Climate Change and Human Rights – Seattle

The University of Washington School of Law presents Three Degrees: The Law of Climate Change and Human Rights Conference May 28-29, 2009. The Climate Project is a partner.

The Law of Climate Change and Human Rights Conference will bring legal practitioners and scholars from a range of disciplines together with an international body of relief organizations and peoples impacted most heavily by climate change, to discuss the application of human rights law to the impending climate crisis. Numerous scholars have suggested that human rights law may provide the most adequate and responsible remedy for climate-related impacts, and this conference will create an international forum to thoroughly test the available remedies, raise the legal issues associated with these remedies, and collaborate over necessary advancements in the law.Through the lens of a fictitious disaster scenario, The Law of Climate Change and Human Rights Conference will offer an opportunity for creative problem-solving and collaboration for lawyers engaged in the historically separate fields of environmental, human rights, refugee, and public health law, and scholars from fields as diverse as philosophy and geography. Panels will address topics such as the forced migration of climate refugees, the disproportionate impacts of climate change on the worldÂ’s poor, the national security implications of climate change, as well as reforms to the governance structure overseeing climate mitigation.