Introduction
The world needs a legally-binding agreement, which is robust, ambitious, efficient and, above all else, effective. MRFCJ has been working to encourage and facilitate on-going discussion on climate justice and the legal form of a new climate agreement to ensure that at all times, the needs of the most vulnerable are considered and given priority. Our work in this area is guided by our Climate Justice Principle: Share Benefits and Burdens Equitably
COP17 reached agreement on a roadmap towards a new legal instrument. The Durban Platform for Enhanced Action has a target of 2015 which is recognition of the urgency of the issue of climate change.
It is important that the necessary political will is mobilised to meet this deadline and to increase the ambition of emissions targets to ensure the most vulnerable are protected.
Latest Updates
Mary Robinson receives Atlas Award
from the Association of American Geographers
Mary Robinson received the Association of American Geographers (AAG) Atlas Award on 25 February 2012 at the AAG annual meeting in New York. Mrs Robinson also delivered an address on climate justice and the international efforts to combat climate change entitled Mapping the Future of Climate Change...read more
Scottish Parliament passes motion on climate justice
An historic debate on a motion of climate justice was held by the Scottish Parliament on 1 March 2012. The Scottish Government motion on climate justice was passed unanimously by the Parliament. President of MRFCJ, Mary Robinson, challenged both government and civil society in Scotland to “become champions of climate justice”.
Webinar by Foundation for International Environmental Law and Development (FIELD)
International climate negotiations are still far from reducing greenhouse gas emissions to a safe level. Northern societies are yet to prove that they can take the lead in combating climate change. As an alternative route, lawyers from around the world are developing legal strategies to hold polluters accountable and compensate climate victims.
A webinar is taking place on Tuesday 21 February at 2pm GMT, hosted by the Foundation for International Environmental Law and Development (FIELD). The online discussion will look at the role that climate science can play in attributing climate change damages to greenhouse gas emissions and the legal consequences.
Climate Justice Post-Durban
Mary Robinson delivered a lecture at University College Cork’s Centre for Global Development on Wednesday 18 January 2012 entitled ‘Climate Justice Post Durban’. Mrs Robinson explored the outcomes of COP17 from a climate justice perspective and the extent to which it addressed the needs of those most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change...
An Important Step Forward – Lots More To Do
COP17 didn’t solve the climate problem. The nations of the world haven’t yet committed to reducing emissions at a rate that can keep global warming below 2°C. This is the hard work ahead – and it will be very hard. But COP17 in Durban did make a number of important decisions...
Download complete overview [2 pages, 120kb]
The Economic Potential of Green Cities
Making cities greener "actually makes a lot of sense" in spite of the economic crisis, says former Irish President, Mary Robinson. "You save money," she said, adding that the real challenge is greening cities in poorer nations, like Bangladesh, where people live in "almost impossible conditions."
Mary Robinson was one of four leading climate change thinkers discussing how viable it is to invest in sustainable cities in a debate hosted by CNN's Robyn Curnow during the 2011 U.N. Conference on Climate Change last week in Durban...watch video
Statement from Mary Robinson on the Closing of COP17/CMP7
Excerpt: "The fact that the Durban Platform deal has a target of 2015 is, at last, recognition of the urgency of the issue facing us. Now, we must ensure that the necessary political will is mobilised to meet this deadline and to increase the ambition of emissions reductions targets in order to protect the most vulnerable people whose most basic rights to food, water and health are undermined by the impacts of climate change... read more
Climate Change is a matter of justice - The Guardian
Having a legal framework is critically important, write Mary Robinson and Archbishop Desmond Tutu in The Guardian... read more
New deal on Kyoto successor more likely - The Irish Times
Excerpt: As Ministers began arriving in Durban yesterday for the final week of the UN Climate Change Conference, an upbeat mood replaced despondency about the prospects of reaching a deal... read more
Mary Robinson at COP17: “The world that benefitted from fossil-fuel growth is not accepting that there is a need to be much more urgent about mitigating and doing it with an international-rules based system”:
Michael Jacobs, visiting professor at London School of Economics, who attended MRFCJ’s meeting on the legal form of new climate agreement, writes in the Guardian that the goal of holding global warming to 2C will be missed if the world's largest economies insist on delaying negotiations.
Excerpt: "When psychologists identified the phenomenon of cognitive dissonance – the ability to believe two contradictory things at the same time – they might have been describing the world of international climate change negotiations..." read more
Professor Lavanya Rajamani, Centre for Policy Research, India who presented at our September meeting on the legal form of a new climate agreement, writes in the Indian Express: The Durban Dictionary
Excerpt: "Ever since the Bali Action Plan, 2007, launched the current phase of negotiations under the Framework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC), parties have been dithering over the legal form that the “agreed outcome” to these negotiations should take..." read more
MRFCJ hosted a meeting on the possible Legal Form of New Climate Agreement on September 9th, 2011, with the support of the Grantham Research Institute of the London School of Economics. The meeting, held under Chatham House rules, was attended by invited participants from different regions of the world and they discussed possible options for the legal form of a future climate agreement.
Highlights from Meeting on Possible Legal Form of a New Climate Agreement [10 pages, 550kb]
- London School of Economics, 9th September 2011
Ireland has bridging role between EU and the Developing World, says Mrs Robinson - The Epoch Times
Excerpt: “Despite the litigation possibilities afforded by viewing climate change as a human rights issue, there is still the need to secure a legally binding agreement under the auspices of the UNFCCC (UN Framework Convention on Climate Change),” said Mrs Robinson. “A legally binding agreement would ensure that richer nations provide adequate financial and technical support to enable the poorest countries to adapt to climate change,” she added, noting that the absence of a legally binding agreement means there is no obligation to act, and that time for action passes by... read more
Mary Robinson: Climate change a rights issue - RTÉ News
Excerpt: Speaking in Dublin, Mary Robinson called for a legally binding international agreement: to compel richer nations to support the poorest counties and help them to adapt to climate change. She said such an accord should succeed the Kyoto Protocol at the end of next year... read more
“Climate justice is one of the most urgent human rights issues of our time”, said Mary Robinson, speaking at the IIEA.
Discussions have been ongoing on a successor regime to Kyoto since 2005 but progress, according to Mrs Robinson, has been “glacial”. The twin track negotiation process is separated into working groups on further commitments under the Kyoto Protocol (KP) and on Long Term Cooperative Action (LCA)... read more
Protecting the most vulnerable: The Role of Climate Justice [13 pages, 376kb]
- Remarks by Mary Robinson at the Institute of International and European Affairs (IIEA), 5th September 2011
Climate change 'threatens human rights' - The Irish Times
Protecting the most vulnerable: Securing a Legally Binding Climate Agreement [19 pages, 374kb]
- Remarks by Mary Robinson at the LSE Centre for the Study of Human Rights, 10th March 2011
This Briefing Note on the Legal form of a new Climate Agreement [9 pages, 104kb] aims to facilitate a better understanding of the different options
available to the parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate
Change (UNFCCC) negotiation process.
Background
Securing a legally binding agreement is an important step in protecting the lives and livelihoods of those who are the most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. The 50 least developed nations of the world account for less than 1% of greenhouse gas emissions, which is the predominant driver of climate change. However, many of these nations are suffering through disruption to weather patterns, changing seasonality and impacts on subsistence agriculture.
An international legally binding commitment could hold advanced economies accountable for greenhouse gas emissions reductions. It would also ensure that richer nations provide adequate financial and technical support to enable the poorest countries to adapt to climate change and embrace low-carbon development.
The only current legally-binding international commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is the Kyoto Protocol, the first commitment period of which expires on 31 December 2012. While the Protocol is not perfect, it has not been ratified by some of the largest emitters of greenhouse gas and the emission reduction targets it contains are not ambitious enough, it is the only such agreement in place. In order to amend the Kyoto Protocol, changes would have to be made at COP17 to allow for the required six-month notification period before changes could be adopted at COP18 in December 2012.
The Cancun Agreements, which were reached at COP16 in Mexico last year, are a set of decisions which provide a framework from which to develop a comprehensive international response to climate change. However, these agreements are not legally binding and do not correspond with the now shared objective of limiting warming to less than 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Therefore, more work is needed to develop them into a new climate regime.
To be effective, commitments made by political leaders need to be accompanied by a system for enforcement and compliance. The robustness and credibility of a post-Kyoto regime depends on clear rules and incentives for compliance which are more likely to be achieve through legally binding commitments.