Climate Justice And Womens Rights

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 License. It is free to read, download and share on Elgaronline.com. Feminist Frontiers in Climate Justice provides a compelling demonstration of the deeply gendered and unequal effects of the climate emergency, alongside the urgent need for a feminist perspective to expose and address these structural political, social and economic inequalities. Taking a nuanced, multidisciplinary approach, this book explores new ways of thinking about how climate change interacts with gender inequalities and feminist concerns with rights and law, and how the human world is bound up with the non-human, natural world.

This book considers how gender issues are entwined with people's vulnerability to the effects of climate change. Vivid case studies show how women and men in developing countries are experiencing climate change and describe their efforts to adapt their ways of making a living to ensure survival, often against extraordinary odds.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Provocative and illuminating essays from women at the forefront of the climate movement who are harnessing truth, courage, and solutions to lead humanity forward. “A powerful read that fills one with, dare I say . . . hope?”—The New York Times NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY SMITHSONIAN MAGAZINE There is a renaissance blooming in the climate movement: leadership that is more characteristically feminine and more faithfully feminist, rooted in compassion, connection, creativity, and collaboration. While it’s clear that women and girls are vital voices and agents of change for this planet, they are too often missing from the proverbial table. More than a problem of bias, it’s a dynamic that sets us up for failure. To change everything, we need everyone. All We Can Save illuminates the expertise and insights of dozens of diverse women leading on climate in the United States—scientists, journalists, farmers, lawyers, teachers, activists, innovators, wonks, and designers, across generations, geographies, and race—and aims to advance a more representative, nuanced, and solution-oriented public conversation on the climate crisis. These women offer a spectrum of ideas and insights for how we can rapidly, radically reshape society. Intermixing essays with poetry and art, this book is both a balm and a guide for knowing and holding what has been done to the world, while bolstering our resolve never to give up on one another or our collective future. We must summon truth, courage, and solutions to turn away from the brink and toward life-giving possibility. Curated by two climate leaders, the book is a collection and celebration of visionaries who are leading us on a path toward all we can save. With essays and poems by: Emily Atkin • Xiye Bastida • Ellen Bass • Colette Pichon Battle • Jainey K. Bavishi • Janine Benyus • adrienne maree brown • Régine Clément • Abigail Dillen • Camille T. Dungy • Rhiana Gunn-Wright • Joy Harjo • Katharine Hayhoe • Mary Annaïse Heglar • Jane Hirshfield • Mary Anne Hitt • Ailish Hopper • Tara Houska, Zhaabowekwe • Emily N. Johnston • Joan Naviyuk Kane • Naomi Klein • Kate Knuth • Ada Limón • Louise Maher-Johnson • Kate Marvel • Gina McCarthy • Anne Haven McDonnell • Sarah Miller • Sherri Mitchell, Weh’na Ha’mu Kwasset • Susanne C. Moser • Lynna Odel • Sharon Olds • Mary Oliver • Kate Orff • Jacqui Patterson • Leah Penniman • Catherine Pierce • Marge Piercy • Kendra Pierre-Louis • Varshini • Prakash • Janisse Ray • Christine E. Nieves Rodriguez • Favianna Rodriguez • Cameron Russell • Ash Sanders • Judith D. Schwartz • Patricia Smith • Emily Stengel • Sarah Stillman • Leah Cardamore Stokes • Amanda Sturgeon • Maggie Thomas • Heather McTeer Toney • Alexandria Villaseñor • Alice Walker • Amy Westervelt • Jane Zelikova

Research, Action and Policy: Addressing the Gendered Impacts of Climate Change presents the voices of women from every continent, women who face vastly different climate events and challenges. The book heralds a new way of understanding climate change that incorporates gender justice and human rights for all.

The climate crisis is the most pressing issue of our times, one that is threatening progress on gender equality and human rights and hindering the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. Against this backdrop of rising global temperatures and unfulfilled national pledges, women, girls and gender-diverse people are mobilizing to demand that their voices be heard in decision-making on climate policy. To answer their demands, this paper describes how to achieve feminist climate justice through four interlinked dimensions (recognition, redistribution, representation and reparation) and the principles of interdependence and intersectionality. It provides practical guidance on what countries need to do to transition to low-emission economies that are resilient to a changing climate, while advancing gender equality and recognising the leadership of women, girls and gender-diverse people in driving the change that is so urgently needed. In doing so, it zooms in on the global food system as just one illustration of how this framework can be applied, as well as provides analysis of the major barriers to accountability for gender-responsive climate action and how they can be overcome. The vision for feminist climate justice is of a world in which everyone can enjoy the full range of human rights, free from discrimination, and flourish on a planet that is healthy and sustainable. With this conceptual framework, UN-Women aims to open up space for discussion of feminist alternatives to the status quo and to inform the next edition of its flagship report, Progress of the World's Women, on gender equality in the age of climate crisis.

This book explains how gender, as a power relationship, influences climate change related strategies, and explores the additional pressures that climate change brings to uneven gender relations. It considers the ways in which men and women experience the impacts of these in different economic contexts. The chapters dismantle gender inequality and injustice through a critical appraisal of vulnerability and relative privilege within genders. Part I addresses conceptual frameworks and international themes concerning climate change and gender, and explores emerging ideas concerning the reification of gender relations in climate change policy. Part II offers a wide range of case studies from the Global North and the Global South to illustrate and explain the limitations to gender-blind climate change strategies. This book will be of interest to students, scholars, practitioners and policymakers interested in climate change, environmental science, geography, politics and gender studies.

"An urgent call to arms by one of the most important voices in the international fight against climate change, sharing inspiring stories and offering vital lessons for the path forward." -- From book jacket.

A critique of population control narratives reproduced by international development actors in the 21st century Since the turn of the millennium, American media, scientists, and environmental activists have insisted that the global population crisis is “back”—and that the only way to avoid catastrophic climate change is to ensure women’s universal access to contraception. Did the population problem ever disappear? What is bringing it back—and why now? In On Infertile Ground, Jade S. Sasser explores how a small network of international development actors, including private donors, NGO program managers, scientists, and youth advocates, is bringing population back to the center of public environmental debate. While these narratives never disappeared, Sasser argues, histories of human rights abuses, racism, and a conservative backlash against abortion in the 1980s drove them underground—until now. Using interviews and case studies from a wide range of sites—from Silicon Valley foundation headquarters to youth advocacy trainings, the halls of Congress and an international climate change conference—Sasser demonstrates how population growth has been reframed as an urgent source of climate crisis and a unique opportunity to support women’s sexual and reproductive health and rights. Although well-intentioned—promoting positive action, women’s empowerment, and moral accountability to a global community—these groups also perpetuate the same myths about the sexuality and lack of virtue and control of women and the people of global south that have been debunked for decades. Unless the development community recognizes the pervasive repackaging of failed narratives, Sasser argues, true change and development progress will not be possible. On Infertile Ground presents a unique critique of international development that blends the study of feminism, environmentalism, and activism in a groundbreaking way. It will make any development professional take a second look at the ideals driving their work.

Women make up the vast majority of activists and organizers of grassroots movements fighting against environmental ills that threaten poor and people of color communities. New Perspectives on Environmental Justice is the first collection of essays that pays tribute to the enormous contributions women have made in these endeavors. The writers offer varied examples of environmental justice issues such as children's environmental health campaigns, cancer research, AIDS/HIV activism, the Environmental Genome Project, and popular culture, among many others. Each one focuses on gender and sexuality as crucial factors in women's or gay men's activism and applies environmental justice principles to related struggles for sexual justice. The contributors represent a wide variety of activist and scholarly perspectives including law, environmental studies, sociology, political science, history, medical anthropology, American studies, English, African and African American studies, women's studies, and gay and lesbian studies, offering multiple vantage points on gender, sexuality, and activism. Feminist/womanist impulses shape and sustain environmental justice movements around the world, making an understanding of gender roles and differences crucial for the success of these efforts.