Climate Change as Climate Debt: Forging a Just Future

Climate change may be the most far reaching manifestation of white privilege and class privilege yet to face humankind. Caused overwhelmingly by high-consuming people, climate change is wreaking death and destruction foremost on impoverished people who also are disproportionately people of color. This presentation will first posit climate change as a compelling moral matter of “race- and class-based climate debt” and “Global North climate-debt.” Part Two will draw upon the descriptive task of Christian ethics as a critical discourse to frame a moral response. A brief third section will suggest keys to accepting commensurate moral responsibility. Finally, drawing upon international environmental law, the presentation illustrates implications for climate-related policy. Along the way, I propose the concepts of “climate privilege” and “climate violence” as tools for demystifying our situation, and “climate citizenship” as a tool for moral identity.

Speaker: Cynthia Moe-Lobeda, Church Divinity School of the Pacific