Queensland’s Human Rights Act: A New Frontier for Australian Climate Change Litigation?

2020 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Justine Bell-James ◽  
Briana Collins
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Human Right ◽  
Coal Deposits ◽  
Successful Case ◽  
Australian Climate ◽  
New Frontier ◽  
Human Rights Act ◽  
International Climate

In 2019, the Queensland Parliament enacted a Human Rights Act, enshrining, inter alia, the human right to life. The Human Rights Act 2019 (Qld) presents a timely opportunity to open the next chapter in Australia’s climate change litigation history – a human rights-based climate change case. This article will consider the possible characterisation of such a case, drawing on international experience. Ultimately, it will conclude that a rights-based climate change case is feasible in Queensland, and a successful case would have national and international ramifications, due to the potential for Queensland coal deposits to contribute to global climate change. Further, a successful rights-based climate change case in Queensland has the capability to set powerful precedent in the growing body of climate litigation both domestically and internationally, where international climate litigation has been observed as taking a ‘rights turn’.

scholarly journals International climate change negotiation: the role of Brazil

2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 379-395
Author(s):  
Marcela Cardoso Guilles Da Conceição ◽  
Renato de Aragão Ribeiro Rodrigues ◽  
Fernanda Reis Cordeiro ◽  
Fernando Vieira Cesário ◽  
Gracie Verde Selva ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
International Negotiation ◽  
Climate Change Negotiations ◽  
Essential Condition ◽  
Average Temperature ◽  
Social And Economic Development ◽  
International Climate ◽  
International Climate Change

The increase of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere raises the average temperature of the planet, triggering problems that threaten the survival of humans. Protecting the global climate from the effects of climate change is an essential condition for sustaining life. For this reason, governments, scientists, and society are joining forces to propose better solutions that could well-rounded environmentally, social and economic development relationships. International climate change negotiations involve many countries in establishing strategies to mitigate the problem. Therefore, understanding international negotiation processes and how ratified agreements impact a country is of fundamental importance. The purpose of this paper is to systematize information about how climate negotiations have progressed, detailing key moments and results, analyzing the role that Brazil played in the course of these negotiations and the country’s future perspectives.

Filling in for Governments? The Role of the Private Actors in the International Climate Regime

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-28
Author(s):  
Charlotte Streck
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Paris Agreement ◽  
Climate Regime ◽  
Climate Action ◽  
Private And Public ◽  
State Actor ◽  
International Climate ◽  
Private Actors

The 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change abandons the Kyoto Protocol’s paradigm of binding emissions targets and relies instead on countries’ voluntary contributions. However, the Paris Agreement encourages not only governments but also sub-national governments, corporations and civil society to contribute to reaching ambitious climate goals. In a transition from the regulated architecture of the Kyoto Protocol to the open system of the Paris Agreement, the Agreement seeks to integrate non-state actors into the treaty-based climate regime. In 2014 the secretariat of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Peru and France created the Non-State Actor Zone for Climate Action (and launched the Global Climate Action portal). In December 2019, this portal recorded more than twenty thousand climate-commitments of private and public non-state entities, making the non-state venues of international climate meetings decisively more exciting than the formal negotiation space. This level engagement and governments’ response to it raises a flurry of questions in relation to the evolving nature of the climate regime and climate change governance, including the role of private actors as standard setters and the lack of accountability mechanisms for non-state actions. This paper takes these developments as occasion to discuss the changing role of private actors in the climate regime.

Climate Justice. A Contractualist Perspective

2010 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Rinderle
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Global Climate Change ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Future Generations ◽  
Climate Justice ◽  
General Welfare ◽  
Principle Of Justice

AbstractThe aim of this paper is to question the utilitarian hegemony in recent discussions about global climate change by defending the possibility of a contractualist alternative. More particularly, I will raise and try to answer two questions. First: How can we justify principles of climate justice? As opposed to the utilitarian concern with maximizing general welfare, a contractualist will look at the question whether certain principles are generally acceptable or could not reasonably be rejected. Second: What do we owe to future generations in these matters? Three principles of climate justice are suggested: a sufficiency principle securing basic human rights, a principle of justice giving each generation a right to realize its conception of justice, and a principle of reciprocity requiring us to take responsibility for the reception of benefits and the causation of harm.

Geoengineering: Ethical Considerations and Global Governance

2013 ◽  
Vol 01 (01) ◽  
pp. 1350006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ying CHEN ◽  
Zhe LIU
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Governance ◽  
Global Climate Change ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
International Community ◽  
Human Society ◽  
Ethical Considerations ◽  
Plan B ◽  
International Climate ◽  
Ethical View

Human society is facing great challenges to address global climate change. How to move the international climate process forward is still a serious problem for politicians. Geoengineering's, so called Plan B to cope with climate change has attracted attentions of the international community with a lot of debate on its impact, risks from an ethical view as well as global governance at the level. In this paper, we focus on some important issues of geoengineering including the definition, characteristics, ethics and global governance, etc. and then put forward some suggestions for China's considerations.

Cosmopolitan Justice, Rights and Global Climate Change

2006 ◽  
Vol 19 (02) ◽  
pp. 255-278 ◽  
Author(s):  
Simon Caney
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Environmental Justice ◽  
Global Climate Change ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Future Generations ◽  
Global Environmental ◽  
State Of Affairs ◽  
Normative Argument ◽  
Climate Change Damages

The paper has the following structure. In Section I, I introduce some important methodological preliminaries by asking: How should one reason about global environmental justice in general and global climate change in particular? Section II introduces the key normative argument; it argues that global climate change damages some fundamental human interests and results in a state of affairs in which the rights of many are unprotected: as such it is unjust. Section III addresses the complexities that arise from the fact that some of the ill effects of global climate change will fall on the members of future generations. Section IV shows that some prevailing approaches are unable to deal satisfactorily with the challenges posed by global climate change. If the argument of this paper is correct, it follows that those who contribute to global climate change through high emissions are guilty of human rights violations and they should be condemned as such.

scholarly journals The CLIMATE CHANGE IMPACT ON THE HUMAN RIGHT TO ENVIRONMENTAL CONDITIONS OF A SPECIFIED QUALITY (SAFE, CLEAN, HEALTHY AND SUSTAINABLE ENVIRONMENT): SOME INTERNATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL LAW ISSUES

2019 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 93-112
Author(s):  
Olha Sushyk ◽  
Olena Shompol
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Environmental Conditions ◽  
Environmental Law ◽  
International Environmental Agreements ◽  
Ghg Emissions ◽  
Environmental Safety ◽  
Human Right ◽  
Human Environment ◽  
The Right

This article discusses recognition between climate change and human rights at the international level. The analysis shows that despite the UN climate change framework does not adequately address the magnitude of the threat posed by climate change related harm to human rights, domestic, regional or international courts must take account of its provisions in deciding cases. The article argues that the causes for climate cases are diverse, whereby the most often ones are those referring to the competent public authority’s failure to fulfil its obligation to regulate limitations of the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.  Further identify the links between human rights and environmental protection, were apparent at least from the first international conference on the human environment, held in Stockholm in 1972. More broadly, it demonstrates international environmental agreements, were some aspects of the right to environmental conditions of a specified quality are identify.  This article discusses also theoretical issues of individual environmental rights and the right to environmental safety in Ukraine. Keywords: climate, human rights, environmental, Ukraine

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