Liz Morrison

All my life I have been intrigued by the study of political philosophy and the psychology behind individual political leanings based on geography, religion, nationality, profession etc. because of where I grew up. I still dont fully understand how I became who I am, in an environment where I was taught to be the opposite of who I have become. How do people develop political beliefs and what keeps them from questioning them? Specifically with climate change…it blows my mind. Throughout my life, I have been through many forms of climate activism. At home in Tennessee, I led small-scale climate advocacy targeted at the state and community level. Having conversations with climate deniers and studying their perceptions of climate activism and learning how to speak in a language they understand. I have been an activist from a law and policy route as well as an educational one, now I am combining the two. 

The extreme shift to far-right politics in the US has created confusion, distrust, propaganda, and hate among people and communities, leading to failures in international multilateralism. I want to study how national contexts and national politics create the contentious spaces expected to “tackle” the climate crisis, and why this is failing. I want to engage with the concepts of democracy and democratic backsliding, political polarization, populist nationalism, multilateralism, extractivism, and international governance. I want to be able to communicate these concepts in digestible writing that people on both sides of the political spectrum can understand and relate to. This is a really hard thing to do but it’s kind of my life goal.

My goals to work in the environmental law sector advocating for environmental injustices have influenced my passion for a deeper understanding of the sociology behind climate denial and the interworkings of the power structures within climate politics and policies. After studying the effects of climate change in frontline communities and learning how these communities are not given the power and influence they must have at an international level, I wanted to continue learning how these spaces are created and become exclusionary and what capacity they can be used to change this power dynamic. Seeing inadequate work being done on an international scale to hold nations accountable for the loss and damages they contribute to or directly cause in marginalized areas of the world, I have become increasingly frustrated with this system. After going to COP 27 in Egypt and COP28 in Dubai, I realized my true passion is in climate politics and the creation and enforcement of international law and human rights. In envisioning the future of human and non-human life through the lens of climate justice, it's imperative to acknowledge that human rights and climate change are intrinsically linked to each other.

During my undergraduate learning experience, I encountered many inconvenient truths about the world I live in. Truths that most mainstream educational resources will not highlight, and can not be fully understood without human stories outside of traditional classrooms. Human life is not valued by the powers which control the world. Individuals and communities are categorized by systems created by oppressors and perpetuated to create the illusion of freedom and self-determination for all while exploiting those who are deemed less than human. The world I live in categorizes, labels, and ranks individuals and communities based on their perceived value in advancing the plots of the elite powers in a world order built around success, power, lust, and greed. The colonial legacy, etched by the ravages of Western imperialism, growth, success, and the insatiable greed of capitalism, has birthed a legacy of patriarchal subjugation. But we have been told that we all have rights, and we are all “equal” under the law. 

Looking back at my experiences and research all over the world, I have begun to interrogate the very notion of human rights—those privileges we assume to be innate to humanity. But whose humanity? Whose voices are drowned out amidst the rising tide of environmental catastrophe? Do the disenfranchised, the marginalized, and the sacrificed, truly share in these rights? If we are given rights just for being human, then maybe whoever decides what these rights are and what they mean, doesn't consider those who are at the frontlines of climate change as human…

The right to life, dignity, water, sanitation, food, and home—these pillars of human rights stand perilously undermined by the ravages of climate change. As the climate crisis becomes impossible for anyone to ignore, it is the voices of marginalized communities that are drowned out, or intentionally silenced in global and national discussions and decision-making processes about climate action. I have begun to consider the law’s limitations in addressing the broader systemic issues of climate injustice and the disparities between who the law works for and who it does not. 

 

Human rights-based climate litigation should demand accountability from profit-driven corporations and state actors, demanding they confront the human impacts of their actions directly. 

It will require lawyers to transcend linear thinking and embrace a holistic vision of justice—one that recognizes the interconnectedness of humanity’s injustices and the exploitation of the natural world for economic profit and power. This approach represents a human ecological paradigm, recognizing the interconnectedness of social and environmental systems. Future lawyers must be equipped with the tools they will need for these new trends in climate litigation and better understand the importance of a human rights based approach to climate litigation. 

When analyzed holistically and applied universally so that all individuals receive equal access to the law, human rights approaches to climate litigation could be used as a powerful framework for advancing climate justice in a way that demands mandatory mitigation targets for international actors and accountability for historical responsibility for the climate crisis. Though this outlook is exhaustively optimistic, from what I have learned I believe that it is possible.