The millennium development goals (MDG's) and national and international policy reform : realising the right to a healthy environment in Africa

摘要

Africa is a continent characterised by deepening environmental degradation andudincreasing loss of natural resources. This has had an adverse effect on human healthudand well-being in the region. Environmental degradation has also made it impossibleudfor average Africans to enjoy the human right to environment guaranteed under theudcontinent-wide African Charter, and the constitutions and laws of most Africanudnations. Several factors are responsible for perpetuating this state of affairs, namelyudpoverty, lack of political will to enforce or adopt environmental regulations, and weakudinstitutional capacity. An opportunity to reverse this trend has been offered by theudadoption of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by all United Nationsudmember States in 2000. The MDGs are eight developmental goals with time-boundudtargets. However, the MDGs are not legally binding despite their global adoption.udDespite this inherent legal weakness, the MDGs still have important normative valueudas they provided a framework for holding governments accountable to theirudmillennium anti-poverty commitments vis-à-vis instituting sound socio-economicudreform and strengthening good governance.udThis thesis proposes that the role of the MDGs in guiding or stimulating national andudinternational policy reform towards the realisation of the right to environment inudAfrica is, as a framework of accountability, they can be used to promote goodudgovernance and socio-economic reform, two ingredients that are essential to creatingudthe enabling environment for implementing the right to environment in Africa. Thisudthesis is therefore an in-depth analysis of this role. The purpose of this analysis is sixfold.udFirst, to provide an overview of the concepts as well as the researchudmethodology used in this study; second, to determine whether there is an establishedudhuman right to environment in Africa; third, to analyse the extent to which the rightudhas been realised as well as the factors responsible for the non-realisation; fourth, touddiscuss the relationship between the achievement of the MDGs and realisation of theudright in Africa; fifth, to analyse how the MDGs can guide or stimulate policy reformudtowards the realisation of the right; and sixth, to analyse the major policies adoptedudfor the achievement of the MDGs in Africa to ascertain how they would contribute toudthe realisation of the right to environment in the region.