Climate Litigation And Justice In Africa

EPDF and EPUB available Open Access under CC-BY-NC-ND licence. This volume brings together an international team of contributors to provide a much-needed examination of climate litigation in Africa. The book outlines how climate litigation in Africa is distinct as well as pinpointing where it connects with the global conversation.

This ground-breaking volume provides analyses from experts around the globe on the part played by national and international law, through legislation and the courts, in advancing efforts to tackle climate change, and what needs to be done in the future. Published under the auspices of the British Institute of International and Comparative Law (BIICL), the volume builds on an event convened at BIICL, which brought together academics, legal practitioners and NGO representatives. The volume offers not only the insights from that event, but also additional materials, sollicited to offer the reader a more complete picture of how climate change litigation is evolving in a global perspective, highlighting both opportunities, and constraints.

Populations in Africa are vulnerable to both the direct and indirect adverse effects of climate change that are of human rights significance. The urgency for states in Africa to implement climate interventions while they face developmental challenges, however, raises questions of ‘justice’ or ‘fairness’ between the developed and the developing states. Consequently, interrogating how the human rights paradigm may respond to negative implications of climate change and its ‘fairness’ is important as states continue to engage with the climate change standard setting. This edited volume critically interrogates human rights paradigm as an intervention to secure climate change justice for vulnerable populations; analyses regional protection against human rights consequences of climate change; and assesses emerging interventions based on domestic regulatory frameworks on climate change in selected states in Africa.

This book is based on the acknowledgment that climate change is a multifaceted challenge that requires action on the part of all stakeholders, including civil society, and the notion that climate change is at a tipping point with urgent measures needed in the next decade. Against this background, civil society is turning its attention to the courts as a means to directly influence climate action, partly because of the global scepticism towards the progress of global climate action, despite the ongoing implementation of the Paris Agreement. Focusing on the individual, broadly representing civil society, the book offers fresh perspectives on climate change litigation. While most of the literature on climate change litigation examines the same specific jurisdictions, mostly common law countries (US and Australia in particular), this book also considers specific countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America with little or no climate change litigation. It explores the reasons for the lack of litigation and discusses what measures should or could be taken to change this situation and push forward climate action. Unlike other literature on the subject, this book analyses climate change litigation using a scenario-based methodology. Combining rigorous academic analysis with a practical policy-oriented focus, the book provides valuable insights for a wide range of stakeholders interested in climate change litigation. It appeals to civil society organisations around the world, international organisations and law firms interested in climate change litigation.

While climate change litigation in developed countries of the 'Global North' is a well-studied phenomenon (from its distinctive characteristics and the contribution it is making, to the implementation of international climate laws like the Paris Agreement), relatively few studies focus on climate case law emerging elsewhere. Litigating Climate Change in the Global South sheds light on emerging and accelerating climate litigation in developing countries across the three regions of Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Asia and the Pacific. It is the first monograph-length work to provide a comprehensive assessment of this jurisprudence. Amid growing scholarly and policy interest in climate change litigation and its impact on international climate governance, the book examines which Global South countries are seeing climate cases, what is driving these trends, the coalitions of actors involved, and the early impacts this litigation is having on global goals of climate mitigation and adaptation.

Softbound - New, softbound print book.

Climate change is one of the central challenges facing African countries and their people. Unless concerted efforts are made worldwide very soon to reduce emissions, climate change impacts are likely to be devastating. Higher-end temperature scenarios present a dark future jeopardizing secure access to basic needs such as water, food, housing and a healthy environment, as well as adding to the stressors on natural resources. Those who will suffer the most from the challenges posed by climate change have contributed the least to the problem in the first place: the poor and vulnerable, especially in developing countries. To make matters worse, these are the same people who have benefited the least from modernisation and industrialisation and have a relatively small carbon footprint. This is a double injustice. While climate justice and social justice are difficult to disentangle, neither the legal systems nor the main actors framing the dominant climate change narratives seem sufficiently attentive to the double-edged justice questions posed by the impacts of climate change on poor communities. This book fills some of the gaps in climate change scholarship by focusing on the climate narratives emerging in and around South Africa - how they relate to broader issues of social justice and resource allocation, and the role of rights talk and legal strategies in the framing of the problems and solutions. In doing so, the book contributes to developing rights- and justice-based strategies for translating knowledge into action.

This book examines how litigation over climate change shapes the choices of governments, corporations and the public regarding mitigation and adaptation.