Consider two population groups: a well-off urban majority burning fossil fuels, and a subsistence rural minority in danger of losing access to food and water if the climate changes. There is a triple injustice in climate change:
- The rural minority has not been responsible for the greenhouse gas concentrations causing climate change, nor has it benefited from the comfort & power provided by fossil energy services.
- The rural minority will suffer the most from climate change because of droughts & floods, and it cannot buy its way out of the problem.
- The cost-benefit neoclassical approach to the problem sets aside the equity aspect and under-represents the harm caused to low-income subsistence minority in its proposed policies.
“Climate change, social justice and development” – Barker et al., 2008
“Pushing the boundaries of climate economics: critical issues to consider in climate policy analysis”- Scrieciu et al., 2011
“A new economics approach to modelling policies to achieve global 2020 targets for climate stabilisation” – Barker et al., 2011
“The economic feasibility of policies for decarbonisation” – Barker et al., 2014
“GDP and employment effects of policies to close the 2020 emissions gap” – Barker et al., 2015
“The economics of avoiding dangerous climate change” – Barker, 2017
“The world as it is: a vision for a social science (and policy) turn in climate justice” – Storey, 2019
“Social impacts of climate change mitigation policies and their implications for inequality” – Markkanen and Anger-Kraavi, 2019