Intergenerational Justice in Exploitation of Natural Resources

Justice has been always served as a prominent problem in different fields of knowledge. The issue has been important in the literature of economic development as well, both negatively and positively approached; and the discussion that whether it is compatible or incompatible with the economic development has engaged a sizable portion of development literature in the last century. This concern has extended to the other generations so as a result, intergenerational justice has risen as a new topic in the arena of justice.In Quran, justice has been mentioned among the most basic concepts of religion and the important goal of the prophets. The holy prophet of Islam (pbuh) has constructed his government and religion based on justice and in the words of Imam Ali (a.s.) justice is introduced as a universal law, an unchangeable tradition in the world of existence and an inviolable necessity in human societies and legislative system; in the same way it is stressed that both the nature of the world and human law should conform with each other; as his eminence has been known as the Imam of justice. Imam Ali (a.s.) in a saying which is narrated from him mentions justice as the cause of consistency and redoubling of the blessings in the society. In the words of the other infallible Imams also justice is regarded as equivalent to the richness of the people.In this paper, among widespread dimensions of the justice, the stress has been put on economic justice in the methods of exploitation of resources, especially the ways of allocation among different generations. Therefore it is claimed first, Islamicly grown up individuals easily exercise the rules of justice among them. However, as a sanction for this purpose, exactly the realization of intergenerational justice in using natural resources, some solutions has been suggested by Shariah of Islam which are discussed in the paper. There is an important role for Islamic government in this mission.