What is the lay of the land when it comes to integrating just transition into national climate policies? The Just Transition Finance Lab published Mapping justice in national climate action: a global overview of just transition policies (June 2024), which reviews 159 policies and laws from 61 countries and the European Union to map how many integrate ideas associated with the just transition into domestic climate policy, and how.
Human Level’s Take: This report is a deep dive into the diverse landscape of just transition policies worldwide. Here's what it found: policies vary widely in defining justice and prioritizing groups for action, based on historical impacts and local risks. Financing strategies for the transition also differ, shaped by available mechanisms and each government's level of ambition. What does this mean for companies and financial institutions? First, alignment with transition policies will look different across countries - and understanding regional priorities and conceptions of justice will go a long way. Second, it means there is space in existing policies for companies to influence governments’ priority areas and contribute to the development of innovative financial models for better capital flows. Third, as key partners for implementation of the transition, companies can help build trust in the process, provide guarantees of future opportunities and make sure affected stakeholders are included in their own decision-making processes.
Key points from the report:
- What is the ‘just’ in just transition policies? Different types of justice are considered important across countries’ climate and transitional policies. The most common kinds include distributive justice (redistribution of resources), procedural justice (formal and procedural inclusion and consultation), restorative justice (reparation for historical harms and damages), intergenerational justice (present generations’ duties towards future generations) and ecological justice (justice for non-human beings and nature). Of these, considerations of distributive justice are the most common - appearing in 128 assessed documents from 59 countries. The report recommends that policymakers take account of procedural justice too, to help ensure that stakeholders affected by climate change and the transition are sitting at the table when decisions are made.
- Justice for whom? The report finds that the groups of people targeted by policies vary from country to country. This could be explained by differences in who has been historically impacted or which groups are most at risk of future impacts. Additionally, the groups covered by transitional policies go beyond the workforce. They include women, Indigenous Peoples, low-income households, rural communities, young people and others. For instance, policies in the U.S. highlight the importance of promoting justice for communities of colour; in Bolivia, they target Indigenous Peoples and nature; in Turkey, policies target climate migrants and migrant workers; and, in other European countries, they commonly prioritise children. The report also finds that “there is also a growing recognition [in laws and policies] that groups that are already affected disproportionately by climate change impacts are likely to also experience comparatively greater negative impacts from policy interventions targeted at climate change.”
- How are we financing the just transition? The report finds that a number of mechanisms are being explored to finance the transition. These include tax reforms (e.g., through carbon taxes), changes in state procurement practices, transforming the employee insurance systems or changing labour market policies. Policies and laws also make use of blended or private finance tools. Yet the report highlights that there is a need for policies to set clearer conditions for private finance to flow to the transition, especially when it comes to conditions of justice. It also highlights that countries need further strategies to coordinate just transition actions through “the creation of cross-departmental taskforces focused on justice issues and improving the coordination of climate policy.” These include the U.K. Green Jobs Taskforce, the U.S. Interagency Working Group on Coal and Power Plant Communities and Economic Revitalization or the White House Environmental Justice Interagency Council.
