Beyond externalities : human rights as a foundation of entitlements over energy resources

The question of human rights and energy has been traditionally framed as an analysis of limitations on energy transactions arising from substantive and procedural human rights. Whereas the negative externality framing of human rights sets safeguards against the adverse effects of energy transactions and thereby restrains how such transactions are conducted, it overlooks a more fundamental dimension, the conferral of entitlements. Indeed, human rights define entitlements over energy resources, setting competing claims that limit not only how energy transactions are conducted but also the very power to conduct them in the first place. The entitlement dimension of human rights also unveils a wider question, namely the competing claims of a variety of collective subjects against the entitlement of the territorial or coastal States. In other words, such reframing opposes two logics of international law, each based on a different conception of the source from which entitlements flow. This article investigates the externality-avoidance and entitlement function of human rights in the context of international energy transactions. It reviews the most relevant judicial and quasi-judicial practice at the international level to illustrate the implications of framing the function of human rights from one or the other perspective.