No-harm rule
Also called: Duty not to cause transboundary harm · Topic: Climate Change: Causes, Evidence and the Global Response · NCERT: Beyond NCERT
Meaning
The no-harm rule is a principle of international environmental law. It says a state must not allow activities on its land to cause significant damage to the environment of other states, or of areas that belong to no one, such as the high seas. The damage is called transboundary harm, which means harm that crosses a national border, like smoke, polluted river water or poisonous gases. The rule makes each state responsible for preventing such harm. It does not stop a state from using its own resources. It appears in the Stockholm Declaration (1972) and was repeated at the Rio Earth Summit (1992). It matters for climate justice because it lets a country argue that harm from another country's greenhouse gas emissions should be stopped or paid for.
Example
The Trail Smelter case is the classic example. Sulphur dioxide fumes from a metal smelter at Trail, British Columbia, in Canada blew south across the border and damaged farms and forests in Washington State, USA. In 1941 a tribunal ruled that no state may use its territory in a way that seriously harms another state. Canada had to pay compensation and control the fumes.
Don't confuse with
- Polluter pays principle: this decides who pays for pollution, which is the polluter, whether a factory or a person, and usually inside one country. The no-harm rule is a duty between states to prevent harm from crossing borders in the first place.