The enforcement of transnational climate litigation cases in Africa: Any role for Private International Law? (original) (raw)

Putting Africa on the Stand: A Bird’s Eye View of Climate Change Litigation on the Continent

2019

Although climate change litigation is rapidly increasing worldwide, and despite Africa being one of the regions predicted to be most severely affected by climate change, the continent has not yet seen any significant growth in this specialized form of litigation. Only a comparatively small number of court cases have to date been recognized as climate change conflicts in Africa. While briefly reflecting on possible reasons for this surprising trend, the primary objective of this article is to offer a first comprehensive interrogation of the state and future prospects of climate change litigation in Africa with a focus on three cases from South Africa, Uganda and Nigeria. The analysis commences with a characterization of current trends in and forms of climate change litigation that are emerging the world over, including a brief assessment of the types of climate change conflicts that are usually litigated, and the challenges and advantages associated with this specialized form of liti...

Climate Change Litigation: Comparative and International Perspectives

British Institute of International and Comparative Law, 2020

The British Institute of International and Comparative Law held the event 'Climate Change Litigation: Comparative and International Perspectives' on 16 January 2020, as part of the Arthur Watts Seminar Series in Public International Law funded by Volterra Fietta. The event discussed legal developments in the field of climate change from a comparative and international perspective. It was comprised of two panels, the first on 'Climate Change Litigation before Domestic Courts', and the second on 'Climate Change Litigation at the International Level'. The panelists included academics and legal practitioners, many of whom were, or are currently, involved in strategic climate change lawsuits, in a range of jurisdictions. The event was opened by Lord Carnwath of the United Kingdom Supreme Court. This report provides an overview of the discussions and synthesises some of the conclusions. It is divided into two parts according to the panel topics, and its content is presented thematically, with each sub-heading incorporating relevant comments that were made throughout the event.

Climate Justice under the Paris Agreement: Framework and Substance

Carbon & Climate Law Review, 2021

The Paris Agreement is the first treaty under the global climate regime to mention 'climate justice' as a concept. Given this unprecedented legal turn of the concept, the article reports a sociolegal study of climate justice, framing and assessing the substantive issues arising from the post-Paris negotiations of the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) leading to the Glasgow COP in 2021. Gleaned from these framework and issues, how does climate justice look under the Paris Agreement? Drawing on the author's lived, legal practice and civil society experience, carrying out a doctrinal analysis of the UNFCCC and its instruments, and reviewing pivotal and representative literature and policy documents, the article claims that climate justice faces the fundamental challenge of state sovereignty. The author creates the conceptual and policy framework to identify the substantive issues converging on this fundamental challenge, assessing four of them: state self-centredness in addressing adaptation, state influence on the progress made on loss and damage, state autonomy and discretion in providing finance, and state-based policy-making that undermines inclusive decision-making. State and non-state actors are addressing some of these substantive issues already under the UNFCCC and beyond, and litigation has become a cross-cutting remedy. However, the fundamental challenge of state sovereignty remains.

Increasing Climate Litigation: A Global Inventory

French Yearbook of Public Law, 2023

Climate change, often described as a “super-wicked” problem, has led to an increasing number of legal actions against governments and cor- porations worldwide. These cases, stemming from the failure of na- tional and international policymakers to address climate change ad- equately, are expanding in scale and ambition. This article explores climate litigation as a response to the urgent climate change crisis. It provides a global overview of climate-related litigation by examining prominent domestic cases, underscoring the collective nature of cli- mate governance and the crucial role of the judicial system in address- ing this global challenge.