Climate Inequality Is Real: We Should Avoid Regressive Action

Populist politicians are turning the climate crisis into a wedge issue, sacrificing the environment to the culture wars. If there’s one pervasive problem that’s allowed them to do that, it’s inequality.

- LARA WILLIAMS

The unequal dynamic that may first come to mind is international relations between developed and developing nations. As the UN’s CoP-28 climate summit draws near, discussions have grown urgent on how to distribute finances from wealthy countries, which have been responsible for the vast majority of carbon emissions, to vulnerable nations that are bearing the brunt of their impact.

Although those negotiations will be vital for a just transition to a decarbonized global economy, socioeconomic inequalities within borders should receive equal attention. A recent report from Oxfam and the Stockholm Environment Institute explored the idea of carbon inequality, and came up with the figure that the richest 1% of the global population pollutes just as much as the poorest 66%. It also found that most of the inequality in emissions is now due to differences within countries rather than between them.