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OCR
124 | Tue PuicosoPuy or Eco-Pozrrics of the ecological worldview: the connections between peoples, generations and species. Neither the terrible crimes committed against alien civilisations and the inhabitants of distant lands, nor extreme inequality among nations is a new phenomenon. The novelty in the Age of the Enlightenment was that the need for justice was even raised in regard to these relations. Today we must face the fact that there are neither alien civilisations, nor distant lands. ‘This is what we call global interdependence or simply globalisation. But closer and more intensive contact between the continents has not dispelled the differences, but rather deepened them and raised them to a conscious level. It is hard to imagine handling the global ecological crisis without the collaboration of the nations and for this an agreement on the principles of fair cooperation is indispensable. At first sight, it seems that the universal recognition of human rights provides a sufficient basis for this, since by now it has become a legitimate point of reference in the area of international relations, even if they are ignored in open conflicts. Since these principles have been declared, the white man has exterminated whole races of native peoples who stood in the way of his expansion. But even here the principle of equality makes its benign effects felt: cutting edge technology is available worldwide. With it, the dictators and warlords of the “developing” countries can murder each other’s subjects or even their own peoples en masse. The question of global justice usually arises, however, in relation to the “peaceful” relations that connect rich and poor countries, whether it is in regards to the advantages and disadvantages of the free trade system, the distribution of the burdens of environmental pollution or global migration. ‘The latter, the new migration, is without a doubt one of the gravest political and ethical problems of our age. It is indisputably connected with the symptoms of the crisis of the current world order. It poses the basic questions of global justice in an acute form. Firstly, as to whether the demands of justice can be interpreted on a global scale. If yes, in what must we share with the needy of the world? Do we bear responsibility for the good or ill fortune of distant peoples? Can the abstract principle of a brotherhood extending to the whole of humanity be reconciled with the just defence of the interests of one’s own community? The causes of mass migration: — the misery of the losers of the postcolonial system known as free trade;
