Climate law experts are already calling it one of the most impactful rulings on human rights and climate change ever made. Today’s judgment, from the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), was read out in front of an eclectic gathering of concerned plaintiffs from around the continent.
A group of older women from Switzerland, young people from Portugal, and a former French mayor—all had brought cases to the court alleging that their governments were not doing enough to battle the climate crisis now regularly ravaging Europe with heat waves, droughts, and other extreme weather.
While the ECHR, based in Strasbourg, France, chose not to admit two of the cases in question, it ruled that the Swiss women were right—their government had failed to do enough to meet the country’s responsibilities over climate change. What’s more, the women plaintiffs had also been denied their right to a fair trial in their country, the court found.
“It’s really a landmark judgement that was issued today, and it’s going to shape how all future climate change judgements are decided,” says human rights law researcher Corina Heri from the University of Zurich, who was present to hear the court’s decision for herself. “I was really relieved and very happy,” she adds, describing the moment when she heard the results of the judges’ deliberations.
Climate activist Greta Thunberg, who also attended the ruling, told reporters afterward that the world could expect more climate-change-related litigation.
The ECHR judges ruled 16 to 1 that the Swiss women—known as the KlimaSeniorinnen, or Senior Women for Climate Protection—had been subject to a violation of their human rights under the terms of the European Convention on Human Rights. The women had argued, for instance, that they were particularly vulnerable to the effects of heat waves.
Essentially, the ECHR has said it deems the Swiss government’s efforts on climate change mitigation to be insufficient. In the immediate aftermath of the ruling, Swiss president Viola Amherd told reporters that she would have to read the court’s judgement before commenting in detail.
“What Switzerland failed to do in the eyes of the court is, firstly, they don’t have a sufficient regulatory framework [for tackling climate change],” says Catherine Higham at the London School of Economics, who coordinates the Climate Change Laws of the World project. “They also felt there was evidence that Switzerland had inadequate 2020 targets and it failed to comply with those.” By 2020, the country had aimed to cut emissions by 20 percent from 1990 levels—however, emissions fell by only 14 percent.
The case brought by a former French mayor who said his town was at risk from rising sea levels was not admitted by the court because the man no longer lives in France. And the case by six Portuguese young people, penned in response to devastating wildfires in 2017, was also not admitted—partly because the plaintiffs did not bring their case in their own country before approaching the ECHR.
Despite this, the positive ruling for the KlimaSeniorinnen is being touted as hugely significant by legal experts. In this case, the court did not accept complaints from individuals within the group, but it did accept complaints made by the group itself as an organization—a distinction that could influence how people collectivize and approach European courts with similar cases in the future, says Heri.
She adds that there was a possibility the court could have ruled that the European Convention on Human Rights doesn’t actually require climate action. Had that happened, it could have undermined existing rulings made in European domestic courts that have demanded tougher climate policies from governments. For example, the Brussels Court of Appeal ruled last year that Belgium must cut its emissions by 55 percent from 1990 levels by 2030.
Today’s judgement comes following years of climate-change-related litigation gathering pace in courts around the world. In the US in 2023, for example, a judge ruled that the state of Montana was violating the right of 16 young people to a “clean and healthful environment.”
Higham says the ECHR’s ruling is “likely to have ramifications around the world.” She notes that, globally, there are around 100 similar cases in progress at various courts, also challenging governments over their climate change mitigation efforts. Heri agrees, noting that the ECHR is viewed globally as a highly influential international court.
Jorge Viñuales at the University of Cambridge, who specializes in law and environmental policy, says it is notable that Switzerland has been found to have fallen foul of human rights legislation, despite the fact that the country has relatively good climate policies. He criticizes the ECHR’s decision not to admit the case brought by the Portuguese young people, however. Part of the court’s reasoning was that their case was targeted not just at Portugal but every EU member state and five other countries. “The court seems to misunderstand that the climate system is everywhere and that effective control over the source of harm is what should count,” says Viñuales.
A big question around climate-change-related legal cases is over their impact—do they actually have enough clout to steer countries and large corporations toward reducing emissions faster than planned? Higham says there is evidence that this is already happening. In the Netherlands, the country’s Supreme Court ordered the government to slash emissions by 15 megatonnes in 2020, and a sharp drop in emissions followed. “We do see policy changes in the Netherlands that seem to be influenced by that judgement,” says Higham.
The ECHR ruling could also reignite cases that have struggled in some nations under the ECHR’s jurisdiction, such as the UK. This is “immensely significant,” says Tim Crosland, director of Plan B, a legal group that challenged the UK government over its climate policies but ultimately lost the case in 2021. “The High Court said, ‘Your fundamental problem is there is no precedent from Strasbourg to support your position that fundamental rights have been violated,’” says Crosland. “Well, now there is.”
Defendants in future cases may feel that their country’s own emissions are only a fraction of those responsible for climate change, and that therefore it is unfair to single one state out over many others. However, the ECHR ruling does not exaggerate nations’ individual duties, says Crosland. Each state has a share of the world’s carbon budget for keeping global warming to, for example, less than 1.5 degrees Celsius.
“Obviously, Switzerland isn’t responsible for emissions from the US or from China, but it’s responsible for its own emissions—and that’s what the judgement says,” he explains.
