For Australia’s First Nations communities, climate justice is more than reparations, it requires rethinking climate action

Climate justice has failed to fully wrestle with the link between climate change and colonisation. A new definition for climate justice is needed – one that more firmly foregrounds the needs and priorities of First Nations peoples in colonised places such as Australia. This definition must not only highlight the connections between colonisation and climate change but must conceptualise how both mitigation and adaptation continue to be shaped by colonial power structures. For Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, climate justice can only be achieved through emancipation and the right to self-determine pathways that will provide First Nations communities with the power and authority to implement solutions for the mutual benefit of Country and people. For climate action to be just, emancipation from colonial systems of injustice must be addressed from the outset and made a central pillar of all contemporary climate policy proposals. Ultimately, this article concludes that the most significant forms of climate justice in Australia are sustained resistance and opposition to colonial systems of oppression. Reparations may be a part of this, but they are not the only or even the most important part.