The aim of this article is to explore the question of ecosystem governance in the Arctic, in light of the potential implications of the ongoing negotiations towards a new global treaty on the conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity in areas beyond national jurisdiction for ecosystem governance of the Arctic. A new global treaty will have inevitably significant implications for Arctic ...

The rise of the idea of the Anthropocene is promoting multiple reflections on its meaning. As we consider entering this new geological epoch, we realize the pervasiveness of humankind’s deconstruction and reconstruction of the Earth, in both geophysical and discursive terms. As the body of the Earth is marked and reshaped, so is its idea. From a hostile territory to be subjugated and exploited through ...

There is a general and widespread consensus on the negative impacts of invasive alien species on biological diversity. Invasive alien species are indeed considered a fundamental threat for endemic biological diversity. Their introduction to novel environments is often described, eloquently, as a <i>biological invasion</i>. How is the threat of invasive alien species addressed in international law? ...

This article explores some of the ways in which marine genetic resources conceptually and normatively intersect with the concept and idea of commons. Through an analysis of the terminological ambiguities and semantic slippages characterizing the usage of the concept of commons in international law, the article addresses questions relation to the idea of global commons and to the multiple reciprocal ...

The question this article wishes to raise, albeit in a preliminary and exploratory manner, is whether or not the Arctic, due to its special ecological circumstances, should be regulated in some special ways within the context of the new BBNJ agreement. Taking as the starting point some of the existing special rules adopted under UNCLOS and the IMO to account for special ecological circumstances, ...

Negotiations are ongoing to develop an international legally binding instrument (ILBI) under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) on the conservation and sustainable use of marine biological diversity in areas beyond national jurisdiction (BBNJ). If adopted, the ILBI will likely apply to parts of the Arctic Ocean where the Arctic Council has played an important role for ocean ...

The aim of this paper is to re-activate certain layers of normative meaning that have been obscured, forgotten or rendered inoperative by the predominant traditions that engaged, from Grotius onwards, with the concept of <i>res communes omnium</i>. The hope and the purpose is that of offering a novel perspective on matters such as the protection and preservation of ocean commons that are of great ...

This article offers a critical interrogation of the relationship between two emerging conceptual frameworks whose importance has grown quickly within the context of international environmental law: the ecosystem approach and ecosystem services. Both premised on the concept of the ecosystem, their origin is parallel, but their present and future is convergent and increasingly intertwined. The ecosystem ...