Editing IPCC:AR6/WGII/Chapter-10 (section)

=== 10.6.4 Social Justice and Equity ===

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Social justice focuses on the justice-related implications of social and economic institutions, examined in different ways such as distributional justice (distribution of benefits and burdens across different societal groups), procedural justice (the design of just institutions and processes for decision making), inter-generational justice (duties of justice to future generations) and recognitional justice (recognition of historical inequality) ( [[#Thaler--2017|Thaler et al., 2017]] ). Climate change is affecting every aspect of our society and economy; thus, it is pertinent to understand the interactions between social justice and climate-change impacts ( [[#Tol--2018|Tol, 2018]] ), in particular, focusing on how vulnerability to various impacts is created, maintained and distributed across geographic, social, demographic and economic dimensions ( [[#Bulkeley--2014|Bulkeley et al., 2014]] ; [[#Schlosberg--2014|Schlosberg and Collins, 2014]] ; [[#Van%20de%20Vliert--2014|Van de Vliert, 2014]] ; [[#Burke--2016|Burke et al., 2016]] ). For instance, environmental and health consequences of climate change, which disproportionately affect low-income countries and poor people in high-income countries, profoundly affect human rights and social justice ( [[#Levy--2015|Levy and Patz, 2015]] ). Furthermore, great concern is expressed about the plight of the poor, disadvantaged and vulnerable populations when it comes to climate, but not in other policy domains (Winters, 2014).

Evidence is increasing on the importance of focusing on environmental sustainability, and relieving poverty and social injustice are not conflicting aims; in fact, there is a further need for mainstreaming such approaches in order to respond to the climate-change challenge in a socially just manner ( [[#Mayrhofer--2016|Mayrhofer and Gupta, 2016]] ). These non-conflicting aims are described as co-benefits as reiterated in the IPCC reports as a central concept that refers to ‘the positive effects that a policy or measure aimed at one objective might have on other objectives, irrespective of the net effect on overall social welfare’ ( [[#IPCC--2014b|IPCC, 2014b]] ). Better understanding of how social justice affects, and is affected by, efforts to build adaptive capacity will be crucial to avoiding unintended, and even perverse, outcomes. For example, on the Andaman coast of Thailand, responses to climate-change trends and events tended to be reactive rather than proactive, making already vulnerable people even more vulnerable and undermining their capacity to adapt in the future ( [[#Bennett--2014|Bennett et al., 2014]] ). Different forms of inequality, moreover, render some groups more vulnerable than others to damage from climate hazards. In Mumbai, India, for example, the houses of poorer families required repeated repairs to secure them against flood damage, and the cumulative cost of those repairs consumed a greater proportion of their income than for richer populations ( [[#UN--2016|UN, 2016]] ). Building the resilience of vulnerable groups requires strong community and government institutions that can support efforts to cope with devastating events, offering SP and social development initiatives to support at-risk or vulnerable groups ( [[#Drolet--2015|Drolet et al., 2015]] ). In addition, agencies need to consider how they can best work in ways which potentially support longer-term positive change to gender roles and relations. For example, post-disaster activities must build and resource women’s resilience and adaptive capacity in practice and challenge the constraints that impinge on their lives ( [[#Sadia--2016|Sadia et al., 2016]] ; [[#Sohrabizadeh--2016|Sohrabizadeh et al., 2016]] ; [[#Hadiyanto--2018|Hadiyanto et al., 2018]] ; [[#Yumarni--2018|Yumarni and Amaratunga, 2018]] ; [[#Alam--2019|Alam and Rahman, 2019]] ).

Insights from the environmental justice literature show that an overemphasis on emission reductions at national levels obscures the negative impacts on disadvantaged communities, including low-income communities ( [[#Burch--2014|Burch and Harris, 2014]] ). The issue of social justice and adaptation is particularly relevant because of the politics that drive how adaptation and recovery efforts, as well as investments, are targeted towards specific populations, places and capacities ( [[#Klinsky--2017|Klinsky et al., 2017]] ). Hence, climate justice and equity need to be highlighted more explicitly in integrative approaches to mitigation and adaptation ( ''medium evidence, high agreement'' ) ( [[#Moellendorf--2015|Moellendorf, 2015]] ; Henrique KP, 2020).

The term ‘climate justice’ is used to problematise global warming in ethical and political contexts. It does so by employing the concepts of environmental justice and social justice to examine inequalities and violation of human collective rights in relation to climate-change impacts ( [[#Ghimire--2016|Ghimire, 2016]] ).

At the heart of climate-justice concerns lies the asymmetry that those who have contributed least to the problem of climate change (i.e., GHG emissions) are the ones who will be affected by its adverse impacts the most. It is about sharing the burden and benefits equitably (a) among developed and developing countries in the context of historical responsibility, and (b) within nations to uplift the marginalised and affected populations who have contributed the least to the problem in the contexts of per-capita equity and local vulnerability ( [[#Joshi--2014|Joshi, 2014]] ; [[#Chaudhuri--2020|Chaudhuri, 2020]] ; Shawoo, 2020).

An ethical analysis of the climate regime reveals an abidingly strong interconnection between economic circumstances, geopolitical power and the justice claims that nations can assert in negotiations ( [[#Okereke--2016|Okereke, 2016]] ). Events within the climate regime highlight the importance of questioning the extent to which claims of justice can ever be truly realised in the context of international regimes of environmental governance, as well as how much concerns for justice are motivated by other concerns such as relative economic gains or geopolitical objectives ( [[#Sikor--2014|Sikor, 2014]] ).

The global land rush and mainstream climate-change narratives have broadened the ranks of state and social actors concerned about land issues while strengthening those opposed to social-justice-oriented land policies (Borras, 2018). The five deep social reforms (redistribution, recognition, restitution, regeneration and resistance) of socially just land policy are necessarily intertwined. But the global land rush amid deepening climate change calls attention to the linkages, especially between the pursuit of agrarian justice, on the one hand, and climate justice, on the other. Here, the relationship is not without contradictions and warrants increased attention as both unit of analysis and object of political action. Understanding and deepening agrarian-justice imperatives in climate politics, and understanding and deepening climate-justice imperatives in agrarian politics, is needed more than ever in the ongoing pursuit of alternatives. For example, the intersection between land grabs and climate-change mitigation politics in Myanmar has created new political opportunities for scaling up, expanding and deepening the struggles towards ‘agrarian climate justice’( [[#Sekine--2021|Sekine, 2021]] ).

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