Human rights in climate change adaptation policies: a systematic assessment

Human rights have potential to enhance adaptation because they reflect internationally agreed upon standards of human dignity, aim to advance formal and substantive forms of equality, and can be used to hold public and private actors accountable for rights violations. We assess whether, how, and under what conditions national adaptation policies recognize human rights principles and standards. We analyze 217 adaptation policies from 147 countries to examine whether there is substantive recognition of the vulnerability and needs of equity-deserving groups that experience systemic marginalization and exclusion, and procedural inclusion of these groups in adaptation planning and decision-making. Results indicate that while under the Paris Agreement governments commit to respect human rights in their adaptation policies and actions, few countries are abiding by this commitment. Only one-third of countries refer to respect, promotion, or consideration of human rights within their adaptation policies. While most countries included here recognize specific conditions of different vulnerable groups in their policies, there is minimal evidence of their inclusion in the adaptation planning and decision-making process, and half of countries fail to identify specific measures that will be developed to reduce their vulnerability. None of the strategies that we reviewed pointed to the creation of accountability mechanisms for redressing harms that may arise due to adaptation actions. We also develop a series of regression models to examine whether hypothesized national predictors of adaptation action are associated with attention to human rights principles and standards. The models indicate that countries with greater wealth and equality are more likely to include attention to human rights norms in their adaptation strategies, but countries with less wealth, more inequality, and less political freedom appear to achieve a more substantive level of engagement with these norms in their strategies. Most countries fail to link human rights obligations and adaptation in national policies.Most countries situate national adaptation policies within various structural drivers of vulnerability.Equity-deserving groups are not being included in national adaptation planning in meaningful ways.Participation of equity-deserving groups predicts inclusion of measures to build adaptive capacity among those groups.National governments do not identify accountability mechanisms that address human rights harms from adaptation actions.

Automated summary

This study assesses the recognition of human rights principles and standards in national adaptation policies worldwide, and finds that only a few countries actually fulfill their commitment to respect human rights. While most countries acknowledge the needs of vulnerable groups in their policies, they fail to include them in the adaptation planning process and do not establish accountability mechanisms for human rights harms caused by adaptation actions.