A Long Way Home: The Human Right to a Healthy Environment a Legal Pathway to Climate Justice?

Abstract

Through case law in regional human rights systems and several reports by the United Nations, the link between climate change and human rights was established. But an international human right to a healthy environment has not been recognized yet. There is still a discrepancy between those who are the main contributor to climate change and those suffering the most under it. The quest to change the unequal distribution of greenhouse gas emissions and the unequal consequences faced by vulnerable communities and groups is called climate justice.
Vulnerability increases the risk to be adversely impacted by climate change. Therefore, the research question of this thesis is if the international human right to a healthy environment can support claims for climate justice and even turn the scales to achieve climate justice for indigenous communities?
The research question will be answered by using a case study. The Inupiat village Kivalina in Alaska is forced to relocate due to adverse impacts of climate change in the form of thinner sea ice, changing weather conditions, and erosion of the land the indigenous community is living on. Between 2008 and 2013 the community filed a lawsuit against ExxonMobil and 23 other oil, energy, and utility companies to the United States District Court for the Northern
District of California Oakland Division, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and the United States Supreme Court. Kivalina claimed that the 24 entities are responsible for climate change and thus the consequences the community is facing. The claim was dismissed on the ground of the political question doctrine. The analysis of the lawsuit and Kivalina’s situation showed that the main problems of climate justice claims are the attribution of harm to
a specific person and an entity that produced the emissions, the causation of a violation, and the harm, the transnational nature of greenhouse gases and resulting harm and the lack of guidelines and support by governmental authorities. Four elements are necessary to achieve climate justice for communities like Kivalina: secure funding, clear guidelines for adaption strategies, strong regulations for environmental pollution, and lastly those responsible for
climate change must be held accountable and collaborate on an international level. The right to a healthy environment can have a promotional effect and change the discourse of climate change discussions, but its mere recognition at an international level will not be strong enough to make a difference for communities like Kivalina. Transnational harm, responsibilities of private actors, and causation of the harm are difficulties the right cannot overcome so far. The
right to a healthy environment needs to be recognized at a national level to be able to achieve climate justice. A stronger sense of responsibility by the international community, national legislation to enforce the right, and international agreements to regulate corporations is needed.

• author: Rücker, Linda
• supervisor: Daria Davitti
• organization: Faculty of Law; Department of Law
• course: JAMM07 20211
• year: 2021
• type: H2 - Master's Degree (Two Years)
• subject: Law and Political Science
• keywords: human right to a healthy environment, human rights and climate change, indigenous people
• language: English
• id: 9055769
• date added to LUP: 2021-07-12 12:45:39
• date last changed: 2021-07-12 12:45:39