Empowering International Law to Address Claims for Climate Reparations

A fundamental and widely recognized inequity at the core of the existential climate crisis facing the planet today is that those who have contributed the least to climate change are also the most affected. The United States, European Union-28, Russia, Japan, and Canada, according to some accounts, are together responsible for 85 percent of global greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions thus far. 1 Yet it is the climate vulnerable—least developed countries, low lying, and small island states among others—that are at the frontlines of climate impacts. There is widespread scientific and diplomatic consensus on the multiple causes and devastating impacts of climate change but so far justice for vulnerable states has proven elusive.