Abstract
The world faces a complex interaction of environmental threats and challenges to human development. Yet as we face this daunting future, it seems that we lack theories capable of providing sufficient guidance. This thesis suggests a potential solution; I propose that Martha Nussbaum’s highly influential capabilities approach to development may be able to provide a consolidated framework that promotes human flourishing on the one hand, and holistic environmental protection on the other. Nussbaum’s capabilities approach (NCA) proposes a list of ten central human capabilities that are intended to capture the conditions needed to ensure that people are able to lead flourishing lives. I focus primarily on the eighth capability, Other Species, which refers to being able to live with concern for and in relation to the world of nature. I suggest that NCA, once amended and appropriately interpreted, and as a result of the inclusion of the OSC, involves a way to value nature that necessitates environmental protection in a way preferential to both economic assessments and nonanthropocentric positions. Defending this suggestion requires a number of independent arguments, which take place across my four articles. I claim, firstly, that NCA can be plausibly understood as valuing nature extrinsically but as an end, even though it is often assumed in the literature to value the environment instrumentally. I argue that the OSC is most appropriately understood as valuing nature as an end by drawing on Christine Korsgaard’s work on the distinctions in value. In my second article, I interrogate NCA and show that it does not include the OSC in a way that ensures that governments will have sufficient guidance as to how it should be enabled. I consequently suggest ways in which NCA be revised to remedy this, namely by recommending a proviso be added to the OSC as its included on the list of central capabilities.
Ph.D. (Philosophy)