Climate justice derives from the idea that historical responsibility for climate change lies with wealthy and powerful people, and yet it disproportionately impacts the poorest and most vulnerable.1 The world’s cities contribute about 75% of greenhouse gas emissions, and in turn are highly vulnerable to heat stress, rising seas, and extreme weather.2 Within and across cities, marginalized populations not only suffer from the consequences of climate change. They are also more likely to be disproportionately burdened by climate policies and less likely to enjoy the benefits of climate action.
How is this playing out in city climate action plans? Researchers at Boston University tackled this question in their analysis of 58 large U.S. cities with a climate action plan as of June 2021.3 They found a range of engagement with justice in urban climate action plans. Forty cities (69%) are attentive to justice in their plans, either by aspiring for justice (20 cities, 34.5%) or by explicitly planning for justice (20 cities, 34.5%). Eighteen cities (31%) do not articulate justice as a core feature of climate action.
One of the most obvious trends is that the level of engagement with justice has increased over time. A variety of factors explain this including the increasing weight of scientific evidence about climate change; the increasing impacts of heat, stress, extreme weather, and rising seas on the quality of life in cities; climate action at the state and international levels; and increasing pressure from a variety of local stakeholders.
Cities with larger populations are more likely to have higher levels of engagement with justice. This may be due to the higher capacities in terms of budget, personnel, etc. of large cities to undertake complex planning efforts. This also reflects the broader trend of big cities increasingly creating climate action plans. For example, the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group was launched in 2005 with representatives from 18 of the world’s “megacities.”4
Some justice-engaged cities such as Boston, New York, and Washington, D.C. have relatively high median incomes juxtaposed with high poverty rates (% of people who live below the poverty level). This inequity may explain why cities with higher scores for aggregate measures of income inequality are more engaged with justice issues compared to cities with more equitable income distributions.
What sectors do cities prioritize? The most common sectors are energy efficiency (47 out 57) plans addressing this sector incorporate justice), clean energy (36 out of 57), and land use and transport (34 out of 54). Although relatively few cities address urban greening and food as part of their mitigation strategies, more than half of these cities connect these policy areas to justice.
A key takeaway from this research is that justice and equity concerns play an increasingly important role in the design of urban climate action plans, progressively pushing cities to articulate more just and inclusive mitigation actions and to develop policy tools to implement and evaluate climate justice efforts. But important work remains. As of June 2021, 42 out of the 100 largest U.S. cities did not have a city-wide climate action plan. Urban decision-makers and activists can regard local climate plans as a key tool to advance just urban transitions in their communities.
1 In-depth Q&A: What is ‘climate justice’?, Carbon Brief, October 4 2021, https://www.carbonbrief.org/in-depth-qa-what-is-climate-justice/
2 Dodman, D., et al., 2022: Cities, Settlements and Key Infrastructure. In: Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability. Contribution of Working Group II to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Cambridge University Press, pp. 907–1040, doi:10.1017/9781009325844.008Link
3 Diezmartínez, C.V., Short Gianotti, A.G. US cities increasingly integrate justice into climate planning and create policy tools for climate justice. Nat Commun 13, 5763 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-33392-9
4 C40 Cities, Our History, accessed August 2, 2023, https://www.c40.org/about-c40/our-history/