Climate Ethics and Intergenerational Justice

Climate ethics addresses the distinctive moral structure of anthropogenic climate change: its causes (principally the combustion of fossil fuels and land-use change) and its worst harms are separated by decades to centuries, its greatest historical contributors — chiefly industrialized nations such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and the European Union member states, which account for a large share of cumulative carbon dioxide emissions since the Industrial Revolution according to data compiled by the Global Carbon Project — are often not those who will suffer its most severe consequences, which fall disproportionately on low-emitting, economically poorer, and often low-lying or arid regions such as Bangladesh, the Sahel, and small island states like Tuvalu and Kiribati. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), established in 1988 by the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Programme, has documented in its periodic assessment reports (the Sixth Assessment Report was completed in 2023) that global mean surface temperature has already risen by roughly 1.1–1.2°C above pre-industrial levels, driving increased frequency and severity of heatwaves, droughts, and extreme precipitation, alongside sea-level rise threatening coastal and island populations.