The Morality of Divestment

Dados Bibliográficos

ID6090458
AutoresJeremy Mo (0000-0002-3496-7928, autor correspondente), Jeremy Moss
Ano2017
Volume39
Fascículo4
Páginas412-428
Data de publicação2017-10-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoLaw & Policy (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0265-8240 • E-ISSN: 1467-9930
EditoraWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/lapo.12088
OpenAlexW2743180029
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas3
Referências citadas23

Divestment from companies that produce or heavily utilize fossil fuels has become one of the biggest issues in the contemporary moral debate surrounding climate change. Universities and other institutions are being asked to divest themselves of their fossil fuel–related investments. In this article I argue that, while the case for divestment is morally strong, not all of the arguments used to support divestment are equally strong. Moreover, which of these arguments is employed matters a great deal for the strength of the conclusions regarding divestment. There are two major groups of arguments: what I call positive arguments for divestment, which stem from the claim that divestment is a response to general duties to take action to prevent dangerous climate change, and what I call negative arguments, which stem from a duty not to cause harm. In this article I will briefly characterize what divestment means and to whom it applies. I will then look at negative and positive duty accounts of the duty to divest before looking at the standard objections to both. Objections have tended to cohere around the claims that divesting is inconsistent, useless and/or harmful, or should be abandoned for better options to avoid dangerous climate change

Business · Climate change · Divestment · Duty · Economics · Harm · Law and economics · Morality · Political economy · Political science · Positive economics · Climate Change and Geoengineering · Climate Change Policy and Economics · Law · Space Science and Extraterrestrial Life · Ecology