Ocean acidification (OA) is a paradigm case of an encroaching long-term environmental problem that is mainly caused by CO2-emissions and will have diverse and often uncertain impacts on marine organisms and ecosystems. SDG 14 (‘Life below water’) demands to halt or slow down OA. Since occurrence of OA is remote to our daily terrestrial life, it has not been in the focus of moral attention so far. This chapter emerged from the BIOACID research programme at Kiel University. It examines five sources of normativity in environmental ethics, addresses problems of uncertainty and framing, and interprets the metaphor of ‘ocean health’ with recurrence to an updated version of Aldo Leopold’s principle. The chapter argues that basic non-anthropocentric approaches, such as biocentrism, ecocentrism, and holism, face severe problems with respect to marine environments and can’t serve as solid groundings for an ocean ethics. The chapter proposes that a deep anthropocentric environmental ethics can provide an appropriate grounding for ambitious marine stewardship policies, including ocean acidification. Finally, the chapter proposes to define a critical threshold for OA which should not be passed.
22.1 Introduction
This chapter addresses ocean acidification (OA) from an environmental ethics perspective. Ocean acidification is seen as a paradigm case for post-normal science. At its core, the chapter adopts and substantiates several ethical building blocks from a discourse-pragmatic approach, as (a) common heritage of humankind, (b) strong sustainability, (c) Aldo Leopold’s principle, and (d) ecosystem services, with a special eye on cultural services. The idea to attribute inherent moral value to marine organisms and ecological systems is seen critically.
This chapter emerged from the research programme BIOACID (Biological Impacts of Ocean Acidification) being conducted at Kiel University. Within the final period of the BIOACID research programme, a work package on environmental ethics was included to address the underlying normative issues. This project resulted in a monograph: Frederike Böhm and Konrad Ott, Impacts of Ocean Acidification: An Analysis from an Environmental Ethics Perspective (Böhm & Ott, 2019).1 The following chapter presents the essential lines of reasoning of this book and adds new thoughts. It is organized as follows: Section 22.2 gives a brief overview of the scientific dimension. Section 22.3 presents a post-normal-science framing of OA. Section 22.4 deals with interrelated sources of normativity which stem from environmental ethics. Section 22.5 addresses the problem of defining a planetary boundary for OA.
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Ott K., 2026. Chapter 22 – Environmental ethics and the case of ocean acidification. Part VIII – Ocean Acidification. In: Meisch S. P. & Schmidt J. J. (Eds.), Ethics and Planetary Boundaries, pp 217-232. Cambridge University Press. Chapter.
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