ALL OR MULTIPLE LEVELS OF GOVERNANCE
Actions
+ Investigate and sue polluters
Through a variety of legal mechanisms, people and entities at all levels should initiate investigations and lawsuits that hold polluting industries and their enablers liable for their multifaceted roles in the climate crisis.
What does this look like?
- States/regions/communities/individuals formally launch investigations into polluting industry corporations and actors to firmly establish what they knew about climate change, and when, and what actions they did or didn’t take to address these findings.
- States/regions/communities/ formally sue polluting industry corporations for compensation for the damage caused or projected to be caused as a result of their business practices, failure to comply with climate action commitments, or their deception and manipulation.
- Compensation received should directly support frontline communities and those that endure the direct abuse of polluting corporations, or to funds that distribute to these communities, such as those detailed here (when user clicks “here” they are taken to the measure on loss and damage finance).
- Register legal claims with national and international judicial bodies to expose and challenge the damage and abuses (environmental or personal) endured as a result of specific projects or business practices of transnational corporations.
- These claims, often brought by local communities, have the ability to set ground-breaking precedents that spur lasting change. For example, a local community of Indian fishermen launched a lawsuit that wound up setting a powerful legal precedent for international financial institutions via the U.S. Supreme Court. Read more about this here [when user clicks “here” they are taken to the Indian fishermen case study].
- Judicial systems should guarantee specific prescribed time frames that should be a matter of months (not years), and that states or legal systems are required to adhere to when liability claims are registered.
- File liability lawsuits against the institutional investors and financiers that enable corporations to pollute, destroy, abuse, and to use the corporate personhood or corporate veil to protect themselves.
In recent years, climate change litigation to advance liability claims has been increasing significantly across global jurisdictions. In the past, the majority of these lawsuits have been brought against governments. We’re now, however, witnessing an intensifying focus in launching climate liability cases against corporations based on several robust legal arguments and claims. This shift in focus on holding corporations legally liable for climate change has been facilitated by advancements in climate attribution science, knowledge from previous legal challenges and precedents, increased evidence regarding corporations’ climate change denial and deception efforts, increased public action to hold corporations accountable for climate change, as well as more effective collaboration between governments, attorneys, scientists and advocates across various jurisdictions and legal contexts.
Some of the most prominent types of legal claims that may be utilized to sue corporations directly, collectively, or individually include but are not limited to:
- Public Nuisance [when user clicks on this, they zoom into the definition below before being prompted to zoom back out again]
Nuisance is an act or omission that interferes with the rights of the community, or the public generally. Public nuisance claims focus on the argument that the extraction and promotion of fossil fuels contributes to climate change impacts, such as sea-level rise, and that these impacts create a public nuisance that interferes with rights of individuals or communities represented.
- Negligence[when user clicks on this, they zoom into the definition below before being prompted to zoom back out again] Most polluting corporations had prior knowledge of climate change science and impacts, in some cases decades before it was commonly known by the public. Being able to demonstrate this prior knowledge forms the basis for negligence claims related to a corporation’s breach of their duty of care by not preventing foreseeable harm, and for negligent failure to warn of the likelihood of this harm.
- Misleading advertising [when user clicks on this, they zoom into the definition below before being prompted to zoom back out again]
- These claims focus on corporate advertising that misled the public regarding the corporation’s climate change activities and impacts. Misleading advertising cases allege that promotional and advertising campaigns by polluting corporations violate national law or even the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, which require accurate communications between businesses and people.[8]
- Consumer protection [when user clicks on this, they zoom into the definition below before being prompted to zoom back out again]
- These claims focus on breaches in consumer protection law, which typically forbids corporations from engaging in any unfair or deceptive trade practices. Consumer protection cases assert that polluting corporations engaged in deceptive marketing and promotion of their products by disseminating misleading information refuting the scientific knowledge generally accepted at that time, advancing junk science and developing public relations materials that prevented reasonable consumers from recognizing the risk that products like fossil fuels would cause serious climate change impacts.[9]
- Strict liability [when user clicks on this, they zoom into the definition below before being prompted to zoom back out again]
- Rather than alleging fault (such as negligence or tortious intent by the defendant), these cases claim strict liability for “design defects," - i.e. problems with a product’s design that render it dangerous to use. In these cases, fossil fuels, for example, are the product, with the defect in this case being the impact of the emissions and the known risks associated with them. For strict liability claims to be robust, the evidence needs to show the defendants engaged in business, sold the product to plaintiffs, the product was used as intended and it caused harm to the plaintiffs. [10][11]
- Human rights [when user clicks on this, they zoom into the definition below before being prompted to zoom back out again]
- Human rights-based climate litigation focuses on the role of corporations in driving climate change and the related impact on an individual’s human rights. These types of claims utilize human rights law to demonstrate corporate obligations to respect human rights, such as expressed in the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights or European Convention on Human Rights. These types of claims demonstrate that domestic human rights bodies may also provide leverage for further action on climate change. [12]
- Nature rights
- Torts
- Administrative actions
- Health recovery costs & strength sanitary healthcare systems.
- Violation of Free, Prior and Informed consent as granted under the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIPs)
- Violations under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
- Violations of customary and traditional rights of communities
Click here to read about the lessons learned through the precedent of advancing tobacco industry liability through the Master Settlement Agreement.
+ Compel the release of industry documents
REPLY 2
+ Protect policymaking from polluters’ manipulation
REPLY 3
+ End business with polluters
REPLY 4
+ Recognize and deliver climate reparations
REPLY 4
+ Community-based climate damage funds
REPLY 4
Investigate and sue polluters and their enablers
Through a variety of legal mechanisms, people and entities at all levels should initiate investigations and lawsuits that hold polluting industries and their enablers liable for their multifaceted roles in the climate crisis.
What does this look like?
States/regions/communities/individuals formally launch investigations into polluting industry corporations and actors to firmly establish what they knew about climate change, and when, and what actions they did or didn’t take to address these findings.
States/regions/communities/ formally sue polluting industry corporations for compensation for the damage caused or projected to be caused as a result of their business practices, failure to comply with climate action commitments, or their deception and manipulation.
Compensation received should directly support frontline communities and those that endure the direct abuse of polluting corporations, or to funds that distribute to these communities, such as those detailed here (when user clicks “here” they are taken to the measure on loss and damage finance).
Register legal claims with national and international judicial bodies to expose and challenge the damage and abuses (environmental or personal) endured as a result of specific projects or business practices of transnational corporations.
These claims, often brought by local communities, have the ability to set ground-breaking precedents that spur lasting change. For example, a local community of Indian fishermen launched a lawsuit that wound up setting a powerful legal precedent for international financial institutions via the U.S. Supreme Court. Read more about this here [when user clicks “here” they are taken to the Indian fishermen case study].
Judicial systems should guarantee specific prescribed time frames that should be a matter of months (not years), and that states or legal systems are required to adhere to when liability claims are registered.
File liability lawsuits against the institutional investors and financiers that enable corporations to pollute, destroy, abuse, and to use the corporate personhood or corporate veil to protect themselves.
In recent years, climate change litigation to advance liability claims has been increasing significantly across global jurisdictions. In the past, the majority of these lawsuits have been brought against governments. We’re now, however, witnessing an intensifying focus in launching climate liability cases against corporations based on several robust legal arguments and claims. This shift in focus on holding corporations legally liable for climate change has been facilitated by advancements in climate attribution science, knowledge from previous legal challenges and precedents, increased evidence regarding corporations’ climate change denial and deception efforts, increased public action to hold corporations accountable for climate change, as well as more effective collaboration between governments, attorneys, scientists and advocates across various jurisdictions and legal contexts.
Some of the most prominent types of legal claims that may be utilized to sue corporations directly, collectively, or individually include but are not limited to:
Public Nuisance [when user clicks on this, they zoom into the definition below before being prompted to zoom back out again]
Nuisance is an act or omission that interferes with the rights of the community, or the public generally. Public nuisance claims focus on the argument that the extraction and promotion of fossil fuels contributes to climate change impacts, such as sea-level rise, and that these impacts create a public nuisance that interferes with rights of individuals or communities represented.
Negligence[when user clicks on this, they zoom into the definition below before being prompted to zoom back out again]
Most polluting corporations had prior knowledge of climate change science and impacts, in some cases decades before it was commonly known by the public. Being able to demonstrate this prior knowledge forms the basis for negligence claims related to a corporation’s breach of their duty of care by not preventing foreseeable harm, and for negligent failure to warn of the likelihood of this harm.
Misleading advertising [when user clicks on this, they zoom into the definition below before being prompted to zoom back out again]
These claims focus on corporate advertising that misled the public regarding the corporation’s climate change activities and impacts. Misleading advertising cases allege that promotional and advertising campaigns by polluting corporations violate national law or even the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, which require accurate communications between businesses and people.[8]
Consumer protection [when user clicks on this, they zoom into the definition below before being prompted to zoom back out again]
These claims focus on breaches in consumer protection law, which typically forbids corporations from engaging in any unfair or deceptive trade practices. Consumer protection cases assert that polluting corporations engaged in deceptive marketing and promotion of their products by disseminating misleading information refuting the scientific knowledge generally accepted at that time, advancing junk science and developing public relations materials that prevented reasonable consumers from recognizing the risk that products like fossil fuels would cause serious climate change impacts.[9]
Strict liability [when user clicks on this, they zoom into the definition below before being prompted to zoom back out again]
Rather than alleging fault (such as negligence or tortious intent by the defendant), these cases claim strict liability for “design defects," - i.e. problems with a product’s design that render it dangerous to use. In these cases, fossil fuels, for example, are the product, with the defect in this case being the impact of the emissions and the known risks associated with them. For strict liability claims to be robust, the evidence needs to show the defendants engaged in business, sold the product to plaintiffs, the product was used as intended and it caused harm to the plaintiffs. [10][11]
Human rights [when user clicks on this, they zoom into the definition below before being prompted to zoom back out again]
Human rights-based climate litigation focuses on the role of corporations in driving climate change and the related impact on an individual’s human rights. These types of claims utilize human rights law to demonstrate corporate obligations to respect human rights, such as expressed in the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights or European Convention on Human Rights. These types of claims demonstrate that domestic human rights bodies may also provide leverage for further action on climate change. [12]
Nature rights
Torts
Administrative actions
Health recovery costs & strength sanitary healthcare systems.
Violation of Free, Prior and Informed consent as granted under the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIPs)
Violations under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
Violations of customary and traditional rights of communities
Click here to read about the lessons learned through the precedent of advancing tobacco industry liability through the Master Settlement Agreement.
Compel the release of industry documents
Through measures laid out elsewhere in this roadmap, or via other means, decision-makers may obtain access to industry documents that evidence wrongdoing. Releasing this data is critical for people, civil society, the media, and officials alike to hold corporations accountable for their harms.
What does this look like?
Publicly disclose and release any data and documentation from polluting corporations that has been previously withheld from the public, making it possible to monitor and expose their wrongdoings.
Click here to read about how the release of tobacco industry documents through the Master Settlement Agreement in the U.S. helped advance tobacco industry liability. (when user clicks it zooms into the case study at the very bottom of this doc)
Protect policymaking from polluters’ manipulation
Pass and implement conflict-of-interest policies to create the space for policymakers and public-serving actors to advance justice and real solutions.
What does this look like?
Reduce the ability of polluters to advance policymaking that protects their profits by implementing measures to firewall policymaking from their interference and influence.
This includes but is not limited to:
1) instituting a firewall to end polluting industry access to decision-making processes.
2) addressing vested or conflicting interests.
3) ending preferential treatment of and rejecting partnerships with individuals or organizations directly or indirectly representing dirty industries.
End business with polluters
Withhold a corporation’s license to pollute and abuse by blacklisting polluting corporations, especially those that are currently under public scrutiny or investigation.
What does this look like?
Ban corporations that are currently the subject of legal investigations or found guilty through such investigations (sub-nationally, nationally, regionally or internationally) for allegations related to fraud, misconduct, or human rights abuses from receiving any privilege or incentives, including but not limited to subsidies, stimulus funds, tax breaks, and access to policymaking spaces and negotiations.
International institutions such as the UN bodies and the World Bank or other financing and investment bodies cease relationships with, or blacklist, these corporations.
These measures should also be taken toward polluting corporations and industries in general, in addition to applying them immediately to entities under legal scrutiny.
End the World Bank’s Ease of Doing Business rankings, which grades economies not on the strength of their environmental or corporate accountability policies, but effectively pressures countries to deregulate.
Cut ties and contracts with such corporations at all levels, including local-level partnerships that allow polluters to “greenwash” their image and buy goodwill among community members.
Recognize and deliver climate reparations
Global South communities, women, youth, and Black, and other communities of colour, and Indigenous communities are on the front lines of the climate crisis. Recognize that they are owed reparations for the damage wrought by climate change. And deliver reparations by compelling polluting corporations to pay their debts.
What does this look like?
Distribute and deliver reparations owed to communities on the frontlines of the climate crisis by requiring corporations to pay their climate debt to these communities.
Reparations should be impunitive to avoid dependence on polluting corporations.
Reparations could be delivered in part through a variety of means, subject to the approval of affected communities, including:
Direct compensation for losses incurred (both past, present, and future).
Restoring land unlawfully or unduly under the control of polluting corporations back to its natural stewards, i.e. indigenous communities or local/frontline communities.
Making accessible technology that directly helps impacted communities respond to and address the impacts of climate change.
Cancel any and all debt from Global South countries or frontline communities that arises out of financing real and legitimate climate action within a country.
Community-based climate damage funds
Provide support needed to frontline communities and countries that are adapting to climate change while simultaneously enduring its impacts.
What does this look like?
Establish national or local climate damages/self-defence funds that collect, govern, and disburse the funds retrieved from liability measures advanced internationally, nationally, or sub-nationally.
These should be community governed.
Funds should provide for:
the development of community controlled renewable energy initiatives;
ensuring food sovereignty;
increasing resilience against climate disasters.