6. A Lockean approach to justice for food security under global climate change

Abstract

This paper argues that the Lockean proviso can be utilised as a relevant principle of justice for food security under global climate change. Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions directly or indirectly affect food systems. There can be no doubt that GHG emissions ought to be reduced to enhance food security. This would seem to suggest a global food security scheme that apportions GHG emission quotas among all states. To consider such a global scheme for dealing with GHG emissions relating to food systems, it is important to provide a principle of justice for food security under global climate change. A relevant principle of justice applying to the scheme must be one that provides for food systems to meet the basic needs of the global population. Furthermore, the principle of justice should incorporate the value of fairness. In this context: (1) the parties concerned under the global food security scheme are states; (2) as part of the ideal of justice, fairness does not undermine the requirement that the basic needs of all people must be met; when determining the fair burdens, a fair allocation of GHG emission quotas should be sensitive to (3) each state’s responsibility for its (past) GHG emissions and (4) its (potential) effort to reduce the emissions in practice. Given these pointers, the Lockean proviso – or, more precisely, its egalitarian version – is a relevant principle of food security justice under global climate change in four corresponding respects. Firstly, the Lockean proviso can provide legitimate normative guidance for each state. Secondly, the Lockean proviso suggests that a state has: (1) a right to a food system that secures its citizens basic needs; and (2) a duty to promote the basic needs of other people. Thirdly, the Lockean proviso can be deployed not only as a principle of global justice, but also as a principle of intergenerational justice in the context of global climate change. Finally, the Lockean proviso enables us to count the reduction of GHG emissions by each state as ‘the fruits of its labours’: this reduction in financial burdens imposed on people can be regarded as ‘savings.’ Specifically, a state’s financial burden for supporting the global food security scheme, determined by its required contribution to the restitution, is mitigated by the corresponding value that the reduction achieves. These points demonstrate that the Lockean proviso is not merely an ideal of justice for food security under global climate change, but offers tangible benefits as well.