| Preface | |
| Acknowledgments | |
| Ch. I | Diagnosis: The Earth Has Cancer, and the Cancer Is Man | 3 |
| In the Doctor's Judgment | 3 |
| Diagnosis at Rio | 5 |
| A Second, Less Foreboding Opinion | 18 |
| Prognosis: Social Choice in the Face of Uncertainty | 26 |
| Ch. II | The Condition of the Earth from the Legal Perspective | 33 |
| Astronaut and Diplomat | 33 |
| A Nation's Abuse of Its Own Environment | 37 |
| Ch. III | Transboundary Pollution | 50 |
| The Preventive Techniques | 52 |
| The Reactive Techniques | 57 |
| Consensual Transboundary Pollution | 66 |
| Ch. IV | Managing the Global Commons | 71 |
| A Nation's "Internal" Activities Damaging the Commons | 72 |
| A Nation's Activities on the Commons Damaging the Commons | 88 |
| A Nation's Activities on the Commons Damaging Another Nation | 94 |
| Ch. V | Treaties as Antidotes | 96 |
| The Virtues of a Treaty-Based Approach | 96 |
| The Impediments to Treaty Formation | 98 |
| Under What Circumstances are International Negotiations Likely to Succeed? | 116 |
| Ch. VI | The Economist's Prescriptions: Taxes and Tradable Permits | 122 |
| The Economic Ideal | 123 |
| Institutionalizing the Economic Ideal | 129 |
| Pro Rata Cutbacks | 132 |
| Effluent Taxes | 134 |
| Tradable Emissions Permits | 141 |
| Ch. VII | Medicating the Earth: Preventatives and Remedies | 153 |
| Need Our Responses Be Fully Global? | 154 |
| Is Prevention Better than Cure? | 159 |
| The Deferred, Go-It-Alone Policy as a Second-Best Strategy | 160 |
| A Review of the Home-Grown Remedies | 162 |
| The New Generation of Legislation | 174 |
| Ch. VIII | Taking Out Calamity Insurance | 182 |
| The Application of Conventional Insurance to Climate Change | 187 |
| Modes of Government Participation | 192 |
| The International Precedents and Prospects | 197 |
| Alternative "Insurance" | 198 |
| Ch. IX | Paying the Bills: Toward a Global Commons Trust Fund | 201 |
| The Global Financing Options | 203 |
| The Global Commons Trust Fund | 208 |
| Financing Options in the Light of Domestic Policy Alternatives | 220 |
| The Virtues and Vices of Global Funds: The Donors versus the "Democrats" | 226 |
| Ch. X | The Spiritual and Moral Dimensions of the Environmental Crisis: Of Humankind and Gnats | 235 |
| The Spiritual Roots of the Environmental Crisis | 235 |
| The Moral Dimensions | 242 |
| What Does an Environmental Ethic Aim For? | 268 |
| The Arguments against an Environmental Ethic | 271 |
| The Burdens an Environmental Ethic Faces | 276 |
| One Further Level of Abstraction: The Metaphysical Underpinnings | 278 |
| Notes | 281 |
| Index to Topics and Institutions | 331 |
| Index to Authors | 337 |
| Index to Conventions | 340 |
| Index to Legal Cases | 341 |
