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The critical role of finance in delivering just transition pathways
7/8/2024
10 min read
Feature
The question of a just transition is not about whether we will have a just or unjust transition. Rather, it is about how justice is contemplated, articulated and implemented in the transition to low greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and climate-resilient development. Implementing climate policies requires policymakers to grapple with crucial questions of whose justice is being affected and how, write Tiffanie Chan, a Policy Analyst at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics, and Jodi-Ann Wang, a Global Policy Analyst at the Just Transition Finance Lab, which is hosted by the same Institute.
Decisions made about how we address climate change and its impacts have justice implications across many different dimensions. A decision made today on mitigating climate change and investing in adaptation and resilience will have a major impact on the ability of people to enjoy a clean, healthy and sustainable environment now and in the future.
However, without proactive and inclusive transition planning, a decision today to phase out fossil fuels and transition to a climate-resilient society may also disproportionately affect the interests of certain workers, communities and other vulnerable groups. Those who are already acutely affected by climate change impacts are also likely to experience greater negative impacts from policy interventions targeted at combatting climate change.
The agenda of a just transition first emerged out of the trade union movement and is now mainstreamed in multilateral climate negotiations, most recently culminating in the new United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Work Programme on Just Transition Pathways. The 2015 Paris Agreement and 2015 International Labour Organization (ILO) Just Transition Guidelines have underscored the concept’s significance at a high level. The Paris Agreement acknowledges the ‘imperatives of a just transition of the workforce and the creation of decent work and quality jobs in accordance with nationally defined development priorities’. The 2021 Glasgow Pact expanded the definition to include ‘promoting sustainable development and eradication of poverty’.