Mainstreaming Gender and Climate Change to Achieve a Just Transition to a Climate‐Neutral Europe

Abstract

In November 2019 the European Parliament (2019/2930(RSP)) declared a climate and environmental emergency, calling for urgent and concrete action. The year 2019 was Europe's hottest year on record (Copernicus Climate Change Service, 2019), and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (2018, p. v) reported that 'emissions of greenhouse gases due to human activities, the root cause of global warming, continue to increase, year after year'. Swedish teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg inspired and led a worldwide school strike movement, and mass protests dominated by young women took place around the world (Wahlström et al., 2019). The European Parliament resolution of 14 March 2019 (2019/2582(RSP)) 'welcomes the fact that people across Europe, in particular younger generations, are becoming increasingly active in demonstrating for climate justice'. At the institutional level 2019 was a year of renewal, with the European Parliament elections in May, the adoption of a new Council strategy in June and the appointment of a new Commission in December. Climate change was a priority for all these institutional actors. The Council strategy 2019-24, for example, insists on the urgent need to build a 'climate-neutral, green, fair and social Europe'. The new President of the Commission Ursula von der Leyen announced her intention to see Europe become the first climate-neutral continent by 2050. Climate change arrived on the EU agenda in the 1980s, emerging out of environmental policy, which was already established as an area that required transnational action. Throughout the 1990s and early 2000s the climate ambition of the EU exceeded its ability to agree on, and implement, effective actions (Dupont and Oberthür, 2015). When the USA withdrew from the Kyoto protocol in 2001 the EU took on a global leadership role and has continued to construct an identity as a global actor around the issue of climate change (Jordan et al., 2010). This had economic motivations (to avoid being undercut by exporters with lower environmental standards) but was also part of the post-Maastricht efforts to increase the EU's global actorness. The past decade has seen climate change gain prominence and take centre stage. In 2009 the landmark climate and energy framework (COM(2014)15 final) introduced targets for greenhouse gas emissions, energy efficiency and renewable energy. Within the European Commission climate action gained its own Directorate General, DG CLIMA. This was an important part of the process of institutionalizing climate change. The issue of climate change continued to rise up the EU and the global agenda, and there was a strong dynamic between the two. The Lisbon Treaty (2007) gave the EU competence to conclude international environmental agreements. The EU, along with its member states, is a party to the United Nations

Gender, Intersectionality and Climate Institutions in Industrialised States

“…EU climate policy is edging away from an exclusive focus on technological solutions towards a recognition that climate change affects people, and that people are part of the solution. However, integrating diversity and intersectionality into the analysis of climate change and proposed responses to it is still a marginal concern (Allwood, 2020b). Efforts to address gender inequality and efforts to address climate change continue to exist in parallel, rather than being fully integrated into each other.…”

Just Adapt: Engaging Disadvantaged Young People in Planning for Climate Adaptation

“…It is widely accepted that the effects of climate change are not the same for everyone and existing inequalities affect how climate change impacts populations and their ability to respond to it (Osborne, 2015). Measures intro-duced to act on climate change will also have different effects on people, according to their gender, class, wealth, ethnicity, physical ability and other structural inequalities (Allwood, 2020). These differences need to be considered for climate action to be fair, both procedurally and in terms of the distribution of impacts.…”

“…As a result, both research and practice find that education can play a key role in supporting engagement with climate change (Cantell, Tolppanen, Aarnio-Linnanvuori, & Lehtonen, 2019;UNESCO, 2015), explaining how participation processes operate and providing training to ensure participants have the requisite capabilities to participate effectively. This does not mean that educational interventions on climate change will necessarily lead to wider participation in climate action and thus to greater procedural justice, particularly given wide variations in people's circumstances and identities (Allwood, 2020), but it is seen as a foundational element if fairness in the processes that resolve disputes and allocate resources to govern climate change is to be achieved.…”

Just Green Transition – key concepts and implications in the Nordic Region

“…Allt fler bedömare menar emellertid att det krävs betydande systemförändringar för att möta utmaningen och att rådande strategier är långt ifrån tillräckliga. Hit hör även de som menar att EU:s såväl som skandinaviska miljö och klimatstrategier tenderar att inte belysa eller konkretisera jämställdhets och jämlikhetsfaktorer, och därmed inte ta höjd för människors olika förutsättningar och behov (Allwood, 2020;Magnusdottir & Kronsell, 2015). Sveriges klimatpolitiska råd menar i sin årsrapport från 2019 att det krävs genomgri pande innovationer och samhällsförändringar på systemnivå för att nå nollutsläpp.…”