Climate Change and Human Rights

Unofficial AI-generated summary based on the public title and abstract. Not an official translation.

🔬研究者:Scholars of climate law and human rights will find a comprehensive overview of the UN human rights system's role in climate governance and state obligations.

🏢実務担当者:Corporate sustainability teams should note the potential for human rights due diligence obligations in climate contexts, affecting disclosure and risk management.

🏛政策担当者:Relevant for ministries of environment and foreign affairs to understand how human rights treaties may impose new climate-related obligations.

Abstract This chapter explores the United Nations (UN) human rights system’s increasing engagement and impact on the international approach to climate change. The negotiations of the UN climate change regime have largely ignored its human rights dimensions, concentrating instead on a technocratic effort to manage the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Over the past two decades, human rights institutions, on the other hand, have filled the gap by documenting the potential impact of climate change on virtually all economic and social rights, as well as the disproportionate impact it will have on vulnerable groups. More recently, human rights treaty bodies, mandate holders, as well as the International Court of Justice and other international and national courts have begun to define States’ responsibilities and obligations to address climate change under human rights law. As a result, human rights now provide an alternative frame for viewing and acting on climate change. In addition to providing strong legal and policy reasons for the prevention of climate change, the human rights framework also strengthens future claims for reparations from climate change.

• crossref https://doi.org/10.1093/9780197599983.003.0045first seen 2026-05-16 04:38:05 · last seen 2026-06-16 05:34:06