The ultimate global commons

The Ocean is the ultimate global commons. Life originated on earth because it has the Ocean: water in liquid state on its surface. Although curiosity has pushed humankind to search for life in outer space, there is still no other planet with life in the known universe.

Life on earth originated in the margins of the primordial ocean and for millions of years evolved in this aquatic milieu. To be certain, the Ocean is a thin[1] layer of fluid that plays an essential role in making the planet livable. The ocean is the ultimate global commons because it provides essential ecological services to all humankind, making life possible on our planet. One example: marine plants produce annually 36 billion tons of oxygen, equal to 70 per cent of the oxygen in the atmosphere. I cannot think of a more fundamental reason to assert that every form of life on the earth has a stake on the health of the ocean. In particular, all human beings have a stake in the ocean and we are responsible for its health.

Once I was explaining that due to the nature of fluids, the Ocean should be considered to be one, singular: one Ocean.  The statement created a strong reaction from part of the audience, many of them lawyers[2], who immediately challenged the unity of the ocean concept and argued in favor of maritime spaces subject to dominant national interest, reflecting the vision of the ocean as open to the competition and dominion of nations, i.e. a territorial space.

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[1] On average the radius of the planet is 6371 kilometers, the ocean on average is 3733 meters deep, i.e. a thickness of 0.058 % or 6 ten thousands of the radius. The Ocean is to the earth thinner than the skin to an apple.

[2] Half of the lawyers in this world are trained within the Roman legal tradition, the other half under consuetudinary law. The commons is a concept that emerges naturally and is harmonious within consuetudinary law but it doesn’t fit easily in the roman tradition where it becomes public good or public space.