Labour law, climate change and the just transition

Climate change is one of the biggest and most complex challenges that the world will face over the next decades and an ever more pressing concern for governments. Addressing this challenge effectively will require a significant economic and social transition, affecting patterns of production and consumption. The effects of climate change on the physical environment, as well as the measures taken to mitigate and adapt to these effects, will have profound consequences for workers and labour markets. In recent years, trade unions have increased efforts to identify these effects and to ensure that workers’ rights and livelihoods will be sufficiently protected in the shift to a clean economy. Yet, as has now been pointed out by a number of scholars, the labour law academic community has engaged with the topic of climate change and just transition relatively little.

The aim of this webinar is to engage labour lawyers and labour law scholars in a conversation about the effects of climate change and related measures on labour law and policy and to begin defining the role which labour law could play in ensuring a just transition for workers. To start the conversation, we have invited Professor Frank Hendrickx (KU Leuven), Dr Ania Zbyszewska (Carleton University) and Dr Paolo Tomassetti (University of Bergamo). The webinar will be structured around a set of questions to be discussed by the three speakers, with time for further questions and comments by the audience. We hope to have a lively discussion which sparks interest and identifies avenues for future research on this important topic.

For more info please contact Kalina Arabadjieva