The Environmental Othering of Outer Space under International Law

Outer space is critical to our daily lives in countless invisible ways - but space is not protected by the same environmental rules that applies on Earth. Space lawyers tend to conclude that space is not part of 'the environment', based on a common interpretation of the four core space treaties, especially Article IX of the Outer Space Treaty. This legal conclusion rests upon certain

historical presumptions that are rarely considered in their own right. By assessing environmental law in space by reference to history, this thesis will explicate these presumptions, reassessing the environmental status of space from the ground up.