On a Mission Towards Climate Neutrality: Assessing the integration of climate justice into the strategies of Dutch EU Mission Cities
(2025) In IIIEE Master Thesis IMEM01 20251The International Institute for Industrial Environmental Economics
- Abstract
- Cities are important stakeholders in the EU’s quest to achieve climate neutrality (European Commission, 2020a). The EU has acknowledged the importance of cities through the EU Mission on ‘Climate Neutral and Smart Cities’, which aims to enable 100 European cities to become climate-neutral by 2030 (European Commission, 2021a). However, climate change has the potential to intersect with, exacerbate, and create new patterns of urban injustices, also known as climate justice (Juhola et al., 2022). Consequently, Mission Cities should ideally be justice-aware when creating their climate strategies. Nevertheless, only a handful of studies have assessed the integration of climate justice in urban climate strategies (e.g. Brousseau et al., 2024;... (More)
- Cities are important stakeholders in the EU’s quest to achieve climate neutrality (European Commission, 2020a). The EU has acknowledged the importance of cities through the EU Mission on ‘Climate Neutral and Smart Cities’, which aims to enable 100 European cities to become climate-neutral by 2030 (European Commission, 2021a). However, climate change has the potential to intersect with, exacerbate, and create new patterns of urban injustices, also known as climate justice (Juhola et al., 2022). Consequently, Mission Cities should ideally be justice-aware when creating their climate strategies. Nevertheless, only a handful of studies have assessed the integration of climate justice in urban climate strategies (e.g. Brousseau et al., 2024; Juhola et al., 2022; Fiack et al., 2021; Schrock et al., 2015). Additionally, there is a lack of studies
that investigate climate justice integration in EU Mission Cities and the extent to which the EU Cities Mission supports this integration. Therefore, this thesis aims to assess how and to what extent climate justice is integrated into the climate strategies of four Dutch Mission Cities, including an analysis of the barriers and the extent to which the EU Cities Mission supports this integration. By applying a Justice Integration Index to the climate strategies of the Dutch cities and interviewing city officials and Mission Representatives, this thesis found that the Dutch Mission Cities score the highest on procedural and distributional justice compared to recognition justice. Moreover, the cities face a major barrier related to defining climate justice, as well as other political and capacity-related barriers. Finally, the Mission documents only superficially engaged with the three justice dimensions, and the city officials were largely unaware of the resources provided by the EU Cities Mission. To facilitate the integration of urban climate justice, the Dutch Mission Cities should primarily focus on establishing a shared definition of climate justice. Additionally, the EU Cities Mission should ensure that its available support is known across municipal departments and closely collaborate with participating cities to understand their needs. (Less) - Popular Abstract
- Cities are important stakeholders in the EU’s quest to achieve climate neutrality (European Commission, 2020a). The EU has acknowledged the importance of cities through the EU Mission on ‘Climate Neutral and Smart Cities’, which aims to enable 100 European cities to become climate-neutral by 2030 (European Commission, 2021a). However, climate change has the potential to intersect with, exacerbate, and create new patterns of urban injustices, also known as climate justice (Juhola et al., 2022). Consequently, Mission Cities should ideally be justice-aware when creating their climate strategies. Nevertheless, only a handful of studies have assessed the integration of climate justice in urban climate strategies (e.g. Brousseau et al., 2024;... (More)
- Cities are important stakeholders in the EU’s quest to achieve climate neutrality (European Commission, 2020a). The EU has acknowledged the importance of cities through the EU Mission on ‘Climate Neutral and Smart Cities’, which aims to enable 100 European cities to become climate-neutral by 2030 (European Commission, 2021a). However, climate change has the potential to intersect with, exacerbate, and create new patterns of urban injustices, also known as climate justice (Juhola et al., 2022). Consequently, Mission Cities should ideally be justice-aware when creating their climate strategies. Nevertheless, only a handful of studies have assessed the integration of climate justice in urban climate strategies (e.g. Brousseau et al., 2024; Juhola et al., 2022; Fiack et al., 2021; Schrock et al., 2015). Additionally, there is a lack of studies
that investigate climate justice integration in EU Mission Cities and the extent to which the EU Cities Mission supports this integration. Therefore, this thesis aims to assess how and to what extent climate justice is integrated into the climate strategies of four Dutch Mission Cities, including an analysis of the barriers and the extent to which the EU Cities Mission supports this integration. By applying a Justice Integration Index to the climate strategies of the Dutch cities and interviewing city officials and Mission Representatives, this thesis found that the Dutch Mission Cities score the highest on procedural and distributional justice compared to recognition justice. Moreover, the cities face a major barrier related to defining climate justice, as well as other political and capacity-related barriers. Finally, the Mission documents only superficially engaged with the three justice dimensions, and the city officials were largely unaware of the resources provided by the EU Cities Mission. To facilitate the integration of urban climate justice, the Dutch Mission Cities should primarily focus on establishing a shared definition of climate justice. Additionally, the EU Cities Mission should ensure that its available support is known across municipal departments and closely collaborate with participating cities to understand their needs. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
http://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/9209364
- author
- Tillij, Joëlle
- supervisor
- organization
- course
- IMEM01 20251
- year
- 2025
- type
- H2 - Master's Degree (Two Years)
- subject
- keywords
- climate justice, EU Cities Mission, just transitions, urban climate policy, climate neutrality
- publication/series
- IIIEE Master Thesis
- report number
- 2025:07
- ISSN
- 1401-9191
- language
- English
- id
- 9209364
- date added to LUP
- 2025-08-12 14:29:01
- date last changed
- 2025-08-12 14:29:01
@misc{9209364,
abstract = {{Cities are important stakeholders in the EU’s quest to achieve climate neutrality (European Commission, 2020a). The EU has acknowledged the importance of cities through the EU Mission on ‘Climate Neutral and Smart Cities’, which aims to enable 100 European cities to become climate-neutral by 2030 (European Commission, 2021a). However, climate change has the potential to intersect with, exacerbate, and create new patterns of urban injustices, also known as climate justice (Juhola et al., 2022). Consequently, Mission Cities should ideally be justice-aware when creating their climate strategies. Nevertheless, only a handful of studies have assessed the integration of climate justice in urban climate strategies (e.g. Brousseau et al., 2024; Juhola et al., 2022; Fiack et al., 2021; Schrock et al., 2015). Additionally, there is a lack of studies
that investigate climate justice integration in EU Mission Cities and the extent to which the EU Cities Mission supports this integration. Therefore, this thesis aims to assess how and to what extent climate justice is integrated into the climate strategies of four Dutch Mission Cities, including an analysis of the barriers and the extent to which the EU Cities Mission supports this integration. By applying a Justice Integration Index to the climate strategies of the Dutch cities and interviewing city officials and Mission Representatives, this thesis found that the Dutch Mission Cities score the highest on procedural and distributional justice compared to recognition justice. Moreover, the cities face a major barrier related to defining climate justice, as well as other political and capacity-related barriers. Finally, the Mission documents only superficially engaged with the three justice dimensions, and the city officials were largely unaware of the resources provided by the EU Cities Mission. To facilitate the integration of urban climate justice, the Dutch Mission Cities should primarily focus on establishing a shared definition of climate justice. Additionally, the EU Cities Mission should ensure that its available support is known across municipal departments and closely collaborate with participating cities to understand their needs.}},
author = {{Tillij, Joëlle}},
issn = {{1401-9191}},
language = {{eng}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
series = {{IIIEE Master Thesis}},
title = {{On a Mission Towards Climate Neutrality: Assessing the integration of climate justice into the strategies of Dutch EU Mission Cities}},
year = {{2025}},
}