relations, and the Third World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

22.

Kant

(1996) The Metaphysics of Morals (edited and translated by Gregor

). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

23.

Kolers

(2012) Floating provisos and sinking islands. Journal of Applied Philosophy 29(4): 333–343.

24.

Lister

(2014) Climate change refugees. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy 17(5): 618–634.

25.

Locke

(1988) Two Treatises of Government (ed Laslett

). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

26.

Meisels

(2005) Territorial Rights. Dordrecht: Springer.

27.

Miller

(2011) Property and territory: Locke, Kant and Steiner. The Journal of Political Philosophy 19(1): 90–109.

28.

Miller

(2012) Territorial rights: Concept and justification. Political Studies 60: 252–268.

29.

Mimura

Nurse

McLean

. (2007) Small islands. In: Parry

Canziani

Palutikof

(eds) Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Climate Change 2007: Impacts, Adaptations and Vulnerability (Contribution of Working Group II to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 687–716.

30.

Mitzen

(2006) Ontological security in world politics: State identity and the security dilemma. European Journal of International Relations 12(3): 341–370.

31.

Navari

(1991) Introduction: The state as a contested concept in international relations. In: Navari

(ed.) The Condition of States: A Study in International Political Theory. Buckingham: Open University Press, pp. 1–18.

32.

Navari

(2003) When agents cannot act: International institutions as ‘moral patients’. In: Erskine

(ed.) Can Institutions Have Responsibilities: Collective Moral Agency and International Relations. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 100–116.

33.

Nine

(2008) A Lockean theory of territory. Political Studies 56: 148–165.

34.

Nine

(2010) Ecological refugees, state borders, and the Lockean proviso. Journal of Applied Philosophy 27(4): 359–375.

35.

Ödalen

(2014) Underwater self-determination: Sea-level rise and deterritorialized small island states. Ethics, Policy & Environment 17(2): 1–13.

36.

Pachauri

Meyer

and The Core Writing Team (eds) (2014) Climate change 2014: Synthesis report. Available at: http://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/syr/ (accessed 29 January 2015).

37.

Rawls

(1999) The Law of Peoples. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

38.

Risse

(2009) The right to relocation: Disappearing island nations and common ownership of the earth. Ethics and International Affairs 23(3): 281–300.

39.

Ryall

(2013) Saving Kiribati: A blueprint to rescue sinking state. The Telegraph, 14 September 2013. Available at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/australiaandthepacific/kiribati/10309669/Saving-Kiribati-a-blueprint-to-rescue-sinking-state.html (accessed 30 January 2015).

40.

Shue

(2014) Climate Justice: Vulnerability and Protection. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

41.

Simpson

(2004) Great Powers and Outlaw States. Unequal Sovereigns in the International Legal Order. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

42.

Singer

(1985) Famine, affluence, and morality. In: Beitz

Alexander

Scanlon

(eds) International Ethics: A Philosophy & Public Affairs Reader. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, pp. 247–261.

43.

Singer

(2008) One atmosphere. In: Brooks

(ed.) The Global Justice Reader. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, pp. 667–675.

44.

Skinner

(1989) The state. In: Ball

Farr

Hanson

(eds) Political Innovation and Conceptual Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 90–131.

45.

Skinner

(2009) A genealogy of the modern state. Proceedings of the British Academy 162: 295–326.

46.

Steele

(2008) Ontological Security in International Relations: Self-Identity and the IR State. Oxon: Routledge.

47.

Steinberger

(2004) The Idea of the State. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

48.

Stilz

(2009) Why do states have territorial rights? International Theory 1(2): 185–213.

49.

Stilz

(2011) Nations, states, and territory. Ethics 121: 572–601.

50.

Tesòn

(1998) A Philosophy of International Law. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.

51.

United Nations (1994a) United Nations framework convention on climate change. Available at: http://www.unfccc.int/essential_background/convention/items/6036.php (accessed 2 April 2014).

52.

United Nations (1994b) United Nations to combat desertification. Available at: http://www.unccd.int/en/about-the-convention/Pages/About-the-Convention.aspx (accessed 26 June 2014).

53.

Vaha

(2013) The Metaphysics of Moral Subjectivity: Theory without Practice? PhD thesis, European University Institute, Fiesole, Italy.

54.

Walker

RBJ

(1993) Inside/Outside: International Relations as Political Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

55.

Walker

RBJ

(2010) After the Globe, Before the World. Oxon: Routledge.

56.

Weber

(1978) Economy and Society: An Outline of Interpretative Sociology. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

57.

Wendt

(1999) Social Theory of International Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

58.

Ypi

(2014) A permissive theory of territorial rights. European Journal of Philosophy 22(2): 288–312.

Drowning under: Small island states and the right to exist

Abstract

Keywords

Get full access to this article

References