Humans, Animals and the International Legal Order: Towards an Integrated Perspective on Bioethics

Wednesday 7th November, 16:15 - 18:00. CL202, Collins Building, University of Strathclyde

This event is free but please register at Eventbrite.

Description

From the time of its emergence, the modern international legal order has tended to evolve desultorily and reactively to political events, and without sufficient regarding to any underlying philosophical principles or informing corpus of scientific knowledge. Insofar as it rests upon any intellectual foundations at all, these are essentially the speculations and assumptions of the 18th Century European Enlightenment, which, despite their manifest inadequacies, have never been seriously re-examined. Accordingly, while the public international legal system contains numerous rules and principles designed for the protection of both humans and other life-forms, and at the individual and the collective levels alike, there is very little sign of coherence, coordination or due comparative cogency amongst them, resulting in a legal order which is fragmented and insufficiently effective - indeed, in certain respects positively counter-productive. Yet, through a scientifically and philosophically informed examination of these rules, and of the values that appear to underpin them - above all, the concept of dignity - it should now be possible to initiate the development of a truly cogent and convincing bioethical foundation and framework for protection, in more faithful reflection of the qualities of rationality and conscience that we humans have always claimed to possess.

Michael Bowman

Michael Bowman is an associate professor at the University of Nottingham. His principal teaching and research interests lie in the field of public international law, particularly international environmental law, the law of treaties and the practice of treaty-making. He is Rapporteur of the International Environmental Law Committee of the British Branch of the International Law Association and has undertaken extensive committee and consultancy work in the fields of animal welfare and environmental protection and has recently published substantial articles on the topics of wetland conservation, the protection of birds and the animal welfare dimension of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species.