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As Europe strives to lower greenhouse gas emissions and decouple economic growth from resource consumption, various social groups and regions face unequal challenges. According to a report by the European Environment Agency (EEA) published today, ensuring justice in sustainability transitions requires combining corrective measures to address potentially regressive social consequences of the green transition with participatory decision-making processes, and recognition of different cultures, values and capabilities.
The EEA report ‘Just sustainability transitions – From concept to practice’ addresses key questions for ensuring fairness as Europe moves ahead towards the goals of the European Green Deal. The report offers tools for policymakers to better understand and govern just transitions.
Delivering justice in Europe’s sustainability transition is multi-dimensional. It requires efforts to correct the unequal distribution of the costs of climate and environmental policies across society, as well as to alleviate the unequal burden of pollution and climate risks for places and people. At the same time, it also requires fair participation in decision-making, enabling vulnerable groups to participate and recognising and engaging with different perspectives and cultures, the EEA report argues.
There is potential to learn from good practice at different levels of governance in implementing measures to deliver social fairness, with case studies from across Europe described in the report. Delivering transitions that are fair demands careful consideration of the specificities, inequalities and challenges of the local context, and its interplay with policy objectives and socio-economic trends at larger geographical scales.
The EU has put forward several initiatives to support those territories and people most affected by the transition towards climate neutrality, including the Just Transition Mechanism and the Social Climate Fund. The political guidelines of the European Commission President-elect, Ursula von der Leyen, refer to a need to ensure a just transition for all, including through increased funding, roll-out of the Social Climate Fund, and putting forward an affordable housing plan and a new Pact for European Social Dialogue.
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