Advancing children’s human rights and climate justice  

Protecting children’s right to a healthy environment, including a healthy ocean, is essential to ensure climate justice. Hub Director Elisa Morgera and early-career researcher Sophie Shields contributed to two international conferences on children’s human rights and climate justice, connecting One Ocean Hub research findings with a wide network of children’s rights and climate justice experts.  

Elisa participated in the “Child/youth-friendly climate justice: Progress and Opportunities” conference at University College Cork, Ireland, organised by Prof Aoife Daly, from 30 September-1 October 2024. With Sophie, she also participated in the ‘Climate (In)justice: How Climate Change Affects Children’s Access to Justice’ conference (Brussels, 10-11 October 2024). Elisa also participated remotely in the ASEAN Dialogue on the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child General Comment No. 26 hosted in the Philippines on 2nd November 2024, to explore the connections between the protection of children’s human rights and her mandate as UN Special Rapporteur on Climate Change and Human Rights. 

Child/youth-friendly climate justice 

Elisa delivered a presentation based on One Ocean Hub research titled “Children’s climate justice is also about biodiversity, the ocean and the human right to science” in Cork, focusing on children’s human rights to a healthy environment, education and science and on the need for States and researchers to prioritise children’s best interests in advancing ocean science at the climate-biodiversity-ocean nexus. The presentation also discussed the need for inter-generational dialogues to support children’s climate justice. In addition, in her capacity as UN Special Rapporteur on Climate Change and Human Rights, Elisa chaired a plenary session with Aoife Nolan, President of the Council of Europe’s European Committee of Social Rights; and Niamh Purcell, Young Advisor for Ireland’s Children and Young People’s Assembly on Biodiversity Loss. Overall, the interdisciplinary conference highlighted how children and youth have emerged as central figures in the fight against the climate crisis, challenging traditional views of children as passive victims; and what adults need to do to empower children and young people as leaders in the climate crisis. The Cork conference followed on from a previous workshop in Spain on the intersection of international environmental law and children’s rights.   

Children’s Access to Justice 

The Child Friendly Justice European Network (CFJ-EN) conference featured children climate activists as lead panellists who asked the most salient questions about how the United Nations , European Commission and Council of Europe can better protect human rights in the context of climate change, notably by supporting their agency in co-developing climate solutions. Elisa co-delivered a keynote speech together with two child climate defenders, in the form of an interview; and also participated in a panel together with Regina Jensdottir – Head of the Children’s Rights Division at the Council of Europe, and Marie-Cécile Rouillon– European Commission Coordinator for the Rights of the Child, which was also led by three young climate activists.

Some of the key points emerging from the two conferences concerned the need to create safe and generative spaces for intergenerational dialogue with clear impacts on climate-related decision-making, which entails: 

• enhancing the capacity of adults to respect children’s human right to be ;  
• respecting children’s right to express their views through art and play and other forms they prefer;heard;  
• the effective protection of child environmental human rights defenders from criminalisation, abuse of police power, harassment, and reprisals in schools for exercising their human right to freedom of expression; and 
• the need to ensure a fair allocation of burdens in climate action, with adults (including the research community) to shoulder the responsibility to transform decision-making processes & climate solutions during the present decade. 

Reflections 

Sophie reflected:

“Climate change places structural pressures on justice systems, in all of their forms, which should be designed and operated to respect and uphold the rights of children. Spaces like the Annual Seminar allow us to discuss and exchange knowledge on the transformations we urgently need, and to place children’s voices, ideas, and action at the centre of much needed progress. 

Panel colleagues and moderators discussed and problematised the current state of play for children and young people who are still experiencing real barriers to co-creating solutions to environmental damage, and accessing justice for the gross rights violations that are being created and exacerbated by climate change. 

Special thanks to all of the children and young people [whose] work as climate activists and child environmental rights defenders is at the heart of the necessary, urgent action we need to protect and respect the planet for current and future generations.”

Click the “One Ocean Learn” button in the Hub’s menu header – If you wish to know more about children’s human rights and ocean governance, please explore this Learning Pathway on One Ocean Learn: Children’s rights and ocean governance

Related SDGs:

  • Quality education
  • Gender equality
  • Reduced inequality
  • Sustainable cities and communities
  • Climate action
  • Life below water
  • Peace, justice and strong institutions