EarthX Website: https://earthxmedia.com/
Enjoy this blast from the past from the EarthX Archives. #OvercomingOvershoot was one of the first shows we produced and aired back in 2020. EarthX Media has grown a lot since then, but we still like to look back on these insightful conversations and see how far we've come.
Harming nature should have the same moral equivalence as harming humans.
About #OvercomingOvershoot:
#OvercomingOvershoot takes a deep look at the myriad symptoms of ecological overshoot by way of thoughtful conversations with experts and visionaries exploring not only what’s going wrong but also what solution pathways are available to overcome overshoot. Moderated by eco-rockstar, Gary Wockner, this show will serve as an essential hub to connect people from around the world on this most pressing concern.
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EarthX is a media company dedicated to inspiring people to care about the planet. We take an omni channel approach to reach audiences of every age through its robust 24/7 linear channel distributed across cable and FAST outlets, along with dynamic, solution oriented short form content on social and digital platforms. EarthX is home to original series, documentaries and snackable content that offer sustainable solutions to environmental challenges. EarthX is the only network that delivers entertaining and inspiring topics that impact and inspire our lives on climate and sustainability.
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Enjoy this blast from the past from the EarthX Archives. #OvercomingOvershoot was one of the first shows we produced and aired back in 2020. EarthX Media has grown a lot since then, but we still like to look back on these insightful conversations and see how far we've come.
Harming nature should have the same moral equivalence as harming humans.
About #OvercomingOvershoot:
#OvercomingOvershoot takes a deep look at the myriad symptoms of ecological overshoot by way of thoughtful conversations with experts and visionaries exploring not only what’s going wrong but also what solution pathways are available to overcome overshoot. Moderated by eco-rockstar, Gary Wockner, this show will serve as an essential hub to connect people from around the world on this most pressing concern.
EarthX
Love Our Planet.
The Official Network of Earth Day.
About Us:
At EarthX, we believe our planet is a pretty special place. The people, landscapes, and critters are likely unique to the entire universe, so we consider ourselves lucky to be here. We are committed to protecting the environment by inspiring conservation and sustainability, and our programming along with our range of expert hosts support this mission. We’re glad you’re with us.
EarthX is a media company dedicated to inspiring people to care about the planet. We take an omni channel approach to reach audiences of every age through its robust 24/7 linear channel distributed across cable and FAST outlets, along with dynamic, solution oriented short form content on social and digital platforms. EarthX is home to original series, documentaries and snackable content that offer sustainable solutions to environmental challenges. EarthX is the only network that delivers entertaining and inspiring topics that impact and inspire our lives on climate and sustainability.
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Follow Us:
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TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@earthxmedia
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@EarthXMedia
How to watch:
United States:
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TVTranscript
00:30Hi, I'm Gary Walkner, host of Overcoming Overshoot here on EarthX TV.
00:44Welcome to another episode of our show.
00:47Today we are going to get an education about a new word and a new legal concept, ecocide.
00:54The title of our show today is ecocide, harming nature should have the same moral equivalence
01:02as harming human beings.
01:05Although not a completely new concept, ecocide is now being moved forward in Europe and in
01:10other parts of the world as a new criminal law.
01:13For example, if a corporation harms the environment, it could be held criminally liable.
01:20With me today are two of the world's leading experts on the concept of ecocide.
01:25Jojo Mehta is a graduate of Oxford and London universities and has a background in communications,
01:32entrepreneurship, and on-the-ground environmental campaigning.
01:36Jojo is the co-founder of Stop Ecocide and the chair of the Stop Ecocide Foundation.
01:45Welcome to the show, Jojo.
01:47Thank you so much.
01:50And also with me is Nemo Bassi.
01:52Nemo is a celebrated Nigerian environmental activist, author, and scholar.
01:57Nemo has held many posts and board positions in the international environmental community,
02:01including chair of Friends of the Earth, chair of Global Green Grants Fund, as well as being
02:06on the advisory board of Stop Ecocide.
02:09In 2010, Nemo was given the Wright Livelihood Award, which is often called the Alternative
02:15Nobel for the Environment.
02:17Nemo, thanks for being on the show.
02:20Thank you so much for inviting me.
02:23And Nemo is in Nigeria today, and Jojo is in England.
02:29So this is a truly international experience.
02:32So before we kind of get into ecocide, I'm wondering if, you know, each or either of
02:37you have what I would call kind of the aha experience.
02:40Something happened in your life, perhaps when you were young, when you decided to dedicate
02:44your life to protecting the environment.
02:46Jojo, do you have any such story?
02:49I absolutely do.
02:51And it actually happened not as long ago as my childhood, although my childhood was filled
02:56with a lot of walks in nature, and my mother was always, you know, a strong naturalist
03:02and sort of instilled in us a love of nature.
03:06But the real kind of get up out of the armchair moment for me was not so many years ago, in
03:12about 2013, when I found out about fracking.
03:17And I was, I'd been a kind of armchair activist, if you like, for a while, you know, signing
03:21petitions and writing letters to my elected representatives, that kind of thing.
03:26But in this instance, when I started researching about fracking or hydraulic fracturing, and
03:30this unconventional mode of extracting oil and gas, and looking at the toxicity of that,
03:36and the way that it was being rolled out, and the effects that it was having on communities
03:39and on the environment, I was really shocked.
03:41And I was talking about it with my family and friends, and my little daughter, who was
03:46five years old at the time, suddenly burst into tears.
03:50And she said, Mommy, I don't understand.
03:52You know, if they're poisoning the ground, surely they understand that they're poisoning
03:56themselves, too.
03:57They, you know, can you, you must call them and tell them to stop.
04:01And of course, I said, Well, I'm not sure how much of a difference it will make if I
04:05just pick up the phone to these companies.
04:08And she said, But Mommy, you have to do something.
04:10What are you going to do?
04:11Who can you talk to?
04:13And we had recently been to the local elections, interestingly, I'd taken her with me to the
04:17ballot box.
04:18So she said, Mommy, can't you talk to the voting man.
04:22And so I went to our local representative to talk to him about fracking with my daughter
04:26at my elbow saying you've got to talk to him.
04:29And I found that our local politician at the time did a fantastic job of that kind of classic
04:35political thing of slipping out of every question I asked and kind of avoiding all
04:40the things I was trying to bring into the conversation.
04:42I remember coming out of there and thinking that is the last time that happens.
04:46That is never happening again.
04:47I'm going to inform myself.
04:49I'm going to make something happen around this.
04:51I'm going to really do something about it.
04:52And that's when I really got engaged with the whole environmental question.
04:56Okay, Nemo, your turn.
04:59Of course, you've had a you've had a long career as environmental activists.
05:03But was there any moment when you were young or at any point where you just decided this
05:07is it, this is what I'm going to do?
05:09Well, I think I've been driven by circumstances in many things I've done in life.
05:18I grew up as a young, young adult in a situation where some countries in Africa were fighting
05:25for liberation, liberation movements and a lot of literature that was circulating free
05:30of charge.
05:31And by the books that were just being sent around the continent, stating the reason why
05:36colonialism had to end and you know why they had to be self determination.
05:43So I grew up on that.
05:46And then in the late 1980s, I was a part of the human rights movement in my country.
05:54And then we're fighting for better prison conditions, better relationship with the military
06:00and all that.
06:01But soon I found out that this was not quite enough.
06:06Because in 1990, specifically, a particular community in the Niger Delta demanded for
06:13a discussion with an oil company, a transnational oil company that had polluted and contaminated
06:18the entire environment.
06:19And rather than go to discuss with the community and find ways to solve the problem, the oil
06:24corporation called in the security forces, the national security forces, and they just
06:28went in the night.
06:2980 people were killed, about 500 houses were burned down.
06:34And that really was a turning point for me, that environmental justice was extremely cutting
06:39off.
06:40That we don't have a safe environment, we don't have a right to life, we can't live
06:43in a dead environment.
06:47You know, so more and more, we see more and more of this issue getting more complicated.
06:53Oil companies getting more intransigent, and governments totally working hand in hand
07:01with this corporation.
07:02So this raised the urgency of the challenge, and that's been my life calling, more or less.
07:08Yeah, thank you both for those stories.
07:11So I'm going to introduce the concept of EcoCite the first time I heard the word.
07:17I was at a board meeting of Global Green Grants Fund in Boulder, Colorado, and Nima was there,
07:23and we were standing at a bar, and we were both drinking wine, as I recall, and I was
07:28trying to describe to Nimo the environmental apocalypse I saw around the world, and he
07:34stopped, he said, EcoCite.
07:37And since he said that, the word has been burnished in my brain here, and I think about
07:42EcoCite all the time.
07:44And so, Jojo, I wonder, you know, again, our audience is probably relatively new to the
07:48concept, tell us, like, what is EcoCite?
07:53So EcoCite is a relatively new word.
07:57It was actually coined in 1970, and it was originally coined to describe the horrific
08:02environmental damage caused by Agent Orange in Vietnam.
08:08And there was discussion around the term in the early 70s, and there was a big environmental
08:14conference in Stockholm, where the leader of Sweden at the time, Olof Palme, talked
08:19about EcoCite and about how this was something that the international community needed to
08:23pay attention to, this serious destruction of the environment.
08:26And so the word is relatively new, but it hasn't been discussed in the public arena
08:33a lot since then.
08:35Behind the scenes, there was some development, but recently, what we're seeing is an understanding
08:40of this word as a way of bringing together people's, in fact, it's funny, what you just
08:45described is a very good example of why the word EcoCite is so powerful.
08:50People can see environmental destruction happening around the world, but they don't
08:56have a term that brings all of that together, that brings it all together as a way to describe
09:00serious damage.
09:02And it literally means EcoCite, as Eco is from home and Cite is from to kill.
09:07It's like to kill one's home.
09:08And of course, you know, the planetary ecosystem is our home.
09:12And so that's the sort of etymology of it.
09:15But the power of it, I think, is very much in what you just described.
09:18It's in people's understanding that there is a concept that can bring together all of
09:23this environmental destruction.
09:25And the interesting thing about it as well is when people kind of get it and it's like
09:28kind of homicide is killing a person.
09:30Oh, yeah, EcoCite is destroying an ecosystem.
09:34And of course, once people understand that, they also, at the same time, tend to understand
09:38that it's wrong and that we need to stop it.
09:40So it's very powerful in that way.
09:43And on your website where you describe EcoCite, you have a long list of calamities, you might
09:50call them.
09:51And if you could just kind of like go through what some of those are in terms of, you know,
09:55what are examples of EcoCite?
09:58So we use as a kind of working definition, we say that it's mass damage and destruction
10:02of ecosystems.
10:03So we're looking at things like big oil spills, serious deforestation, overfishing of the
10:10kind that dredges up and destroys the whole seabed, you know, excessive use of pesticides
10:17to the extent that, you know, entire insect populations are being wiped out.
10:22And we're looking at the depletion of soils at an astronomical rate.
10:25You know, we're looking basically at big scale.
10:28So widespread, severe, systematic.
10:31And I think importantly as well, committed with knowledge of the risks, because at this
10:37moment in time, those companies who are engaging in activities of this kind, they're no longer
10:43in a position, if they ever were, to say we didn't understand what the consequences would
10:48be of what we're doing.
10:50You know, that information is now very clear and abundant.
10:53And so, you know, there is this sense that EcoCite as a criminal act is committed with
10:59knowledge of the results of the acts that are being committed.
11:04And Nemo, in your introduction, you described the situation with the oil spill there in
11:10Nigeria.
11:11Can you tell us a little bit more about that, you know, in terms of how does something get
11:16to the scale of being, you know, EcoCite, as opposed to just, you know, the constant
11:21environmental damage we see around and, you know, what's going on in Africa and specifically
11:26and in Nigeria?
11:28We're talking about massive scale of environmental degradation, kind of, see, I've seen environment
11:38that I would say is dead, you know, you just said environment said this place is simply
11:44dead, it's being killed by human activity.
11:48But you see, nature is actually very resilient.
11:50And that's why I personally don't use the term fragile ecosystem.
11:55Every ecosystem is very resilient.
11:56Every ecosystem is very resilient, but we don't have to pump on it and hit on it and
12:01just destroy it because it's strong.
12:05But nature has a way of getting itself back into shape.
12:10But not when human action knowingly, knowingly poisons everything in the ecosystem.
12:18So I've seen many examples in Latin America, in Africa.
12:22Actually, you can find examples everywhere in the world.
12:26Because human activity, especially transnational cooperation activities and political activities
12:32are deliberately toxic because they're just fighting for profit and don't care anything
12:37about the environment or the people who depend on the environment.
12:43I've had the misfortune of carrying out pollution tour of many countries.
12:48And instead of going to see nice things, I just get to see things that make me more angry.
12:52I've been to the biggest underground gold mine in Ghana.
12:58I mean, for a long time, gold was a major income earner for Ghana.
13:02And I find that the communities around the town where gold was mined has been so poisoned
13:10that people, even up to now, people are still being displaced from communities because of
13:14poison.
13:15Because our water bodies are poisoned with cyanide, with terlings, and people keep on
13:19being pushed away.
13:20Because the environment is just damaged beyond measure.
13:24I've been to a place in South Africa called Witbank, where coal mines, not gold this time
13:32around, coal mines have been on fire.
13:34Underground coal mines on fire for over 50 years.
13:37Abandoned coal mines just burning, blazing.
13:41So when you look above the ground, you can feel the heat rising from above the ground.
13:49You just wonder what's going on.
13:50And community people tell you, well, you can't really walk over that territory because you
13:55don't know where a sinkhole may appear under your feet, where you may just be dragged into
14:01the flames under the ground.
14:02That, to me, is clearly ecocide.
14:04Then you come home to the Niger Delta.
14:08Regularly, I go to some communities just to sit down and get myself pumped up again so
14:13I don't think anything has been solved.
14:15I get myself angry enough to keep on pushing on.
14:19You find places like Ilogoni, where oil spills cover an entire creek, an entire river just
14:25covered by oil spill.
14:27And then the air is sapped.
14:29When you get to the community, you're smelling hydrocarbons.
14:33You have a headache within five minutes of arriving in that community.
14:36But people are living right there.
14:38So you have a situation of ecocide going on continuously, and people being poisoned, very
14:43comprehensively poisoned.
14:45We find big gas furnaces burning 24 hours every day for decades in oil fields.
14:53This is totally incredible.
14:55And then one thing I found recently, the United Nations Environment Program carried out a
14:59research assessment of the Ogoni environment.
15:02And by 2011, they published a report that showed that in some places, hydrocarbons had
15:07penetrated the soil to a depth of five meters.
15:11This was in 2011.
15:13This year, when I visited some of those locations, they were being remediated.
15:17The pollution had gone down to 10 meters.
15:21This is simply incredible, that your soil is poisoned, your water is poisoned, your
15:26air is poisoned.
15:27And then corporations still published sustainability reports saying they're doing very well.
15:34I mean, these corporations and the governments that work with them ought to be in the dark.
15:39And that's what ecocide is all about, to bring them to justice.
15:43To make them accountable for the damage that is being inflicted, not once in a while, but
15:47continuously, routinely, knowingly.
15:50And this cannot be accepted.
15:53And that's kind of a nice transition, Jodo, to the concept of turning ecocide into criminal
16:01law.
16:02And so I wonder if you can tell us a little bit about that sort of process, like how could
16:09ecocide become an international crime?
16:12Like, what is the sort of governing body you're trying to work with to get that done?
16:17And sort of how the process might work?
16:22Yeah, so we aim specifically to have ecocide criminalized at the International Criminal
16:29Court, which is based in The Hague, and which has 123 member states.
16:35So, you know, nearly two-thirds of the world has signed up to the International Criminal
16:38Court.
16:39Now, so no, not every country has signed up, but I'll come on to why that may not matter
16:45as much as you think in the context.
16:48So with the ICC, it's the only global mechanism that directly accesses the criminal justice
16:55systems of its members.
16:57So if you make something a crime at the International Criminal Court, at the ICC, then any
17:03country ratifying that crime must incorporate it in its own domestic legislation within
17:08a year.
17:09So if you want to create a new rule, a new law that will go across boundaries and have
17:15coherence internationally, then the ICC is the logical route to take.
17:21And so that's why we aim to move it forward there.
17:24And the way that that has to happen is that it needs to be proposed by a member state
17:28or a group of member states.
17:31And there are a certain number of stages.
17:33It's a four-stage process, but it's not a particularly complex process.
17:38It just takes a bit of time.
17:40So a state has to propose it.
17:42Then the annual assembly has to approve it, if you like, with a simple majority in terms
17:48of putting it on the table for discussion.
17:51And then you move on to the adoption stage, which could take some time as states discuss
17:56the exact text, if you like.
17:59And then once it's adopted, the states can then ratify.
18:02But the power of doing this in this particular way is that because ecocide is mostly a corporate
18:10crime, it means that it could be prosecuted in any of the jurisdictions that ratify it.
18:17So it's a bit different to, say, war crimes, where a war criminal is probably unlikely
18:23to be prosecuted by their own state.
18:26And so their case will end up at the International Criminal Court, which is a court of last resort.
18:32Whereas with ecocide, a CEO could be prosecuted in any country that ratifies.
18:38And that's where the power of it comes in with regard to countries that may not be signed
18:43up as members.
18:44Because effectively, I mean, I'll give you a hypothetical example.
18:49Let's say a CEO from the US signs off on an ecocidal project in Venezuela, for example,
19:01that they have a corporate office in Belgium, then the crime could be prosecuted in Belgium.
19:11So effectively, I mean, a real life example, if you like, of this is the case of General
19:16Pinochet at the end of the 90s, who was arrested in the UK for effectively crimes against humanity.
19:24And he basically said, well, Chile is not signed up to this.
19:28So you can't touch me.
19:31And actually, the UK Supreme Court said, well, you've set foot on our territory.
19:37We prosecute this crime.
19:39And so we have jurisdiction.
19:40And it's a principle called universal jurisdiction that can be used in any country that
19:45decides the crime is serious enough and has ratified it itself.
19:50Now, just as an example, would you, when you say prosecute, is that like, would you sue
19:59them or be like a trial in a court?
20:01Or what does that mean exactly?
20:03OK, so there's a bit of a difference.
20:05This is where we see the difference between civil law and criminal law.
20:08OK, and here's suing people is essentially what you do in civil law.
20:13You have a you have a direct kind of confrontation, if you like, between the individual or potentially
20:19the community and a particular company.
20:21They kind of go head to head.
20:23And that's a very expensive thing to do because they each have to employ lawyers to do it.
20:28And it can be long and difficult.
20:30And of course, corporations will do their absolute utmost to make sure that you don't
20:34win.
20:34And even if you do, they'll then get in the way of having to actually cough up anything
20:39that they've been asked to compensate and so on.
20:41And so, I mean, suing or civil litigation is a little bit like I mean, it's a bit of
20:47a brutal analogy.
20:48But for a corporation, it's a little bit like, let's say you're beating up a woman and you're
20:55told you have to pay her some pocket money because you've made some bruises.
20:59And so you might do that, but then you can just carry on beating her up.
21:02That is effectively the situation with civil litigation.
21:05And that's not to say that it's not important to do it.
21:08It is important to do it.
21:09It creates an evidence base.
21:11It shames people, all of those things.
21:13But when you've got a criminal law, that's not about suing.
21:16That's about prosecution.
21:18That means that the state will prosecute.
21:21And effectively, it's individual criminal responsibility.
21:24So you can't hide behind the corporation.
21:26And you can't just make up for it by accounting for some extra legal costs.
21:31So it's a very different sort of ballpark.
21:33And a very simple example to explain this is, I mean, if you're walking down the street
21:37and somebody beats you up, you don't sue them.
21:41You go to the police and the state prosecutes.
21:44And that is the situation that we want to see with this level of environmental destruction.
21:50So Nimmo, with the example that you brought up about the oil spill in Nigeria,
21:55first, is Nigeria part of the International Criminal Court?
22:00And if it were, if it would have been back when that spill happened and still ongoing,
22:06you know, could you have tried to hold the corporation and the CEO accountable with this law?
22:16Absolutely.
22:17Nigeria is part of the International Criminal Court.
22:19And as we speak, young people are threatened to drag the government before that court because of
22:27brutal responses to peaceful protests that have been going on.
22:32And so clearly, the transnational oil corporations who have
22:38damaged our environment so thoroughly are very good candidates.
22:42Once, as soon as this law is enacted, I believe they will be the first,
22:45one among the first to be dragged there because what they've done is totally unconscionable.
22:50So far, they've been getting away by hiding behind corporate shields.
22:55And whenever communities or individuals take them to court,
22:59they just try to settle the matter out of court.
23:01I don't see anybody settling it outside, out of court.
23:05We cannot do that.
23:06And then leaders of corporations just have to be also held personally liable
23:12for directing the criminal activities going on in our environment.
23:16Otherwise, they just do whatever they do, knowing that it's a corporation that will answer for it.
23:22So we need a law that holds the corporation and those behind the corporation accountable.
23:28And then shareholders be careful where they put their money because right now,
23:32a lot of shareholders just kind of wait for the value of their shares and not really
23:39what goes on in the background to bring that kind of value.
23:41That is not really valuable.
23:45So go ahead.
23:47And I was just going to say, this is one of the key points here,
23:51is that finance is kind of like water.
23:54Funds will flow where they're allowed to flow.
23:58So effectively, putting this law in place is a little bit like kind of
24:02plugging a hole in the boat in comparison to these companies that are fully invested in.
24:09And because the funds continue to be allowed to go that way, these things don't stop.
24:14So effectively, once something's made a crime,
24:18it's actually illegal to finance it and illegal to give a permit for it.
24:22So you're actually plugging that gap in a way that's very important,
24:27creates a kind of a guardrail for future practices,
24:30actually starts to steer corporate practice in a different direction.
24:35I want to use an example.
24:37In the United States, we have a law called the Clean Water Act,
24:41and it's often used by activists like myself.
24:44When a corporation or even a government agency pollutes water,
24:49you can sue them in court.
24:52And then if you win, you can collect damages.
24:56But the Ecoside Law is actually more than that,
25:00because it's the government itself that would be criminally prosecuting the polluter.
25:05Is that correct?
25:08Yeah, that's absolutely how it would and should work.
25:12And of course, in Nimo's case, he's actually looking at taking government actors to court.
25:19So he might well be looking directly at the jurisdiction of the ICC itself,
25:23if the government's not obviously going to prosecute its own members, perhaps.
25:27Whereas in the situation of a CEO,
25:32they could be prosecuted within a certain jurisdiction
25:35without necessarily having to go to the ICC.
25:38But of course, Nimo, correct me if I'm wrong,
25:41but I suspect that in Nigeria,
25:44there's quite a strong connection between those big corporations and the governmental actors.
25:49Or there could well be.
25:51In which case, potentially, one would want to be prosecuting elsewhere,
25:58whether that was the ICC or in another ratifying state.
26:02Because in Nigeria itself,
26:04it might be harder for that to proceed because of existing relationships.
26:08Is that the case?
26:10You are right.
26:11We have a very unholy matrimony between the corporations and the government.
26:16The laws setting up the corporations in our countries,
26:20they were supposed to be progressive, but they're very colonial, actually.
26:24And they're working hand in hand.
26:27In fact, in terms of oil extraction,
26:29in each of the corporations operating,
26:32the government holds the highest shareholder in the operation.
26:36And it's also an operator.
26:38Whenever we sue the companies, we're also suing the government.
26:42They go hand in hand.
26:43So that's a bit tricky.
26:44And we have to find a way around that.
26:46And actually, there's a move now for the separation,
26:50for a kind of divorce between the state and these transnational corporations.
26:55Because it makes it extremely difficult for government to supervise or regulate
27:01an operation that they are also players in.
27:04So the corporations find a leeway to commit all kinds of crimes and get away with it.
27:10So I know, Nemo, you're also involved in the Rights of Nature movement.
27:15I think you're on a board of an organization or two.
27:18So how does Rights of Nature,
27:21which we're a little bit more familiar with here in the United States,
27:25how does that relate to ecocide law?
27:27Or would they kind of work together too?
27:31Absolutely.
27:32The two work together, but there will be some fine differences.
27:40Now, the Rights of Nature can already be tested in some countries.
27:45Countries like Ecuador, like Bolivia,
27:47where it's been integrated into our national constitutions.
27:50So this can be prosecuted within those kind of jurisdictions.
27:55And in fact, some years back, when the Gulf of Mexico oil spill occurred,
28:00BP was sued in Ecuador.
28:02Because if you commit a crime against Mother Earth,
28:07if you affect the rights of Mother Earth,
28:09you could be sued anywhere Mother Earth is.
28:11And that's all over the planet.
28:13More or less the same as in the concept of ecocide in terms of jurisdiction.
28:17But so, yes, I think that kind of marks out the difference.
28:21There are many other subtle differences,
28:24because the Rights of Nature is much more philosophical and broad.
28:33So they work together.
28:34The ecocide law gives us the space to hold corporations or individuals criminally liable.
28:42And then, of course, the Rights of Nature gives us a broader picture,
28:46a much wider picture over many things.
28:48And then we have the Rights of Nature.
28:52A river has a right to exist as an individual.
28:56A mountain has a right, spiritually and otherwise, and citizens also.
29:02We recognize other beings, living and non-living,
29:07as fellow citizens or children of Mother Earth.
29:11Yeah, I think there's an interesting kind of complementarity there,
29:16because it's almost like they're two sides of the same coin.
29:20It's like the rights on the one hand and the responsibilities on the other hand,
29:26which is where the criminal law comes in.
29:28So, you know, I mean, one parallel might be to say that, you know,
29:31we all have a right to life, but our right to life is protected
29:36because killing people is a crime.
29:38So murder is a crime and that protects your right to life.
29:42And in the same way, ecocide, as a criminal law,
29:45would protect the Rights of Nature.
29:49And so I think it's also good to point out because, you know,
29:52Rights of Nature, we hear about it in some places,
29:55and I've actually visited a few places,
29:57including the Whanganui River, now in New Zealand,
30:00which had the first, you know, river which was given personhood status,
30:04went on a wonderful canoe trip down there with some Maori tribespeople.
30:09But, and it is sort of philosophical,
30:12and there's a lot of questions about if and how you can actually,
30:16you know, sue someone because of Rights of Nature.
30:20But on the ecocide law, you guys are actually making progress.
30:25I mean, you have some countries that have agreed to it
30:29and are literally trying to move this through the international court system.
30:32So, Jojo, I wonder if you can tell me, you know,
30:35I mean, this is like becoming real.
30:38And so give us a little bit of example of how,
30:41or what are the countries that are involved in,
30:43and what are they doing?
30:45And, you know, is this a possibility to actually happen?
30:51We very much believe so, yes.
30:54So the whole movement towards criminalizing ecocide
30:58has accelerated considerably in the last year or so.
31:03And I mean, there are a number of reasons for that.
31:05But I mean, one key one that I think it's worth mentioning here,
31:07particularly, Gary, as you mentioned,
31:09that you have this activist background yourself,
31:12is that the civil mobilization that we've seen around the world,
31:15so the Sunrise Movement, Greta Thunberg's school strikes,
31:20the Extinction Rebellion, and so on,
31:23have made a huge difference to how much we're being heard
31:27in terms of talking about ecocide.
31:28Because it's kind of widened the scope of the conversation
31:31in terms of the media and what they're prepared to talk about.
31:34And, you know, what politicians are effectively being pressured
31:38to now address.
31:39So that's one aspect.
31:41But on the sort of on-the-ground level of state support,
31:45last year, in November,
31:47we had our first really major endorsement from a head of state.
31:52And that head of state was the Pope.
31:55It was Pope Francis, who obviously is head of the Vatican State.
32:00And in front of the International Association of Penal Law,
32:03he quite explicitly asked for ecocide to become a fifth crime at the ICC,
32:08and said that this was something that needed to happen
32:10in order to protect the planet.
32:13And shortly afterwards, in December, at the ICC's annual assembly,
32:18two countries, two small island countries, Vanuatu and the Maldives,
32:23spoke out in their official statements
32:26and asked the member states to seriously consider
32:30amending the Rome Statute,
32:31which is the governing document for the court,
32:34amending it to add ecocide.
32:38So that was a huge step.
32:40And actually, you remember earlier,
32:42I was mentioning it was first brought up in an international forum in 1972.
32:46And actually, never again until last year,
32:48at that level, at that kind of UN-ICC level.
32:51And so that was a really major step.
32:53And it brought the conversation back onto the level of international government
32:57and that conversation.
32:58And then this year, we've had key developments in France,
33:01and in Belgium.
33:02So we've now had four states actually specifically vocally supporting.
33:08And we have parliamentarians from a number of other different countries
33:11also interested in discussing this.
33:14And that's a very exciting position to be in,
33:18because I think things are really starting to move.
33:20And literally, as we are recording this,
33:24various events are going on in association with the annual assembly of the ICC,
33:30at least quite a lot of it is happening online this year
33:32for reasons of the COVID restrictions and so on.
33:36But that conversation is being continually amplified now in that forum,
33:41which is where we need it to move forward.
33:43So yes, it's very exciting.
33:45And Nemo, from your perspective in Africa,
33:51and we hear a lot about these kind of movements,
33:54especially in the so-called Western world and the developing world.
33:58But are you also feeling some energy and, I guess, excitement about this
34:03from your African colleagues and environmental activists in Africa,
34:08as well as Latin America?
34:09Because I know, especially being part of Global Green Grants Fund,
34:14and you have a lot of connections around the world
34:16in the so-called developing world that are non-Western.
34:19Are you also hearing some excitement about that?
34:24Oh, yes.
34:25Yes.
34:27Especially at grassroots level,
34:28this is part of the cosmology that nature has rights
34:32and that ecocide should be a law.
34:35In Nigeria, there's a case of a Pasifika River
34:38that has been promoted to have rights.
34:40The Ethiopian River in the Niger Delta
34:42is one of the few rivers that is not totally damaged,
34:45as most others are.
34:48And in fact, I believe early next year,
34:51there's going to be an international conference
34:53promoting the rights of that particular river.
34:56And the concept of ecocide will be part of the discussion.
35:01But generally, there's going to be a lot of uncoupling
35:06of the colonial ecology on the continent,
35:08because even conservation has a bad name and a bad approach,
35:14where certain parts of creation,
35:16parts of some of our relatives,
35:20are given more space than humans.
35:23And this has very big pressure on communities,
35:26who are losing land because certain territories
35:29are earmarked for tourism, for ecotourism,
35:31for purpose of any foreign exchange by governments.
35:35And so having the kind of conservation protection
35:39that actually protects human communities,
35:42as well as other citizens,
35:46and I'm looking for a term to call relatives,
35:49other relatives,
35:51other beings who are sharing the planet.
35:53Having a balance is something that needs to,
35:57one level of fight that we have to confront,
36:01so that people don't hide behind any law
36:06or rights of the Mother Earth
36:08to further disenfranchise people
36:10and further displace people from communities.
36:12We're having very serious cases in climate action.
36:18We're having carbon slavery,
36:19where communities are forced to take care of trees
36:22just because of the carbon in the trees,
36:24rather than see trees as part of a living ecosystem.
36:27And so there are different levels of struggle,
36:31but all these are going hand in hand.
36:35Then it's going to be ecocide,
36:37rise of Mother Earth,
36:39will virtually lead to total liberation
36:41and total allowance of people
36:46to live in harmony with nature,
36:48which is the way forward, actually.
36:50So ecocide law is actually a big impetus
36:53for us to live within planetary limits
36:56to respect the places we're living,
36:59because everybody knows,
37:00I mean, most people know,
37:01even though some would not admit it,
37:03that our continuous transformation of everything,
37:07colonization of the land, the sea, the sky,
37:10would not solve the problems
37:11confronting humans at this time.
37:14And you brought up an issue
37:16I want to kind of ask
37:18if you can develop a little bit more,
37:19because here in the United States,
37:21in the environmental movement,
37:23we're hearing more about indigenous rights.
37:27And I think the kind of philosophy
37:29that you just described,
37:32even though this word ecocide is relatively new,
37:35it is not a new concept, of course.
37:39It might be new to Westerners
37:40and people in the United States,
37:42but it's not a new concept
37:43that we have a right to,
37:45we have a responsibility
37:47to the non-human world around us,
37:49because it is from that
37:50which we sustain our own existence.
37:52And so, can you tell us a little bit more, Nimo,
37:55just about the connection of,
37:56like sort of ecocide law
37:58and it's sort of the roots
37:59in sort of indigenous lifestyles
38:03and values and those kinds of things.
38:07Indeed.
38:11In most of our societies,
38:13we have very deep connections
38:15between individuals and the community.
38:18And when you talk about the community,
38:19it's not just a collection of people,
38:21it's a collection of the totality of the community.
38:24It's about the environment,
38:25it's about the people,
38:27it's about everything.
38:28It's about the culture, the spirituality,
38:31the economy, it's not about oppression,
38:34it's not about exploitation.
38:36It's not about exploitation,
38:37it's not about accumulation of personal goods
38:42or resources, it's about sharing.
38:44This is where we have the concept of Ubuntu,
38:48for example, which is widely known,
38:51that each person's humanity
38:53is tied to the humanity of the next person.
38:54You can expand that to me to be
38:56that our humanity is tied to the safety
38:59and security of the environment around us,
39:01because we don't live in space,
39:03we don't live in Mars,
39:04we live right here.
39:06In my local language,
39:09we call this etiwem,
39:12which means a good life,
39:13living the good life.
39:16You cannot say that you live a good life
39:18because you have 10 billion US dollars
39:21in the bank account,
39:22that doesn't count at all.
39:24A good life is a life that's lived in harmony
39:27with others, your neighbors,
39:28others around you,
39:29others in the community,
39:30as well as taking care of the environment.
39:33When you pass somebody's home,
39:36someone who has a garden around his home,
39:38who takes care of the environment
39:39in the community,
39:41you send good energy,
39:43good thoughts to the owner of that,
39:45to the person who occupies
39:47that particular space.
39:48But when you see somebody else
39:49who damages everything,
39:50it's a very bad energy flows from that space
39:53and also from you,
39:54which is not very healthy for you,
39:55but you can't really help it all the time.
39:58And so there's this balance always
40:00of being very conscious
40:02of what people do with other beings
40:06and the environment around us.
40:07And we believe also
40:09that the things we call non-living
40:11and that we can exploit
40:12without even thinking,
40:14is just because of our limited understanding
40:16we think they are not living.
40:17We don't know what is living
40:18and what is not living.
40:20When I was growing up,
40:21my father, I learned from my father
40:25that whenever I eat,
40:27I should give a bit of it to mother earth
40:30because the earth is our mother.
40:32And so up to now,
40:36if I take a glass of water,
40:37I don't finish it.
40:38I got to leave a little bit
40:39at the bottom of the glass.
40:41But you could interpret this
40:43in different ways,
40:44but it's part of being conscious
40:45of how we relate to where we live
40:47and not to damage it.
40:49And not to think that
40:50because we have the opportunity
40:51to destroy, to transform,
40:53to appropriate that we should do that.
40:55There must be restriction.
40:57And this law brings about that impetus,
41:00that opportunity for people
41:02to learn to stop misbehavior.
41:05I would totally agree with that.
41:07I think what's wonderful
41:08about what Nimo just elaborated
41:13is that there's something
41:14about the law of ecocide
41:15that reflects this sense of reciprocity
41:19that Nimo is just describing,
41:20that we have to be thankful
41:22and have this connection with the earth.
41:24And it's actually deeply understood
41:27by the world's indigenous cultures
41:29that if you damage mother earth,
41:31there are consequences.
41:33That's a fact.
41:34That's not a rule
41:35that you decide in your head.
41:37That's actually a fact that's out there.
41:38And it's one that's becoming
41:39ever more increasingly obvious to all of us
41:42that when we destroy nature,
41:44there are consequences.
41:45And those consequences
41:46is becoming increasingly apocalyptic.
41:48So reflecting this sort of reciprocity,
41:51if you like,
41:52in the form of this law
41:54is actually, it's kind of quite,
41:57I feel quite intimately related
41:59with that understanding.
42:00And I think it also,
42:01it starts to kind of bring us back
42:03towards the awareness
42:06that we are, of course,
42:07as Nimo just described,
42:08completely interconnected
42:10with the ecosystems around us.
42:12And I think in the West,
42:13we've had a bit of a disastrous background
42:16in terms of this
42:17because we have this very separate mindset.
42:20So, you know, you can go back,
42:22it goes back as far as Plato,
42:23you know, you've got the split
42:25between the ideal and the real,
42:26you know, you've got in the Catholic church,
42:28you've got the split
42:29between the spiritual and the physical,
42:31and then you keep going
42:32into the enlightenment thinking,
42:33and then you've got the split
42:34between the rational and the emotional
42:36or the nature and the masculine feminine,
42:38all of these,
42:39this kind of dualism
42:40runs right through Western history.
42:43And it's almost unsurprising
42:46that we've ended up
42:46with this incredibly skewed idea
42:49that somehow we get to dominate nature.
42:51You know, ultimately that's,
42:53you know, it's like, you know,
42:55believing that we can continue
42:56to extract resources on a finite planet
42:59is a bit like believing the earth is flat.
43:01I mean, if you keep walking West far enough,
43:03you know, you're going to realize you're wrong.
43:04We just really have to,
43:07you know, change the laws
43:09that can protect us
43:11so that we don't end up in a situation
43:13where we have to actually prove by doing it
43:16that you can't extract anymore from the planet.
43:20Kind of connected to what you just said.
43:24Are you having much success
43:25getting sort of mainstream
43:27environmental organizations
43:28kind of on board with this idea?
43:29And I'll just make a little bit
43:30of a subjective statement.
43:32You know, here in the United States,
43:34a lot of the big groups,
43:34they tend to be kind of corporate and moderate
43:37and sort of boring in my opinion.
43:38And they kind of stand in the way of progress
43:41rather than actually helping it move forward.
43:45And I know a few of the international groups
43:47are more involved in this,
43:48but how is the concept moving forward
43:51just in the broader environmental movement?
43:52Are you having success
43:53getting any groups to kind of adopt it?
43:56It's a really good question.
43:59And it has, it is taking time
44:01because interestingly,
44:04I think the concept of ecocide,
44:06you know, becoming a crime
44:07has been a bit,
44:08has been always felt to be a bit extreme,
44:11maybe even a bit kind of pie in the sky.
44:13You know, that that'll never happen.
44:15Lovely idea, but it'll never really happen.
44:18And I think at this point,
44:19I mean, I would just love to bring in
44:21the figure of Polly Higgins
44:23because I worked with her for many years.
44:25We were very, very close colleagues and friends.
44:27And I worked with her very closely until she died.
44:32And she's probably the name
44:34that's most strongly associated
44:36with this concept of ecocide.
44:37And, you know, she would get this kind of response
44:39all the time, you know,
44:41yes, lovely idea, it's never gonna happen.
44:43And often that would come from
44:45environmental organizations,
44:47and particularly perhaps the more established ones.
44:50But she was absolutely single-minded
44:53about this particular concept
44:55and this particular route to following it.
44:58And she kind of kept that flame alive, if you like,
45:01for all of that time.
45:02And just really, I mean,
45:05in the last week of her life
45:07was when the Extinction Rebellion in the UK
45:11was happening in London.
45:12So there was a big rebellion in April last year
45:15around Easter and Polly died on Easter day.
45:17But that was the first time that she saw
45:20that word ecocide and that,
45:22stop ecocide actually taken to the streets.
45:25And I would say, and I think,
45:27I'm not sure what Nimmo feels about this,
45:29but I would say that the grassroots pressure
45:32of public activism
45:35has actually been probably more instrumental
45:39in moving this forward
45:40than established environmental NGOs.
45:44And that's not to say that they're against it
45:46or that they're not coming on board
45:49because I think slowly that is starting to happen.
45:51But I think it's very interesting
45:53that the real push here came from the grassroots
45:58and the pressure of civil mobilization.
46:00And I think it's one of those things
46:01where if you ask the people,
46:06if you go to the people
46:07and you explain what ecocide means,
46:09I mean, I've yet to meet someone
46:11that says it's a bad idea.
46:13I mean, it's one of those kind of light bulb
46:17sort of moments for people often.
46:19And that's quite inspiring for us.
46:21When we're talking about it,
46:22we literally see the light come on in people's eyes.
46:25And they go, oh my God, yes.
46:26Imagine if we could criminalize that.
46:28That just makes total sense.
46:30It's a no brainer.
46:31Why hasn't it already happened?
46:33So I think, yeah, I mean,
46:34I would really credit the grassroots decisions.
46:37And I think when you look at what's happened in France,
46:41you can really see that it's almost like a pilot scheme
46:44for how this could go in the sense that Macron
46:48started talking about ecocide last year.
46:50He referred to the deforestation in the Amazon as ecocide.
46:55But twice, the government refused to talk about it
47:00at the governmental level.
47:02However, when they brought together
47:04a citizen's climate assembly,
47:05which they did in response to the whole situation
47:08with the gilets jaunes,
47:09where the French government had introduced a tax on fuel
47:12and it was very, very unpopular.
47:13There were lots of protests
47:14and it was intended to be a climate measure.
47:17And so the government said,
47:18well, okay, you don't like our climate measures.
47:20What would you put in place as a policy?
47:23And the top policy they came back with
47:25was criminalize ecocide.
47:27So I think, it's like,
47:29I find it very encouraging and heartening actually
47:31that at the level of ordinary people,
47:36just having this conversation
47:37and expanding this conversation
47:39is actually quite obviously making the difference
47:42at the political pressure level.
47:44Nemo, from your perspective, go ahead, yeah.
47:47Yeah, just to add on to that,
47:48on the issue of the established
47:51non-governmental organizations,
47:53I think many of social,
47:55there are social organizations that behave
47:57just like transnational corporations,
47:59that are totally disconnected from grassroots,
48:02from reality on the ground,
48:03and they're working for corporate interests, unfortunately.
48:06And they are totally
48:10kind of creating harm for communities
48:13and for environments
48:14in the name of protect and conserve the environment.
48:18And many of the laws,
48:21many of the policies that have been made in nations
48:25and in multilateral spaces
48:27are also greenwashed by this kind of organization.
48:32So we really, I mean, the challenge that some,
48:35not all, some that are good, of course,
48:37are the established grassroots-based organization,
48:39big ones in the world
48:41that are doing quite good, very good job.
48:43But there are others who are really on the other side
48:46and creating more problems in the name of environmentalism.
48:51Jojo, I wonder if you could just finish up
48:53pointing us to your website.
48:54And I think there's also a way
48:57that individuals can sign up.
48:59And I actually went on the website yesterday
49:01and stuck my name in there.
49:02So tell us what people can do to learn more,
49:04where can they go to learn more
49:05and how can they stick their name in
49:07and get on the email list?
49:08And I got on the email list
49:10and I've already gotten emails.
49:11Which is pretty cool.
49:13Fantastic, I'm delighted to hear it.
49:15So our website is stopecocide.earth.
49:20And we have, I mean,
49:21there's a lot of information on that site,
49:23but there's a lot of,
49:23there's a whole list of actions
49:25that you can take quite quickly or immediately,
49:28even when it comes to just signing up.
49:29We have an international petition,
49:31which is a kind of ongoing petition
49:33in the sense that we want to show
49:34the accumulating support for this.
49:37And then if you go a step further,
49:38you can actually become a kind of subscribed member
49:40if you like to our organisation.
49:42And we call our paid up members Earth Protectors.
49:45So you can become an Earth Protector
49:47by gifting into the fund.
49:49And the funds that we get through those signups,
49:52they go directly towards the strategic work
49:54legally and diplomatically,
49:56taking this forward at the international level.
49:58So there's some very obvious ways of joining in
50:01and finding more information.
50:03But I would also say that whatever arena you work in
50:07and whatever your network is,
50:09it's very important to have the conversation,
50:11talk about it, use the word ecocide
50:13because it's very, very powerful.
50:15And the more different arenas
50:16and the more different NGOs
50:18and the more different networks
50:20are using this word and communicating about it,
50:23the more that word is becoming a mosquito
50:26in the ears of the politicians.
50:28And that is really important.
50:29Thank you very much.
50:31I could sit here and talk to you both all day long.
50:34This has been just music to my ears.
50:37And as I mentioned this story at the beginning,
50:40when Nemo said ecocide, it got burnished in my brain.
50:44And I think anybody who's watching this
50:46will probably also feel,
50:48I think it's bigger than a mosquito.
50:50I think it kind of gets stuck up here
50:51and that's probably a good thing.
50:53So thank you both for being on the show today.
50:57Thank you so much.
50:59And again, I'm Gary Wachner.
51:01You're watching Overcoming Overshoot
51:04here on EarthX TV.