Fair and Equitable Benefit-sharing in International Law

Abstract

Fair and equitable benefit-sharing is a diffuse legal phenomenon in international law that remains perplexing with regard to its general nature, extent, content, and implications. The continued proliferation of benefit-sharing clauses in international law can in effect be explained by its intuitive appeal as an optimistic frame. In principle, it serves to recognize, encourage, and reward in innovative ways sustainable human relations with the environment, by focusing on equity issues arising from the most intractable challenges of our time (biodiversity loss, climate change, poverty, global epidemics). Empirical evidence, however, indicates that in practice benefit-sharing rarely achieves its stated fairness and equity objectives, and actually ends up entrenching or worsening inequitable relationships, with little or no benefit for the environment. Instead of focusing on fair and equitable benefit-sharing in specific areas of international law separately, this book assesses the phenomenon both from a general international law perspective and through a comparative analysis across international environmental law, international human rights law, international health law, and the law of the sea. This analysis reveals an opportunity to advance the interpretation and practice of fairness and equity in benefit-sharing through a mutually supportive interpretation of international biodiversity law and international human rights law.