Legal Challenges To Just Transitions: Summary Report

Abstract

Report from workshop entitled 'Legal Challenges to Just Transitions' held at University of Glasgow on 21 April 2023, organised by the Just Transition Research Cluster at the School of Law.

Just Transition focuses on ensuring timely progress towards net zero and addressing the impact of the transition to ensure fairness in the treatment of different communities in how they experience the effects of the transition. Some Just Transition policy frameworks are already in place but in overall terms Just Transition is less developed as a concept and policy framework than some other elements of sustainability. While that trend can be explained to some extent by the time required to consider and respond to the impact of evolving sustainability frameworks, other aspects are linked more to the subjective and contested nature of the ‘just’ element of Just Transition. Against that background, our workshop brought together participants and experts engaged in Just Transition policy development in Scotland, the UK and EU with a view to understanding the process and the role of law. We set out some core questions for the workshop on the relationship between Just Transition and law and focused on these in three panels addressing Just Transition across the public, private and corporate sectors. This summary report serves as a record of the workshop that was held at the University of Glasgow on 21 April 2023. It will be followed in due course by more detailed research and engagement on the issues.

Keywords: Just Transition, Law