TROUBLED WATERS - Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society

14 Legal precedents for whaleprotectionKitty Block, Special Counsel to the UN & Treaties Dept., The Humane Society of the UnitedStates (HSUS), Washington D.C., US.Sue Fisher, US Director, WDCS US, P.O. Box 820064, Portland 97282 – 1064,Oregon, US.“Recent history indicates that man’s impact upon marine mammals has ranged from whatmight be termed malign neglect to virtual genocide. These animals including whales,porpoises, seals, sea otters, polar bears, manatees and others, have not only rarely benefitedfrom our interest; they have been shot, blown up, clubbed to death, run down by boats,poisoned and exposed to a multitude of other indignities, all in the interest of profit orrecreation, with little or no consideration of the potential impact of these activities on theanimal populations involved” (US Congress 1971).IntroductionThis powerful testimony presaged both the birth of the ‘save the whale’ movement and a call by theUnited Nations Conference on the Human Environment for the International Whaling Commission(IWC) to consider adopting a ten-year moratorium on all commercial whaling 1 . Although the IWCtook fifteen more years to agree a moratorium on the commercial slaughter of whales, the number ofnational, regional and international agreements concerning whales has increased significantly sincethe early 1970s, and continues to grow.LEGAL PRECEDENTS FOR WHALE PROTECTION111The laws that were first enacted in the 1970s and 1980s tended to focus primarily on cetaceanconservation, not welfare, and were mainly directed at trying to regulate the exploitation of whales.However, in the last 30 years, civil society has shown a growing concern for the protection of animalsin general, and for cetaceans in particular. As a result of this movement, which has gained evengreater momentum in the last 15 years, the science of animal welfare has developed into a majordiscipline, and national, regional and international animal protection legislation has been enacted.Space does not permit a review of the evolution of animal protection legislation in general, althoughsuch reviews exist (Ritvo 1987, The Animal Welfare Institute 1990, Wise 2003). This chapter brieflyconsiders some national, regional and international developments relating to cetaceans that areconsistent and concurrent with this trend, and summarises the various regional and internationalagreements that specifically address the treatment of cetaceans. It argues that emerging customary lawmay modify these agreements over time to incorporate even greater protection measures for cetaceansin the future.