Contemporary issue: the role of the law in relation to global threats to the environment: HSC Legal Studies

What this dot point is asking

The role of the law in relation to global threats to the environment is the first of the four contemporary issues that must be studied in the Global Environmental Protection option. You must identify and investigate the issue and evaluate the effectiveness of legal and non-legal responses.

A global threat is one that affects the whole planet or the global commons and cannot be solved by one state: climate change, depletion of the ozone layer, loss of biodiversity, pollution and degradation of the oceans, and deforestation. The question is what the law does about each threat, and how well. The strongest answers compare threats: the law's clear success against ozone depletion shows what conditions make law effective, and its weaker record on climate change and plastics shows what happens when those conditions are missing.

The answer

Identifying the issue

Global threats share features that make them hard for law:

• Scale. They affect every state, and the harm often falls hardest on those who contributed least.
• Scientific complexity. They involve long time lags and uncertainty, so precaution is needed (see ESD).
• Economic entanglement. Climate change is driven by the energy system on which economies depend; biodiversity loss by land clearing, agriculture and resource extraction.
• Sovereignty. No world government can impose rules; every response must be negotiated between states (see sovereignty and the UN).

Climate change

The threat. The WMO reported that 2024 was the warmest year on record and 2025 about 1.44°C above the 1850 to 1900 average. The IPCC's Sixth Assessment Report (2021 to 2023) found it "unequivocal" that human influence has warmed the planet. Impacts include sea-level rise threatening low-lying Pacific states, more intense heatwaves, bushfires and floods, and mass coral bleaching: the Great Barrier Reef suffered mass bleaching in 2024 and 2025.

Legal responses.

• The UNFCCC (1992) set the objective of stabilising greenhouse gas concentrations to prevent dangerous interference with the climate system, and the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities.
• The Kyoto Protocol (1997, in force 2005) set binding targets for developed countries only. It lost major emitters and covered a shrinking share of global emissions.
• The Paris Agreement (2015) binds all parties to prepare, communicate and maintain NDCs, with the goal of well below 2°C and pursuing 1.5°C, a five-yearly global stocktake and a transparency framework. It has 194 parties.
• COP decisions have tightened expectations: the Glasgow Climate Pact (2021) named coal for the first time; the first global stocktake at COP28 (2023) called for "transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems" and tripling renewable capacity by 2030; COP29 (2024) set a finance goal of at least USD 300 billion a year by 2035; COP30 (2025) called for tripling adaptation finance by 2035 but left a fossil fuel roadmap out of its formal decision.
• Courts. The ICJ advisory opinion (23 July 2025) unanimously confirmed binding treaty and customary obligations and said fossil fuel production, licences and subsidies may be internationally wrongful acts. Domestic courts have ordered stronger action (Urgenda, 2019) or found human rights violations (KlimaSeniorinnen, 2024).
• Domestic law. Australia's Climate Change Act 2022 (Cth) legislates 43 per cent by 2030 and net zero by 2050, with a 2035 target of 62 to 70 per cent set in 2025 (see Australia's responses).

Effectiveness. The framework is comprehensive and participation near-universal, and emissions projections have fallen since Paris. But the UNEP Emissions Gap Report 2025 projected 2.3 to 2.5°C with full implementation of NDCs, far above the Paris goal; COP30 resolved to limit the magnitude and duration of any temperature overshoot beyond 1.5°C; and the United States left Paris on 27 January 2026 and will leave the UNFCCC on 27 February 2027.

Ozone depletion: the success story

The threat. Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and other chemicals used in refrigeration, aerosols and fire extinguishers destroy stratospheric ozone, which shields life from ultraviolet radiation. The Antarctic ozone hole was reported in 1985.

Legal responses. The Vienna Convention for the Protection of the Ozone Layer (1985) was a framework; the Montreal Protocol (1987) set binding phase-out schedules. Its design is why it worked:

• Clear science and substitutes. The problem was well defined and alternatives existed.
• Differentiated obligations and money. Developing countries had longer timetables, and the Multilateral Fund (1990) paid their compliance costs.
• Trade measures. Parties restricted trade in controlled substances with non-parties, giving every state a reason to join.
• Adjustment. Schedules have been tightened as the science developed. The Kigali Amendment (2016) added HFCs, which are ozone-safe but powerful greenhouse gases, making Montreal a climate treaty as well.
• Domestic implementation. In Australia, the Ozone Protection and Synthetic Greenhouse Gas Management Act 1989 (Cth) controls imports and use.

Effectiveness. The Protocol is universally ratified and has phased out nearly all ozone-depleting substances. The 2022 Scientific Assessment (released January 2023) found the ozone layer on track to recover to 1980 levels by about 2066 over Antarctica. It shows that international law can solve a global threat when the conditions are right.

Biodiversity loss

The threat

The IPBES Global Assessment (2019) found around 1 million species threatened with extinction, driven by land and sea use change, direct exploitation, climate change, pollution and invasive species.

Legal responses

CITES (1973) controls trade in endangered species through permits; the Convention on Biological Diversity (1992) commits parties to conservation, sustainable use and benefit-sharing; the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (2022) sets 23 targets for 2030, including 30 by 30; the Ramsar and World Heritage conventions protect particular places. In Australia the EPBC Act and the Biodiversity Conservation Act 2016 (NSW) protect listed species.

Effectiveness

Protected areas have expanded and trade controls have helped some species, but the Aichi targets for 2020 were not fully met at a global level, the United States is not a party to the CBD, and the framework's targets are not individually binding on states. Australia's State of the Environment 2021 found the environment "poor and deteriorating".

The oceans

The threat

Warming, acidification, overfishing, and pollution from ships, land run-off and plastics.

Legal responses

UNCLOS (1982) requires states to protect and preserve the marine environment (Part XII); MARPOL controls pollution from ships; ITLOS advised in May 2024 that greenhouse gas emissions are marine pollution under UNCLOS; the High Seas Treaty (BBNJ Agreement) entered into force on 17 January 2026, allowing marine protected areas on the high seas for the first time. Australia ratified it on 23 September 2026.

Plastics

In March 2022 the UN Environment Assembly (resolution 5/14) agreed to negotiate a legally binding treaty to end plastic pollution. After five sessions, the resumed talks in Geneva in August 2025 ended without agreement, mainly because oil-producing states opposed limits on plastic production. A new chair was elected in February 2026. This is a clear example of consensus allowing a minority of states to block a response.

Deforestation

Forests store carbon and hold most land-based biodiversity. There is no binding global forest treaty: the 1992 Forest Principles and the Glasgow Leaders' Declaration on Forests and Land Use (2021), in which more than 140 countries pledged to halt and reverse forest loss by 2030, are soft law. Progress depends on domestic law and enforcement, as in Brazil, which hosted COP30 in the Amazon city of Belém in 2025.

Non-legal responses

• Science. The IPCC, IPBES and the WMO provide the evidence on which law is built; the ozone and climate regimes both began with scientific alarm.
• NGOs. Greenpeace, WWF and local groups campaign, monitor and litigate; the Climate Action Tracker rates national targets.
• Youth movements. The school strikes from 2018 and Pacific Islands Students Fighting Climate Change, whose campaign led to the ICJ advisory opinion.
• Media. Coverage of bleaching on the Great Barrier Reef, bushfires and floods, and documentaries such as Blue Planet II (2017) changed public attitudes.
• Business and finance. Corporate net zero pledges and investor pressure, with mandatory climate-related financial disclosure for large Australian companies from 2025. Critics warn of greenwashing.

Evaluating legal and non-legal responses

Judgement. The law plays an essential but uneven role in relation to global threats. Where the threat is well defined, the cost of action is manageable and compliance is supported with finance and trade measures, international law has succeeded, as the recovery of the ozone layer shows. Where the threat is embedded in national economies and protected by sovereignty, as with climate change, biodiversity loss and plastics, the law has created frameworks and clarified obligations (most authoritatively in the 2025 ICJ opinion) but has not yet delivered outcomes that match the scale of the threat. Non-legal responses have been decisive in creating pressure for law, but they cannot replace enforceable obligations.

In one sentence

The law's role against global threats is to set shared goals, bind states and fund compliance, and it has worked for the ozone layer through the Montreal Protocol, but against climate change, biodiversity loss and plastic pollution it has built frameworks and clarified duties without yet changing outcomes enough, because states set their own targets and can block or leave agreements.

Try this

Q1. Identify TWO global threats to the environment and ONE legal response to each. (4 marks)

• What the marker wants. For example, climate change and the Paris Agreement; ozone depletion and the Montreal Protocol.

Q2. Explain the role of the Paris Agreement in responding to climate change. (6 marks)

• What the marker wants. Goals, NDCs, transparency and stocktake, participation, and limits (self-set targets, US exit, emissions gap).

Q3. To what extent has the law been effective in responding to global threats to the environment? (15 marks)

• What the marker wants. A clear judgement comparing at least two threats (ozone as success; climate or biodiversity as limited), with international and domestic evidence and non-legal responses.