Conference Human Rights and Climate Change

Human Rights and Climate Change

The conference is being organised by the Centre for Climate Law and Sustainability Studies (CLASS) at the Institute of State and Law of the Czech Academy of Sciences. It is one part of the SOLSTICE project called ‘Socially Just and Politically Robust Decarbonisation: A Knowledge Base and Toolkit for Policymakers’ (JUSTDECARB).

The application of human rights instruments in the protection against negative impacts of climate change is a topic attracting rapidly growing attention among both law scholars and climate litigants. The interlinkages between human rights and climate change, and possible barriers to using the rights-based approach to climate protection and their solutions present one of the highlights of the newly developing scholarship of climate change law. At the same time, the potential of international human rights law for solving climate crisis is being tested in a rising number of climate litigations throughout the world, against both state and non-state actors, and sometimes with interesting or surprising results. Against this background, the aim of the conference is to explore the capabilities and limits of framing climate change risks and harms in terms of human rights violations, to analyse human rights approaches to protection and redress in climate cases, as well as to examine how human rights litigations may prompt states and corporate actors to fulfil all of their obligations under national and EU law.

The conference will cover topics such as developing theoretical foundations for linking human rights and the climate, examining human rights-based climate litigation from various theoretical and practical perspectives, re-interpreting traditional human rights to cover climate risks, developing new environmental and climate human rights, seeking solutions for barriers found in the application of traditional human rights in climate protection (e.g. problems of extraterritoriality or duties towards future generations), solving causation and attribution hurdles in rights-based climate litigation, exploring human rights aspects of climate justice in transition and decarbonisation policies, and outlining future pathways to apply human rights instruments in climate protection more effectively.

The conference will take the form of a hybrid event, combining in-person speakers presenting at the Czech Academy of Sciences, and online speakers participating via Zoom. No registration fee is required.

Register

Programme

Here is the latest printable version of the conference programme and abstracts. Check back for updates.

Conference programme

Conference registration