Children are particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change. The climate crisis is not only an environmental issue; it is a direct violation of children’s rights. From the right to education to the right to health, climate change threatens nearly every aspect of a child’s wellbeing. Despite contributing the least to the problem, children are disproportionately affected by its consequences. 

Although they are the most vulnerable, children and young people are at the forefront of the fight for climate justice. Through movements like Fridays For Future, young activists are challenging political inaction and demanding urgent climate action.

However, activism alone is not enough. Addressing climate change requires coordinated action by national governments and international bodies to establish and strengthen legal frameworks. These must enable urgent and effective change, keeping children and their rights at the forefront of climate-related policies.

Recognising the impacts of climate change and its intersecting global crises on children and young people is essential to protecting their rights. Climate education can be seen as a means to bridge the gap in climate polarisation among children. Moreover, meaningful youth participation in decision-making is important to empower children and ensure that their voices are heard in political and legal decisions.

By addressing these emerging issues, we are paving the path for climate justice and intergenerational solidarity.

The legal framework for children’s rights and the environment

There are a number of instruments that create a legal framework for children’s rights and the environment. These include human rights law, environmental laws, and standards set by international, regional and national bodies.

International human rights law

Climate change is not explicitly mentioned in the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). However, the General comments include the climate crisis as impacting on the rights of the child. Luxembourg has been a party to the CRC since 1994. The CRC preamble mentions the importance of protecting the natural environment for the development and wellbeing of children. Additionally, it establishes that several substantive rights are related to the natural environment, specifically the right to health (Article 24(2)(c)) and the right to education (Article 29(1)(e)).

In 2023, the Committee on the Rights of the Child recognised in General comment No. 26 that the climate crisis severely undermines the full enjoyment of children’s rights. States have a legal obligation to take urgent action to protect young people from environmental impact. The best interests of children must be a primary consideration in all climate policies.^[1] Governments assess how climate change affects children. States must adopt more ambitious and effective climate measures in order to protect the rights of children.^[2] A failure to act on climate change may amount to a violation of these rights.

Climate obligations

According to the Paris Agreement (2015), states have agreed to mitigate climate change and keep global average temperatures well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels, ideally 1.5°C.^[3] The preamble acknowledges that children are particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change. Additionally, states must take vulnerable groups into account in measures to adapt to and mitigate the effects of climate change. Therefore, in order to fulfil their obligations, states must explicitly protect children’s rights. Luxembourg has an obligation to protect children’s rights to the maximum possible extent.^[4]

In addition, emissions reduction should be a priority in order to support children’s full enjoyment of their rights and to prevent irreversible damage that could harm them.

The CRC and the Paris Agreement provide a foundation to protect children’s rights in the context of climate change. However, these legal frameworks are still quite fragmented and under-enforced.

Nonetheless, they have been used as the legal basis for strategic litigation by children and young people. Governments have a legal obligation to take actionable steps to enforce these rights. Current inaction on climate change is having a negative impact on the wellbeing and development of children.

The climate crisis as a polycrisis

The Children’s Climate Risk Index of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) shows that one billion children live in countries that are at extremely high risk to the impacts of climate change.^[5] The climate crisis has a devastating impact on children’s lives, health, education and wellbeing worldwide. From increased health risks to rising food insecurity, the risks children face are disproportionately high.

Globally, children are experiencing – and will continue to experience – climate and environmental hazards, shocks and stresses. The climate crisis affects children worldwide, particularly in the Global South, where its consequences are the worst.

Repeated exposure to climate and environmental hazards undermines rights: the right to health, the right to adequate food and water, the right to education and the right to life. It is apparent that the climate crisis is not an isolated issue but rather deeply intertwined with other global challenges, such as conflicts, political and economic instability, water security, the energy crisis and pandemics. Scholars refer to this as a polycrisis.^[6] This concept recognises that multiple global crises are interconnected, reinforcing and amplifying one another, with children at the centre, often bearing the brunt of their consequences.

Understanding climate change through the lens of such a polycrisis highlights the need for systemic, rights-based and intergenerational solutions. It underscores the urgent need for climate-resilient economies, climate awareness and education, stronger healthcare systems and a framework that ensures that climate action is considered at all levels of policymaking.

Moreover, the climate crisis and associated global issues can have important long-term implications for children’s mental health, resulting in climate anxiety and eco-anxiety.^[7] Anxiety is an emotion that some children experience as a result of feeling overwhelmed by the complexity and lack of clear solutions to tackle global challenges. Children are facing added physiological stress, followed by feelings of hopelessness and frustration due to political inaction towards climate change. For young people, the polycrisis deepens mental health challenges leading to rising eco-anxiety and further stress. These stressors violate a child’s right to the highest attainable standard of health.

In this context, only early climate-focused education and awareness building can prepare children to face these global challenges.

Climate education as a means to bridge the gap in climate polarisation

Education is an essential tool in addressing the climate crisis, yet many school curricula fail to adequately cover climate science, environmental justice and the social impacts of global warming. Without comprehensive climate literacy, children and young people do not have the tools to understand, engage and respond to the ongoing challenges of climate change.

The way climate change is taught deeply matters. During recent consultations with children and young people in Luxembourg, many students experienced climate fatigue and a sense of hopelessness and frustration, because they were repeatedly exposed to the alarming effects of climate change without seeing actionable solutions. This contributed to eco-anxiety, a growing phenomenon among children and youth. Conversely, the lack of adequate climate education can lead to climate denial, apathy or misinformation. In order to overcome polarisation and disengagement, there is a need for inclusive, empowering and systematic climate education.

Moreover, climate education should be interdisciplinary, integrating climate literacy across all disciplines, such as social sciences, natural sciences and civics. Extending beyond the presentation of facts, education should teach children and young people analytical skills and how to evaluate and assess challenges related to climate change.

A high-quality climate education will support children’s right to information and participation by allowing them to take informed action and engage in public discourse. This will also equip them to better understand the broader triple planetary crisis of climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution.

Furthermore, the Committee on the Rights of the Child has stated that adolescents, as they approach adulthood, must have access to an education that is suitable and supports them in tackling local and global challenges including climate change and environmental degradation.^[8]

It is crucial to recognise the right to education as the most effective means to bridge the gap in climate polarisation and shift the narrative from climate inaction to climate agency. 

Youth climate activism

Children are at the frontline of the fight for environmental justice. From small local protests to global mobilisation, children and youth activists have organised actions and protests to raise awareness, engage political authorities and demand urgent climate action.

The Fridays For Future (FFF) movement began in August 2018 with a single student sitting outside the Swedish Parliament every Friday. Greta Thunberg was only 15 years old when she decided to start her ‘Skolstrejk för klimatet’ (school strike for climate). What started as an individual protest quickly became a global movement. By March 2019, young people in over 125 countries had organised the first global climate strike, with more than 1.6 million participants.^[9] For the first time in history, children and youth mobilised on an international scale to demand climate justice.

In Luxembourg, over 15,000 students participated in the first climate strike in 2019. As part of this global movement, young activists have fought to hold their governments accountable to the Paris Agreement. At the core of this mobilisation was the call for international and intergenerational climate justice, recognising that the climate crisis disproportionately affects young people and future generations.

The fight for climate justice is not just a youth movement; it requires intergenerational collaboration. Children and young people must engage in meaningful dialogue with policymakers. Adolescents in particular should be recognised as agents of change who bring creativity, passion and innovative solutions to the challenges posed by climate change.^[10]

Tackling the climate crisis is a crucial issue for current and future generations. Therefore, to achieve true climate justice, change must be supported by political action and intergenerational efforts to secure a liveable planet for future generations.

In addition to these political means, young people have turned to the courts to advance children’s rights in the context of climate action. This form of strategic litigation can be seen as an expression of activism. It seeks to challenge political inaction, expand existing legal frameworks and reinforce the understanding that climate change is fundamentally a human rights issue.

Defenders of children’s rights

Children around the world are defending their own rights. In Sacchi et al. v. Argentina and others (2021), 16 children brought a complaint before the Committee on the Rights of the Child. They argued that several states had failed to take adequate climate action, thereby violating several children’s rights in the CRC. Although the case was dismissed on procedural grounds, the Committee acknowledged that states can bear extraterritorial responsibility for greenhouse gas emissions and that transboundary environmental harm may give rise to state responsibilities.

In Duarte Agostinho v. Portugal and Others (2024), a group of six young Portuguese citizens similarly alleged that Portugal and 32 other states had violated several human rights within the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), due to present and future impacts of climate change. The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), like the Committee on the Rights of the Child, recognised the existential nature of climate change and the fact that states have assumed international climate obligations. However, it declared the case inadmissible on procedural grounds as the applicants had not exhausted all domestic solutions. Unlike the Committee on the Rights of the Child, the ECtHR refused to broaden the extraterritorial jurisdiction of the ECHR.

Although both cases were unsuccessful, they did help to define the current legal limits of, and establish the legal constraints for future climate litigations by children. For instance, the successful judgement in Verein KlimaSeniorinnen Schweiz and Others v. Switzerland (2024), before the ECtHR, may offer valuable guidance for future claims by defenders of children’s rights. In this case, the ECtHR clarified the admissibility criteria in climate-related cases: individual applicants must demonstrate a “high intensity of exposure” to the adverse consequences and a “pressing need” for protection due to insufficient state measures.[11] Associations, however, may be granted standing if they were lawfully established, pursue a purpose of human rights protection, and are genuinely qualified and representative of affected individuals.[12]

This judgement shows a procedural advantage of relying on associations to bring forward climate related claims before human rights courts. This could offer a potential path for future children’s rights defenders.

Moving forward

The fight against climate change is not only about the environment but also about international solidarity, justice and ensuring that children’s rights are at the centre of climate policy.

Legal frameworks play a crucial role in protecting children from the impacts of climate change. However, without enforcement and meaningful action, these rights remain theoretical^[13]. We must ensure that environmental policies are child-sensitive, acknowledging the disproportionate impact of climate change on children and making their needs a priority in all climate-related decisions. This includes the meaningful engagement of children and young people in national, regional and international climate negotiations and decision-making. Climate action cannot be truly effective unless it is intergenerational, fostering collaboration between young people and policymakers to create impactful and inclusive solutions. Education must be at the forefront of ensuring the engagement of future generations, recognising the importance of climate literacy to bridge the gap in climate polarisation. Access to quality education is an essential tool to ensure climate and social justice and safeguard children’s rights.

Governments must recognise the interconnectedness of global crises and guarantee that children’s rights are at the centre of all policies.

As recent climate litigation before international human rights bodies has shown, there are substantial legal grounds for the defenders of children’s rights to pursue justice. We must use all existing means to the fullest extent to expand the recognition of climate change as a human rights issue.

The voices of children and young people are loud and clear on the streets, but they must be heard in courtrooms, parliaments and global climate negotiations as well. It is time to tackle the root cause of climate change before it is too late and children suffer its worst consequences. Promoting social awareness as early as possible and providing high-quality climate education are essential tools in empowering a new generation to understand the challenges and fight for our climate.

Footenotes

^[1] UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, General comment 26 on children’s rights and the environment, with a special focus on climate change, UN doc. CRC/C/GC/26, § 16.

^[2] CRC/C/GC/26, § 8.

^[3] United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC), The Paris Agreement, art. 2, § 1, ¶ a.

^[4] UNFCC, Paris Agreement, art. 4.

^[5] United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), The climate crisis is a child rights crisis: Introducing the Children’s Climate Risk Index (UNICEF Division of Communications, 2023).

^[6] Jani Siirilä and Arto O. Salonen, ‘Towards a sustainable future in the age of polycrisis,’ Frontiers in Sustainable Development 5 (2024): https://doi.org/10.3389/frsus.2024.1436740.

^[7] Caroline Hickman et al., ‘Climate anxiety in children and young people and their beliefs about government responses to climate change: a global survey,’ The Lancet Planetary Health 5, no. 12 (2021): 863-873.

^[8] UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, General comment 20 on the implementation of the rights of the child during adolescence, UN doc. CRC/C/GC/20, § 12.

^[9] BBC, ‘School strike for climate: Protests staged around the world’, BBC, 24 May 2019, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-48392551.

^[10] CRC/C/GC/20, §2.

[11] Verein KlimaSeniorinnen Schweiz and Others v Switzerland App no 53600/20 (ECtHR, 9 April 2024), § 487.

[12] App no 53600/20, § 502.

^[13] Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Analytical Study on the Relationship Between Climate Change and the Full and Effective Enjoyment of the Rights of the Child –  Report of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, UN doc. A/HRC/35/13.