Climate change policies have so far ignored the likely human rights impacts, according to a new report published by the International Council on Human Rights Policy on 24 June 2008. The report, Climate Change and Human Rights: A Rough Guide argues that human rights principles can guide climate change policy by focusing on individual suffering and exposure to risk.

To date, little systematic research has examined the human rights dimensions of climate change, yet almost every human right is threatened. Climate change will create new health risks, threaten food and water supplies, destroy land and livelihoods, and lead to forced migration and conflict. Global warming will cause widespread human suffering that will disproportionately affect people in countries already lacking the resources to meet basic human rights obligations.

The report identifies where human rights are relevant to climate change policy: in placing the human person at the centre of analysis, identifying likely future victims and orienting responses to where needs are greatest. Although attention to human rights cannot provide answers to every climate change challenge, it can illuminate injustices and offer tools to assist those most at risk.

Human rights principles can help mobilise and direct adaptation funding, the report finds. They provide criteria for evaluating mitigation and technology transfer policies. The report also examines decision-making processes and accountability, the merits of litigation, and a range of ethical and policy dilemmas that climate change generates.

As former President of Ireland and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson notes in a foreword for the report:

“To address climate change effectively will require a transformation of global policy capacity – from information-gathering and collective decision-making to law enforcement and resource distribution. … Human rights law is relevant because climate change causes human rights violations. But a human rights lens can also be helpful in approaching and managing climate change. The human rights framework reminds us that climate change is about suffering – about the human misery that results directly from the damage we are doing to nature. … As this report makes clear, if we build human rights criteria into our future planning, we will better understand who is at risk and how we should act to protect them.”

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To download a copy of the full report, please click here. (PDF format, 623kb)