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Can the law protect us from climate change?

July 24, 2015

Can the law protect us from climate change?

Can the law protect us from climate change? Do we have a legal right to a stable climate? Are governments responsible for preventing dangerous climate change within their borders? One month ago I would have answered these questions with “most likely not”, but one extraordinary court case changed that to “hopefully, yes!”

I have been following this case from the moment John Jopling recommended to me the book Revolution Justified by Roger Cox, the lawyer behind the climate case. (an interesting read, John wrote a great review about it.) This led me to study the 120 page indictment and follow the court case on a live stream. This article will first introduce why this case is different than others, secondly how it has been received in the Netherlands and thirdly how to proceed from here with the COP21 in mind.

1. The case

As a lay-person in law and legislation it was surprisingly easy to understand the legal documents and Roger’s book. Basically the argument is that the government has to protect its citizens against external threats. This is a widely accepted government task. If a neighbouring country were to invade we would expect the government to coordinate the response. The difficulty is that we do not yet perceive climate change as the immense threat it clearly is according to climate science. In Revolution Justified the parallel with the ban on asbestos is made. In both cases it seemed initially like a good idea to make use of a polluting resource, but gradually the unexpected consequences piled up. According Roger Cox the level of consensus required to ban asbestos was lower than the current level of consensus on the dangers of climate change.

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