On a case-by-case basis, the activist insists on being climatically equal

“We may be less famous than the youth climate movement, but we are many: we are the older women against climate change.” In a cool-looking campaign video, a group of older Swiss women say the words with confidence. This ‘KlimaSeniors’as they are called published on Wednesday before the “Grand Chamber” of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). Activists are suing the Swiss government for human rights violations.

Their government, campaigners say, is failing to tackle CO2₂that it is responsible for the suffering of elderly women, relatively affected by extreme temperatures. This reasoning is not (yet) self-evident: this is the first time that the ECHR has heard a climate case, which in itself means a victory for climate activists.

legal landslide

If the KlimaSeniorinnen were successful, it would mean a potential legal earthquake for the 47 countries that are parties to the European Convention on Human Rights. A large number of lawsuits brought by environmental clubs against governments are likely to follow, according to professor of environmental law at the University of Groningen Gerrit van der Veen. According to him, a victory is certainly not to be excluded: “In view of recent case law, I give them a chance. The fact that the European Court of Human Rights works by examining the case with seventeen judges, who together form the Grand Chamber, “indicates in any case the weight which is attached to this case before the Court”.

According to Professor Lodewijk Smeehuijzen, professor of private law at the VU University of Amsterdam, the KlimaSeniorinnen’s appeal to human rights is an attractive choice: “Climate change can have dramatic implications for human rights. the man. Environmental groups around the world have increasingly realized that, concluded the London School of Economics. Between 1986 and 2014, just over eight hundred climate cases were conducted. Another twelve hundred have been added until 2022.

Legal arguments in court cases can often be clearly transferred from one climate group to another

But the victories of environmental organizations in court are anything but obvious. Climate cases repeatedly come up against the same legal problem, notes Smeehuijzen. “Governments and businesses are powerless to avoid the disastrous consequences of climate change.” Even though the judge ruled in favor of the activists, the negative consequences of climate change still exist after the judgment. “Normally, a judge shows you the door immediately if he knows that his judgment will not have a direct effect on your situation,” says Smeehuijzen. The lion’s share of climate activists are therefore legally behind the net.

This includes the KlimaSeniorinnen, who in 2016 sued the Swiss government for allegedly breaching the Paris climate treaty because it would not limit global warming to 1.5 degrees. The judge dismissed the charge. After all, international agreements have been made to limit emissions, the court said, and even if the 1.5-degree limit is not reached, it won’t happen for decades. By then the KlimaSeniorinnen will be long dead, so their human rights cannot be violated. The seniors have now been pleading for six years, culminating in the case at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.

A legal hailstorm

Activists often use such a “hailstorm” to see what works. For example, the environmental group Mobilization for the Environment is threatening legal action if a number of Dutch provinces do not revoke binding agricultural permits. Sometimes it’s just right, like in the Netherlands in recent years. For example, there was the highly publicized Urgenda case of 2015, in which the Dutch Supreme Court ruled that the state of CO₂emissions, compared to 1990, were to fall by 25% by 2020. Shortly after, climate activists struck again: in 2021, the court in The Hague ruled that Shell must reduce its emissions by 45% in 2030. Both statements came unexpectedly, says Professor Smeehuijzen. But that’s no coincidence either.