Climate justice focuses on the rights, equity, and effects of climate change on different groups of people. Not only does climate justice advocate for the land but also for the people who reside on this earth and their wellbeing. This movement is intersectional, meaning it recognizes how diverse identities impact the experiences felt by climate change, rehabilitation, and aid.
The climate justice movement is built on the much older environmental justice movement. Environmental justice aims for all people – regardless of their identities or status – to experience the same "just treatment and meaningful involvement" in decision-making processes related to the environment, according to the United States Environmental Protection Agency. Other activists argue that the goal of environmental justice goes even further: "The environmental justice movement isn't seeking to simply redistribute environmental harms, but to abolish them."
What is Climate Change?
Climate change is a combination of natural events and human activity. It has devastating effects on weather, land, water, air, and ultimately, the health and wellbeing of all living things on earth. It is important to note that scientists are sure that climate change is caused by humans.
Natural events
Natural disasters, such a earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and tornados, occur independent of human influence.
Disasters are socially constructed and even “natural” disasters are often a result of human errors.
It is often our preparation for and response to these natural events, including our "insufficient disaster risk management," that create the disaster.
Implying that disasters and victims are natural often fails to account for the social, political, and cultural factors that have led to the disaster and its consequences
Human activity (anthropogenic)
Climate change is attributed to human activities, including the burning of fossil fuels, industrialization, oil and gas extraction, agriculture, and pollution.
Greenhouse gases (carbon monoxide and methane) are caused by burning fossil fuels and clearing land. Temperatures and ocean levels are rising, land is more susceptible to disasters, and air and water are becoming increasingly polluted. "Global warming", which is sometimes used interchangeably with "climate change" refers to the rising temperatures, while climate change refers to other effects and consequences.
As humans have caused these changes, we also have the power and potential to slow or reverse the effects.
Throughout this website, we will discuss climate disasters and emergencies, and environmental hazards, which can include:
catastrophic storms and increased frequency of storms
wildfires
extreme temperatures, including heatwaves and overall warming temperatures
spread of diseases, especially through food, water, and air
malnutrition (decreased food production and barriers to access)
water scarcity and droughts
floods, hurricanes, and tsunamis
declining biodiversity
rockslides, landslides, and mudslides
rising sea levels and melting polar ice
Intersectional Movement
Everyone will experience the effects of climate change, now or in the future. However, not all climate risks have the same impact, depending on many social, economic, and political factors. Identity, physical location, and access to resources affect people's vulnerability and their ability to react to climate change-related events. This page defines climate change and how its effects are felt differently by different groups of people.
Race
Climate and environmental justice movements trace their origins to communities of color. Indigenous communities have been advocating for the land since even before the arrival of European colonizers and African American communities were the first to organize for environmental issues during the Civil Rights movement.
Racial justice and climate justice are inherently tied together. It is not that people of color are inherently more likely to feel the effects of climate change. Rather, human harm has created our current realities as "the loss of life comes out of a legacy of neglect and racism." As a result, the conditions in which people of color live place them at higher risk to experience the consequences of climate change in the United States and globally.
Furthermore, individuals and communities of color are often excluded from conversations about environmental justice and government aid in disaster recovery.
Gender & sexuality
Women are more likely to feel the effects of climate disasters, as their chance of being at home and not being aware of emergency notifications is higher. They are also less likely to learn how to swim, which puts them at increased risk of death in disasters involving flooding, hurricanes, and other water-related disasters.
People who are able to get pregnant face higher needs in disasters, especially when proper and safe medical care is not available.
LGTBQ+ communities face barriers to medical treatment and evacuation centers during climate emergencies. When couples and families are not legally recognized, this can make it harder to get disaster aid.
Women and queer communities bring many strengths to climate resiliency and mitigation, but in research and conversations on climate, their vulnerability and distress is more often highlighted.
Income & education
Effects of climate change are felt in heightened ways in low-income areas, although they are often contributing the least to climate change. This is an issue of distributive justice, in which communities with "lower levels of education, income, homeownership, voting participation, social capital, and political clout" are targeted waste sites and polluting factories because they are less likely to have the means to fight back.
In situations of evacuations or climate-related migrations, there are fewer choices available to those with less capital or resources, which compromise people's safety and wellbeing. Heightened food insecurity and transference of diseases and illnesses are occurring as a result of climate change, disproportionately impacting low-income populations. Links between poverty and climate change are under-researched, meaning that the effects are not fully understood or addressed.
Age
Younger and older populations are more vulnerable during climate disasters, especially in situations when they are dependent on someone else to care for them. They are more likely to feel the effects of climate change outside of disasters themselves, including contracting diseases and facing malnutrition.
While often lumped together, the disabled and elderly can often have distinct needs and require different accommodations. As two separate and large minority groups, there is overlap between these identities, but they are many people who only fit one social identity.
Future generations will feel the effects of climate change more, and it is our responsibility to ensure that the world we are leaving for future generations is safe. Youth activists are making way in the climate justice movement as many young people are recognizing the impacts climate change will have on their future.
“Climate vulnerability describes the degree to which natural, built, and human systems are at risk of exposure to climate change impacts…" - OPR
Climate, Health, & Pandemic
The environment is all around us and interconnected to our daily lives, influencing everything from the air we breathe to the food we eat. Our daily activities – from commuting to consuming – are intertwined with the health and stability of the climate, shaping our experiences and well-being. The climate crisis is deeply related to our health as humans as it is a threat to global health and can exacerbate existing health conditions. The health of our world and the health of ourselves are deeply connected, but often not recognized as such, as many view ourselves as separate from the earth, rather than an interconnected part of it. Certain populations are more vulnerable to feeling the impacts of climate change on their health.
The chronic stress, isolation required with staying home, lack of green and natural spaces, and food and water insecurity caused by climate change are having extremely adverse effects on mental health. Mental health is often not prioritized in responses to disasters. Access to proper care, therapy, medication, and psychological services, particularly for those with psychological or mental disabilities, can be scarce amidst a disaster or emergency.
"Maintaining my mental health is part of my activism because mental health is planetary health." - Tori Tsui
The global COVID-19 pandemic, and the quarantine, safety precautions, and social isolation that ensued, revealed a reality that many disabled people experience. The pandemic also exposed many inequalities in global health, including increased risk of contracting the virus when living in an area with high air pollution, inequitable food insecurity, poor distribution of vaccines and access to personal protective equipment (PPE) and testing, medical racism, and the perceived expendability of disabled lives, exposing how ableist societies treat immunocomprised/at-risk/elderly populations, which is often with little regard for their well-being.
Sources Used & Suggested Reading
Environmental Justice - United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Official government page that discusses what environmental justice means and includes a timeline of its history in the United States.
Environmental Justice / Environmental Racism - A webpage full of information discussing what environmental justice means and how it differs from environmental equity. It includes links to information on environmental racism, activism, climate justice, environmental classism, law and policy, and suggests ways in which the EPA has fallen short.
Summary for Policymakers: Climate Change 2014 Impacts, Adaptations, and Vulnerability - IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), 2014. A 34-page PDF combining findings and implications from research, particularly with a global perspective that highlights specific risks by region.
What Is Climate Change? - United Nations. General definitions of climate change, including some causes, impacts, and consequences.
The Right To Be Rescued: Disability Justice in an Age of Disaster - Adrien A. Weibgen, 2015. A Law Journal Note exploring the legalities behind climate planning, highlighting how the impacts of man-made disasters, specifically on PWD, must be legally alleviated by the government (specific focus on the United States).
Human activity the common link between disasters around the world - United Nations, 2021. A news story reporting on a UN University study highlighting clear examples that link human activity to the "natural" disasters being felt globally, ultimately concluding that "human-induced greenhouse gas emissions, insufficient disaster risk management, and undervaluing environmental costs and benefits in decision-making" are the most common root causes.
Disability and the Social Politics of “Natural” Disaster - Julia Watts Belser, 2015. This academic article implores disability studies with a Jewish feminist lens to analyze societal attitudes towards disasters, distress, and suffering, especially as it relates to women and people with disabilities.
IPCC report: ‘Code red’ for human driven global heating, warns UN chief - United Nations, 2021. A news article analyzing information from the "Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis" report, which is part of the IPCC's Sixth Assessment Report.
What is the difference between global warming and climate change? - USGS (U.S. Geological Survey). A very brief answer explaining the difference between global warming and climate change.
Factors Associated with the Climate Change Vulnerability and the Adaptive Capacity of People with Disability: A Systematic Review - Cadeyrn J. Gaskin, et al. 2017. A systematic review looking at factors impacting vulnerability and adaptive capacity of PWDs, including personal and environmental factors, activities, and participation.
Environmental hazard and disabled people: from vulnerable to expert to interconnected - Sue Porter, 2013. An academic article moving beyond a focus on vulnerabilities to explore how disabled people bring their lived experiences to disaster preparation and climate conversations, linking together commonalities between disability and climate movements.
Indigenous People With Disabilities Are on the Front Lines of the Climate Crisis – Jen Deerinwater, 2021. An op-ed focusing on the disproportion weight of the climate crisis felt by Indigenous people with disabilities and how the United States' colonial history continues impacting realities felt today.
Climate justice can't happen without racial justice – David Lammy, 2020. A TedTalk video in which David Lammy, a member of Parliament for Tottenham, England, discusses the critical intersection between race and climate, and the importance of highlighting voices of people of color, specifically Black people, in climate justice movements.
Unequal Impact: The Deep Links Between Racism and Climate Change – Beth Gardiner, 2020. An interview with activist Elizabeth Yeampierre discussing current justice issues of race and climate, as well as calls for policy and social change.
Why Does Disaster Aid Often Favor White People? - Christopher Flavelle, 2021. A New York Times article that explores research about inequitable and racist Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) financial assistance in disaster recovery efforts.
Unequal Proximity to Environmental Pollution: An Intersectional Analysis of People with Disabilities in Harris County, Texas – Jayajit Chakraborty, 2020. An academic analysis of proximity to 3 different types of pollution sites, finding that "individuals with disabilities are experiencing a 'multiple jeopardy' defined by the convergence of disability with other social disadvantages such as racial/ethnic minority and elderly status and amplified by their proximity to pollution sources."
The Impacts of Climate Change on Human Health in the United States: A Scientific Assessment - U.S. Global Change Research Program, 2016. A 9-part summary looking at the relationship between health and lived experiences.
Climate change through a poverty lens - Stephane Hallegatte & Julie Rozenberg, 2017. An academic article based on a study with a bottom-up approach to the impacts of climate change on poverty and poor people.
A Culture of Neglect: Climate Discourse and Disabled People - Gregor Wolbring, 2009. An academic paper looking at the inclusion/exclusion of disabled people in climate discourse and in environmental, economic, political and social realms.
Leave No One Behind: People with Disabilities and Older People in Climate-Related Disasters - Human Rights Watch, 2022. A report compiling data from over 100 interviews that looks at risk factors associated with disability and age within various types of disasters.
Children and Youth Environmental Action: The Case of Children and Youth with Disabilities - Chiara Salvatore and Gregor Wolbring, 2021. A scoping review on the involvements of children and youth in environmental movements.
Climate Disaster Risk, Disability, and Resilience – Emma Calgaro, 2021. A research essay acknowledging inequalities that people with disabilities face, while recognizing that vulnerability narratives disregard the knowledge, experience, and resilience that they bring to the climate justice movement.
The environment connects to everything, so our environmentalism should too – Greenpeace, 2022. A blog post on intersectional environmentalism and how it relates to disability, gender, sexuality, and race.
Defining Vulnerable Communities in the Context of Climate Adaptation - Governor’s Office of Planning and Research, 2018. An 18-page PDF exploring climate vulnerability in California, not disability-specific.
Disability, Human Rights, and Climate Justice - Penelope Stein and Michael Stein, 2022. This academic paper examines a number legal mandates that require the inclusion of PWD in climate change mitigation efforts.
Conserving Biodiversity, Preserving Mental Health - Words by Tori Tsui (as told to Daphne Chouliaraki Milner), 2022. A story about activism, the ableism of eco-anxiety, how mental health is connected to climate, and the euro-centricity of environmental activism.
New Research Links Air Pollution to Higher Coronavirus Death Rates - Lisa Friedman, 2020. Research from April of 2020 finding the connection between areas with higher air pollution and likeliness of contracting and dying from COVID-19.
Why people with disabilities are at greater risk of going hungry during the pandemic - Melissa Caldwell, 2021. A news article discussing the risk of food insecurity that people with disabilities face due economic, physical, and societal barriers.
How Racial Health Disparities Will Play Out in the Pandemic - Julia Craven, 2020. A news article covering an interview with Dr. Uché Blackstock discussing the risks that Black patients face due to medical racism, discrimination, and bias.
I’m disabled and need a ventilator to live. Am I expendable during this pandemic? - Alice Wong, 2020. An article exploring the devaluation of vulnerable populations in our society, especially during the pandemic and in other crises.
Mental health and the global climate crisis - Carlos Corvalan, et. al., 2022. An epidemiology and psychiatric science academic article exploring the effects of climate change on mental health and psychosocial well-being, especially those already living with mental health.