Looking to the future? Including children, young people and future generations in deliberations on climate action: Ireland's Citizens’Assembly 2016–2018

Abstract

The effects of climate change are multiple and fundamental. Decisions made today may result in irreversible damage to the planet's biodiversity and ecosystems, the detrimental impacts of which will be borne by today's children, young people and those yet unborn (future generations). The use of citizens' assemblies (CAs) to tackle the issue of climate change is growing. Their remit is future focused. Yet is the future in the room? Focusing on a single case study, the recent Irish CA and Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action (JOCCA) deliberations on climate action, this paper explores the extent to which children, young people and future generations were included. Its systemic analysis of the membership of both institutions, the public submissions to them and the invited expertise presented, finds that the Irish CA was 'too tightly coupled' on this issue. This may have been beneficial in terms of impact, but it came at the expense of input legitimacy and potentially intergenerational justice. Referring to international developments, it suggests how these groups may be included through enclave deliberation, institutional innovations, design experiments and future-oriented practice. .

Experts and expertise in practices of citizen engagement in climate policy: a comparative analysis of two contrasting cases

“…Climate change was not included in the initial draft but was added by an amendment of the Green Party , Harris 2021. Ireland was ahead of the curve in using the citizen assembly format on a national level to address climate change (Devaney et al, 2020).…”

The Politics of Non‐Existence

“…Scholars of deliberative democracy have argued that actual physical presence may be an important factor in strengthening understanding among individuals representing different social groups (e.g., Machin, 2015). The physical presence of future generations could be enhanced by including children or young people as stakeholders in deliberative processes on long-term decisions that will affect their lives (e.g., Harris, 2021). As involving minors in deliberative processes may give rise to ethical issues as well as issues of competence, deliberation among like-minded peers or "enclave deliberation" (Karpowitz et al, 2009) could be allowed to help minors articulate their views before deliberating in more inclusive forums.…”

Recent contributions of citizen science on sustainability policies: A critical review

“…Findings point to (i) actions to advance the implementation of goals and targets through awareness raising and training, participatory methods, multi-stakeholder connections, and supporting citizens to move from data to action; and (ii) data contributions to SDG indicator monitoring through citizen-generated datasets, thus enhancing sustained data collection for ongoing indicator level monitoring [38]. A number of CS projects are thus focussed on data to inform public governance [20] as well as scientific research [64,65]. On the basis of the literature and these findings, two general observations can be made that are of relevance for the CS-SDG link.…”