Climate justice

In 2000, at the same time as the Sixth Conference of the Parties (COP 6), the first Climate Justice Summit took place in The Hague. This summit aimed to "affirm that climate change is a rights issue" and to "build alliances across states and borders" against climate change and in favor of sustainable development.[6]

Subsequently, in August–September 2002, international environmental groups met in Johannesburg for the Earth Summit.[7] At this summit, also known as Rio+10, as it took place ten years after the 1992 Earth Summit, the Bali Principles of Climate Justice[8] were adopted.

In 2004, the Durban Group for Climate Justice was formed at an international meeting in Durban, South Africa. Here representatives from NGOs and peoples' movements discussed realistic policies for addressing climate change.[9]

At the 2007 Bali Conference, the global coalition Climate Justice Now! was founded, and, in 2008, the Global Humanitarian Forum focused on climate justice at its inaugural meeting in Geneva.[10]

In 2009, the Climate Justice Action Network was formed during the run-up to the Copenhagen Summit.[11] It proposed civil disobedience and direct action during the summit, and many climate activists used the slogan 'system change not climate change'.[12]

In April 2010, the World People's Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth took place in Tiquipaya, Bolivia. It was hosted by the government of Bolivia as a global gathering of civil society and governments. The conference published a "People's Agreement" calling, among other things, for greater climate justice.[13]

In December 2018, the People’s Demands for Climate Justice, signed by 292,000 individuals and 366 organisations, called upon government delegates at COP24 comply with a list of six climate justice demands.[14]

Disadvantaged groups will continue to be disproportionately impacted as climate change persists. These groups will be affected due to inequalities that are based on demographic characteristics such as differences in gender, race, ethnicity, age, and income.[15] Inequality increases the exposure of disadvantaged groups to the harmful effects of climate change while also increasing their susceptibility to destruction caused by climate change.[15] A problem with destruction is that disadvantaged groups are the last to receive emergency relief and are rarely included in the planning process at local, national and international levels for coping with the impacts of climate change.[16]

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth National Climate Assessment Report found that low-income individuals and communities are more exposed to environmental hazards and pollution.[17] One problem with this disproportionate impact is that it takes longer for low-income communities to rebuild after natural disasters.[18] Low-income groups will be affected by increased warming due to climate change because wealth will be a factor in determining one's ability to cope with warmer temperatures. This means that individuals with more money could afford resources that will help adapt or cope with increased warming while individuals of lower income may not be able to afford the same resources. Low-income communities also have access to less information which makes it harder to be able to prepare for the impacts of climate change.[18]

Communities of color, women, indigenous groups, and people of low-income all face an increased vulnerability to climate change. These groups will be disproportionately impacted due to heat waves, air quality, and extreme weather events. It has been found that there are more U.S. racial and ethnic minorities that live in low-lying areas than Whites which shows a disproportionate impact since these areas are more susceptible to flooding.[17] Women are also disadvantaged and will be affected by climate change differently than men.[19] This will impact the ability of minority groups to adapt unless there is progress made so that these groups have more access to universal resources.[17] Indigenous groups are affected by the consequences of climate change even though they historically have contributed the least.[20] In addition, indigenous peoples are disproportionately impacted due to their income and continue to have fewer resources to cope with climate change.[20]

One way to mitigate the disproportionate impact of climate change to achieve climate justice is to involve disadvantaged groups in the planning and policymaking process so that these individuals have a say in their own futures. This would also help minority groups achieve more access to resources to adapt and plan for a changing climate.[19] The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) Environmental and Climate Justice Program was also created to support community leadership in addressing the disproportionate impact of communities of color and low income.

Rally for climate justice (2009).

The ability of populations to mitigate and adapt to the negative consequences of climate change are shaped by factors such as income, race, class, gender, capital and political representation.[22] As low-income communities and communities of color possess few if any adaptive resources, they are particularly vulnerable to climate change.[22][23] People living in poverty or in precarious circumstances tend to have neither the resources nor the insurance coverage necessary to recover from environmental disasters.[23] On top of that, such populations often receive an unequal share of disaster relief and recovery assistance.[22] Additionally, they generally have less say and involvement in decision-making, political, and legal processes that relate to climate change and the natural environment.

One contentious issue in debates about climate justice is the extent to which capitalism is viewed as the root cause of climate injustice. This question frequently leads to fundamental disagreements between, on the one hand, liberal and conservative environmental groups and, on the other, leftist and radical organizations. While the former often tend to blame the excesses of neoliberalism for climate change and argue in favor of market-based reform, the latter view capitalism with its exploitative traits as the underlying central issue.[24][25]

Hurricane Katrina case study

NASA flood image after Hurricane Katrina.

According to one study, Hurricane Katrina provided insights into how climate change disasters affect different people differently,[22] as it had a disproportionate effect on low-income and minority groups.[22] A study on the race and class dimensions of Hurricane Katrina suggests that those most vulnerable include poor, black, brown, elderly, sick, and homeless people.[26] Low-income and black communities had little resources and limited mobility to evacuate before the storm.[27][28] Also, after the hurricane, low-income communities were most affected by contamination,[22] and this was made worse by the fact that government relief measures failed to adequately assist those most at risk.[23][26]

There have been increasing efforts to use national and international judiciary systems to enforce climate change efforts at national governments and at commercial and industrial entities.

In 2018, ten families from European countries, Kenya and Fiji filed a suit against the European Union for the threats against their homes caused by the EU greenhouse emissions.[29]

Netherlands

In 2019, the Supreme Court of the Netherlands confirmed that the government must cut carbon dioxide emissions, as climate change threatens human health.[31]

Main article: State of the Netherlands v. Urgenda Foundation

The Netherlands had committed to reducing its carbon dioxide emissions from 1990 levels by 49% by 2030 with various intermediate targets. However, the Dutch Environmental Assessment Agency determined that the country would be missing its goals for 2020.[32]

In 2012, the Dutch lawyer Roger Cox gave the idea of judicial intervention to force action against climate change.[33][34] In 2013, the Urgenda Foundation, with 900 co-plaintiffs, has filed a lawsuit against the Government of the Netherlands "for not taking sufficient measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that cause dangerous climate change".[33]

In 2015, the District Court of The Hague ruled that the government of the Netherlands must do more to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to protect its citizens from climate change (Urgenda climate case).[33][35][36] It was described as a "precedent-setting judgment"[35] and as the "world’s first climate liability suit".[36]

According to James Thornton, chief executive of Client Earth, "Most remarkably, it is based in essence on established science and the ancient principle of a government's duty of care. That reasoning is applicable in any legal system and will certainly be used by courts in other countries".[35][37] In 2018, a court of appeal in The Hague has upheld the precedent-setting judgment that forces the Dutch government to step up its efforts to curb greenhouse-gas emissions in the Netherlands.[38]

In December 2019, the Supreme Court of the Netherlands upheld the ruling on appeal, affirming that the government must cut carbon dioxide emissions by 25% from 1990 levels, by the end of 2020, on the basis that climate change poses a risk to human health.[31][32]

Tens of thousands of people marching in Copenhagen for climate justice (2009).[54]

In 2019 Greta Thunberg, a 16 year old Swedish native, brought a great deal of media attention to the idea of climate justice. Every Friday she skips school to strike for the climate and she once stated in an interview with Democracy Now!, “Since you don’t give a damn about my future then I won’t either,”[55] referring to the Swedish members of Parliament. When Thunberg came to the United States to speak at the UN Climate Summit she traveled across the Atlantic Ocean by sailboat in protest of the emissions caused by airplanes.

Greta Thunberg’s radical way of protesting has created “The Greta effect” which inspires a new generation to take a stance on climate justice as a political issue.[55] She is joined by many other students in her school strike for action towards climate change.

The 21st century became the time to take serious action towards climate justice because many elite groups were unwilling to solve the environmental and social issues for climate justice. At the same time, climate justice activists demands began to increase significantly that it was important to take alternative steps. For example, the Climate Justice Now! network, which is a network of organizations that advocate for climate justice was founded in 2007 by the UNFCCC. Additionally, in 2010, the Bolivian government sponsored "Peoples' World Conference on Climate Change and the Right of Mother Earth in Cochabamba,[56], which helped connect many climate change activists together. Many political groups also began to take impressive actions towards climate change: The grassrootscampaign of Dine local citizen group in New Mexico prevented "the creation of the Desert Rock coal plant, which would have been the third such polluting monolith in this small, rural community."[56] New coal power plant proposals have been cancelled because the community is against it and therefore has helped keep the climate pollution low. The increase of climate justice political groups helped go against many companies and were successful at lowering pollution.

• Mary Robinson (2018). Climate Justice: Hope, Resilience, and the Fight for a Sustainable Future. Bloomsbury Publishing. ISBN 978-1632869289.
• Henry Shue (2016). Climate Justice: Vulnerability and Protection. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0198778745.
• Vanderheiden, Steve. (2009). Atmospheric justice : a political theory of climate change (1st Oxford University Press paperback ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780199733125. OCLC 428033357.
• Bali Principles of Climate Justice.
• Institute for International Integration Studies.
• Space for Movement? Reflections from Bolivia on climate justice, social movements and the state, PDF, edited by Building Bridges collective, July 2010, ISBN 978 0 85316 294 0.
• Climate Change and Justice: On the road to Copenhagen, PDF, Heinrich Böll Foundation, Berlin 2009.
• Broome, J. (2006). "Valuing policies in response to climate change: some ethical issues" (PDF). HM Treasury. Archived from the original (PDF) on 15 October 2009. Retrieved 28 August 2009.
• Africa Speaks up on Climate Change, PDF, Heinrich Böll Foundation, Nairobi 2007.
• FOE Australia Climate Justice Position Paper, December 16, 2006.
• Vandana Shiva (2005). Earth Democracy: Justice, Sustainability, and Peace. South End Press. ISBN 0-89608-745-X.
• Pleyers, Geoffrey (2015). "The Global Age: A Social Movement Perspective". In Bringel, Breno M.; Domingues, José Maurício (eds.). Global Modernity and Social Contestation. London; Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications Ltd. pp. 105–121. ISBN 978-1-4462-9574-8.
• Goodman, James (2009). "From Global Justice to Climate Justice? Justice Ecologist in an Era of Global Warming". New Political Science. 31 (4): 499–514. doi:10.1080/07393140903322570.