Discussions on the Earth Charter took place leading up to the Earth Summit at Rio de Janeiro in 1992. In 1994, Maurice Strong (Secretary-General of the Earth Summit) and Mikhail Gorbachev launched a civil-society initiative to develop an Earth Charter. A commission was formed and a drafting process that worked through hundreds of international documents and extensive global consultation before a global consensus document was adopted in March 2000 at the UNESCO headquarters in Paris.

Over the following five years, a formal endorsement campaign attracted over 2,000 organizational endorsements, representing millions of people, including numerous national and international associations, and ultimately global institutions such as UNESCO and IUCN – The World Conservation Union. Many thousands of individuals also endorsed the Earth Charter.

The Earth Charter is increasingly recognized as a global consensus statement on the meaning of sustainability, the challenge and vision of sustainable development, and the principles by which sustainable development is to be achieved.