• for: urban development, inequality, just boundaries, safe and just boundaries, climate justice, urban planetary boundaries, livable cities, earth system boundaries, earth system justice
• title: Urban inequalities in the 21st century economy
• author: Jan niman, Yehua Dennis Wei
• date: Apr 2, 2020
• source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7124478/

• for: green city, living city, environmental justice, safe and just transition, safe and just boundaries earth system boundaries, just transition, climate justice, cross-scale translation of earth system boundaries
• title: Environmental justice in a very green city: Spatial inequality in exposure to urban nature, air pollution and heat in Oslo, Norway
• author: Zander S. Venter, Helene Figari, Olve Krange, Vegard Gundersen
• date: Feb. 2023
• source: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S004896972207293X#f0005

• for: safe and just boundaries, earth system boundaries, planetary boundaries
• title
  • Safe and just Earth system boundaries

• for: inequality, wealth tax, climate justice, earth system justice
• policy paper
• title
  • Survival of the Richest
• source
  • Oxfam

• date

  • Jan 2023

• Executive Summary

  • Since 2020, the richest 1% have captured almost two-thirds of all new wealth
    • nearly twice as much money as the bottom 99% of the world’s population.
  • Billionaire fortunes are increasing by $2.7bn a day,
    • even as inflation outpaces the wages of at least 1.7 billion workers, more than the population of India.7
  • Food and energy companies more than doubled their profits in 2022,
    • paying out $257bn to wealthy shareholders,
    • while over 800 million people went to bed hungry
  • Only 4 cents in every dollar of tax revenue comes from wealth taxes and
    • half the world’s billionaires live in countries with no inheritance tax on money they give to their children.
  • A tax of up to 5% on the world’s multi-millionaires and billionaires could raise $1.7 trillion a year,
    • enough to lift 2 billion people out of poverty, and fund a global plan to end hunger.

• for: safe and just boundaries, earth system justice, planetary boundaries

• Paraphrase
• Earth System Justice that makes up the "Just components of the Earth System Boundaries are characterized by the ‘3 Is of justice’:
  • interspecies justice promotes Earth system stability to prevent the collapse of conditions of life for all species.
  • intergenerational justice (between past and present, and present and future);
  • intragenerational justice (between countries, communities and individuals).
• These principles derive from the seminal work of Weiss on intergenerational and intragenerational equity,
• intergenerational justice can be broken down into:
  • intercommunity, justice,
  • interstate justice,
  • interindividual justice
  • intersectional justice

// ESJ is therefore characterized by INTERbeing

• The = Earth Commission,
• proposes ‘safe and just Earth system boundaries’ (ESBs)
• that go beyond planetary boundaries as
  • they also include a justice perspective
  • suggest transformations to achieve them.

• Safe and just ESBs aim to:

  • stabilize the Earth system,
  • protect species and ecosystems,
  • avoid tipping points,
  • minimize ‘significant harm’ to people while ensuring access to resources for a dignified life and escape from poverty.

• If justice is not considered,

• the biophysical limits may not be adequate

• to protect current generations from significant harm

• Comment

• Similar to aims of doughnut economics

• Earth Commission has develop principles for sharing responsibilities for cities and companies.
• Comment
  • This is implicitly a form of downscaling

• Comment
• "Fortress conservation" is an example of approaching safe boundaries but not considering JUST boundaries.

• The meaning of safe and JUST ESBs
• Safe:
  • stabilize the Earth system,
  • protect species and ecosystems,
  • avoid tipping points
• JUST:
  • minimize ‘significant harm’ to people
  • while ensuring access to resources for a dignified life and escape from poverty.
  • If JUSTice is not considered,
    • the biophysical limits may not be adequate to protect current generations from significant harm.
    • IF JUSTICE is not explicitly included, it can lead to a progress trap.
      • https://jonudell.info/h/facet/?max=100&expanded=true&user=stopresetgo&exactTagSearch=true&any=Progress+trap
  • Strict biophysical limits, such as reducing emissions or setting aside land for nature,
    • may lead to intended consequences that reduce access to food and land for vulnerable people.
    • To mitigate this, biophysical limited should be complemented by fair sharing and management of the remaining ecological space on Earth.

• = Earth system justice
• build upon = Doughnut economics socio-economic boundaries.

• Planetary justice scholarship goes further than global justice
• it:
  • calls for radical or profound changes to justice understandings in the Anthropocene,
  • critiques anthropocentricism,
  • calls for greater engagement with the non-human world
• Comment
  • See Symbiocene
  • https://jonudell.info/h/facet/?max=100&expanded=true&user=stopresetgo&exactTagSearch=true&any=Symbiocene

• Differences between Global North and Global south perspectives on earth system justice:
• Some scholars argue that in the Global North, the view tends to be ‘no humanity without nature’,
• while in the Global South, the focus is on ‘no nature without social justice’.

• Title
• Earth system justice needed to identify and live within Earth system boundaries
• Abstract
• Paraphrase
• Living within planetary limits requires attention to justice as biophysical boundaries are not inherently just.
• Through collaboration between natural and social scientists, the = Earth Commission
  • defines and operationalizes = Earth system justice
  • to ensure that boundaries:
    • reduce harm,
    • increase well-being,
    • reflect substantive and procedural justice.
• Such stringent boundaries may also affect ‘just access’ to:
  • food,
  • water,
  • energy,
  • infrastructure.
• We show how boundaries may need to be adjusted to:
  • reduce harm,
  • increase access,
  • challenge inequality to ensure a safe and just future for people, other species and the planet.
• Earth system justice may enable living justly within boundaries.

• Title
  • Impacts of meeting minimum access on critical earth systems amidst the Great Inequality
• Abstract

• Paraphrase

  • The Sustainable Development Goals aim to improve access to resources and services, reduce environmental degradation, eradicate poverty and reduce inequality.
  • However, the magnitude of the environmental burden that would arise from meeting the needs of the poorest is under debate—especially when compared to much larger burdens from the rich.
  • The ‘Great Acceleration’ of human impacts was also accompanied by a ‘Great Inequality’ in using and damaging the environment.
  • To correct the great inequality, the authors define ‘just access’ to minimum energy, water, food and infrastructure.
  • The penality incurred for achieving just access in 2018, with existing inequalities, technologies and behaviours, would have produced 2–26% additional impacts on the Earth’s natural systems of climate, water, land and nutrients—thus further crossing planetary boundaries.
  • These hypothetical impacts, caused by about a third of humanity, equalled those caused by the wealthiest 1–4%.
  • Technological and behavioural changes thus far, while important, did not deliver just access within a stable Earth system.
  • Achieving these goals therefore calls for a radical redistribution of resources.

• Comment

  • Check the 1/3 figure against the 2/3 figure equal to 4% of the wealthiest in the Earth System Justice paper: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-023-01064-1#annotations:3cWMhLv6Ee2jgD9EDXKNVA

• The conclusion of this study is that the ultimate definition of justice is that all of us have a right to a stable planet.
• Earth System Boundaries are like doughnut economics and include social justice as well.
• Earth System Justice is a multi-dimensional definition of justice including:
  • justice among present nations, communities and individuals (Intragenerational Justice),
  • justice for future generations (Intergenerational justice),.
  • justice for other living things and Earth system stability (‘Interspecies Justice and Earth system stability’)

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/11/ahmaud-arbery-verdict-guilty/620817/

A good reminder that justice was only reached because of national outrage and not because our system really works.

Recall that it took 70 days for an arrest in this case.

Reflections, The United States, Worst parts; Time in the US, Arrests, False accusations, Prison, Feelings, Despair, Frustration; Leaving the US, Court proceedings, Reasons for Exit, Deportation,

Reflections, The United States, Favorite parts, missing, Worst parts, US government, Mexico, Worst parts about being back