Presentation Information
[i4CY8toL-02]Reconsidering the Significance of Planetary Health from a Human Rights Perspective
*Kenta MINAMITANI1 (1. Attorney at Mori Hamada & Matsumoto / Visiting Lecturer, Department of Public Health, Yokohama City University School of Medicine (Japan))
Keywords:
Human Rights
This presentation examines planetary health as a matter of law and justice, drawing on the presenter's dual background in law and public health.
The right to health, enshrined in the WHO Constitution (1946) and the ICESCR (Article 12, 1966), has become increasingly intertwined with environmental rights. UN General Assembly Resolution 76/300 (2022) recognized the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment as a universal human right, and the ICJ's Advisory Opinion of July 2025 explicitly linked environmental degradation to a broad range of human rights, including health. Planetary health, by providing scientific evidence of the interdependence between Earth systems and human well-being, offers a crucial empirical foundation for this legal nexus.
Japan's legal landscape, however, is different from this international situation. Neither environmental rights nor the right to health is guaranteed under the Japanese Constitution, and courts have addressed environmental harms through the lens of personality rights (jinkaku-ken). To date, no Japanese court has recognized climate-related health harms as a violation of jinkaku-ken. Planetary health holds transformative potential here: by reframing environmental issues as personal/community health concerns, it can provide the evidence-based foundation needed to advance climate justice advocacy and integrate environmental and health policy in Japan.
Finally, the business and human rights dimension is critical. The UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs, 2011) and Japan's 2022 Human Rights Due Diligence Guidelines provide a framework through which planetary health can be embedded in corporate accountability. Connecting planetary health to human rights due diligence can drive the mainstreaming of climate and biodiversity risks as human rights issues within business practice.
The right to health, enshrined in the WHO Constitution (1946) and the ICESCR (Article 12, 1966), has become increasingly intertwined with environmental rights. UN General Assembly Resolution 76/300 (2022) recognized the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment as a universal human right, and the ICJ's Advisory Opinion of July 2025 explicitly linked environmental degradation to a broad range of human rights, including health. Planetary health, by providing scientific evidence of the interdependence between Earth systems and human well-being, offers a crucial empirical foundation for this legal nexus.
Japan's legal landscape, however, is different from this international situation. Neither environmental rights nor the right to health is guaranteed under the Japanese Constitution, and courts have addressed environmental harms through the lens of personality rights (jinkaku-ken). To date, no Japanese court has recognized climate-related health harms as a violation of jinkaku-ken. Planetary health holds transformative potential here: by reframing environmental issues as personal/community health concerns, it can provide the evidence-based foundation needed to advance climate justice advocacy and integrate environmental and health policy in Japan.
Finally, the business and human rights dimension is critical. The UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs, 2011) and Japan's 2022 Human Rights Due Diligence Guidelines provide a framework through which planetary health can be embedded in corporate accountability. Connecting planetary health to human rights due diligence can drive the mainstreaming of climate and biodiversity risks as human rights issues within business practice.
Comment
To browse or post comments, you must log in.Log in