Abstract
Jacqueline Peel and Jolene Lin make an important contribution to the climate change litigation literature through their analysis of emerging climate change litigation in the Global South. Their article provides insights into patterns in that litigation and implications for how the cases may fit into transnational climate change governance. As Peel and Lin discuss, context matters greatly in establishing pathways for climate change litigation and determining regulatory impact. They acknowledge that the countries that they study as a group have significant differences among them and that these differences influence how this litigation is emerging. However, their article largely focuses on differences in legal systems and available legal mechanisms.1 This essay builds upon their article by considering how the geography of climate change interacts with this emerging litigation. The essay begins by examining which countries from the Global South are involved, and argues that they are not a representative sample, but rather are among the largest greenhouse gas emitters and highest GDP countries in the Global South. It considers the implications of that pattern for the role of the litigation and its future pathways. The essay then turns to the substantive focus of the lawsuits and analyzes ways in which they reflect the particular geography of mitigation and adaptation in those countries. It concludes by considering how these geographic patterns might influence the future of climate litigation’s impact on governance.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 61-66 |
Number of pages | 6 |
Journal | AJIL Unbound |
Volume | 114 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - 2020 |
All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes
- Law