Human Rights

Human rights are universal, inalienable, and interdependent guarantees that belong to every person simply because they are human. They were first articulated comprehensively in the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights and later expanded through the International Covenants, which together form the International Bill of Rights. Universality means everyone is equally entitled to these rights; inalienability means they cannot be taken away except through due process; and interdependence means no right can be fully realised without the others. Non‑discrimination is a foundational principle running through all major human rights treaties.

States have legal duties to uphold human rights, and individuals share responsibility for respecting the rights of others. By ratifying human rights treaties, governments commit to three obligations: to respect rights by not interfering with them, to protect people from abuses by others, and to fulfil rights through positive action that enables their enjoyment. While rights belong to each person individually, safeguarding them is a collective responsibility.(1)

The climate crisis threatens several human rights, including the right to life, right to food, right to adequate housing, and right to water, sanitation, and health. It also deepens inequality by disproportionately affecting people already marginalised by poverty and discrimination. On an individual level, this includes young people, future generations, girls, and women. On a country level, these are the less industrially developed countries, including low-lying island states.

The Human Rights-Based Approach (HRBA) is the first of the six Guiding Principles of the United Nations Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework. It is a conceptual framework for the process of human development, seeking to analyse the existing inequalities that sit at the heart of development problems and to redistribute power. HRBA requires human rights principles to guide United Nations development cooperation.

Climate change undermines a wide range of human rights, especially for already marginalised groups. International law requires States, businesses, and other actors to take rights‑based climate action that prevents harm, protects vulnerable people, ensures participation and accountability, and shares responsibilities fairly across countries and generations.

The right to a remedy is central to human rights, but climate‑related harms make it unusually hard to enforce: victims (often the poorest and least responsible) face financial, legal, and scientific barriers to accessing justice, while states remain legally obliged to provide remedies, stop ongoing violations, prevent future harm and offer restitution, compensation, or other forms of reparation. As climate litigation expands across domestic, regional and international forums, courts are developing ways to address causation, jurisdiction, and shared responsibility so that those harmed by climate change can meaningfully seek redress.

The UN’s 2022 recognition of the human right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment marks a major global milestone, affirming that everyone is entitled to both the environmental conditions (clean air, a safe climate, healthy ecosystems) and the procedural protections (access to information, participation, justice) needed to enjoy this right. Its adoption is expected to accelerate legal, political, and societal action, embedding a rights‑based approach across environmental policy, strengthening accountability for states and businesses, and empowering communities and defenders to demand protection of people and planet alike.

The movement to give legal rights to nature is gaining momentum worldwide, but it remains conceptually and legally difficult because nature cannot hold rights or responsibilities the way humans do. Efforts to grant personhood to rivers, forests, or ecosystems rely on human guardians, face enforcement and political challenges, draw on Indigenous relational worldviews, and function mainly as innovative tools for protecting ecological integrity rather than true equivalents to human rights.

The European Court of Human Rights’ (ECtHR) 2024 KlimaSeniorinnen ruling held that Switzerland violated human rights by failing to adopt adequate climate policies, confirming that states can be held legally accountable when weak climate action endangers life, health and well‑being. The judgment requires all 47 Convention members to set clear emissions targets, integrate climate science into decision‑making, and ensure access to justice. Switzerland must now strengthen its laws, correct policy gaps, and implement domestic measures under court supervision.

Vanuatu’s youth‑led push for an International Court of Justice advisory opinion culminated in a 2023 UN resolution asking the Court to clarify states’ legal duties to protect the climate system and the rights of present and future generations. The ICJ’s Advisory Opinion on the Obligations of States in Respect of Climate Change confirms that states have binding obligations under international law to prevent significant climate harm, act with due diligence, cooperate internationally, and avoid conduct that endangers vulnerable countries and peoples, with failures potentially triggering legal consequences and reparation duties despite the opinion’s non‑binding nature.