Nothing is more frustrating than the ongoing misunderstanding between campaigners for social justice and climate justice. It is well said that procrastination is the thief of time. We are dying as a result of this misunderstanding, which is a form of procrastination. In his book, Hope in Hell, Sir Jonathon Porritt rightly argues that the two campaigns are really just two sides of the same coin. Given that the book is essentially a clarion call to action and a concerted effort to counter the catastrophic consequences of climate change, which is a challenge to us all, this argument is especially pertinent. It is essential for all stakeholders to speak with one voice and stop procrastinating.
But first, what exactly do we mean by “social justice” and how do we define “climate justice”?
According to Britannica, social justice is “the fair treatment and equitable status of all individuals and social groups within a state or society. The term is also used to refer to social, political, and economic institutions, laws, or policies that collectively afford such fairness and equity and is commonly applied to movements that seek fairness, equity, inclusion, self-determination, or other goals for currently or historically oppressed, exploited, or marginalised populations.” Climate justice, on the other hand, is defined as “acknowledging that those most responsible for burning fossil fuels are least hurt by their effects on the climate. It covers differences in age, wealth, and race, as well as gender, sexuality, and disability. It also includes policies protecting workers reliant on fossil fuel industries from the switch to clean energy.”
The above two definitions make it easy for us to see that these two crusades are indeed two sides of the same coin, as Porritt argues. But social justice and climate justice are at heart about people. Climate change is a community project that involves us all: rich or poor, black or white, democrat or autocrat; we are all in it together, and it is the great leveller of our age. But I hear an objection or two. The first being that ordinary people’s lives are not so easily conducted in shades of black and white. And secondly, it is easy to subscribe to ringing declarations and ambitions but a great deal harder to balance vision with practical measures and persistence.
To answer the objections, let me share with you an instance to show how social justice and climate justice are one; that is, two sides of the same coin. The instance is a live issue as I write. The setting is the land of my forefathers, Uganda. It is a land that is extremely beautiful and endowed with many natural resources, including fossil fuels, namely, oil and gas. I first heard about the existence of oil and gas in Uganda when I was a boy. I was a silent witness to a debate in my father’s study involving visiting dignitaries and professors at Makerere University. The issue was whether it was wise to extract fossil fuels from the ground or not. Long story short, a consensus emerged that it would be prudent to leave the fossil fuels in the ground. That was the 1970s. As a young boy, I did not register the significance of oil and gas in Uganda at the time.
Ugandan countryside. Photo by Random Institute on Unsplash
It is now the 21st century. Uganda is a military dictatorship in all but name. Her population has exploded from 10,317,212 million in 1970 to 48,582,334 million in 2023. Her infrastructure, on the other hand, has all but collapsed. The infrastructure has not improved commensurately with a rapidly expanding population. The situation is made worse by rapacious corruption and a retreat from democracy, and her governance institutions now exist in name only. Yes, it’s true. Uganda has a written constitution, a framework by which she is supposed to be governed. Indeed, such a framework was promulgated in the new 1995 constitution. Alas, however, the 1995 Uganda Constitution has lost its power owing to controversial presidential term-limit amendments; it might as well not exist.
An instance speaking to the poverty of the 1995 Constitution may be mentioned here. Article 249 provides for the Disaster Preparedness and Management Commission. It is intended to deal with both natural and man-made disasters. And yet, there is no evidence that such a commission has ever been established, and even if it does exist, there is no evidence of its work. Disasters ravage Uganda on an annual basis, and her people are hostages to fortune.
Uganda’s human rights record is another instance. A Human Rights Watch report of 2022 states, “The authorities in Uganda restricted right to freedom of movement and assembly, in particular for political opposition leaders, and violated rights to freedoms of association and expression, as security forces beat and at times arbitrarily detained journalists and opposition members.” And speaking of journalists, The Africa Report recently published on January 9, 2023, says thus: “A wave of draconian laws by Yoweri Museveni, Uganda’s president since 1986, criminalising journalism has dealt further several blows to the right to information. It is no wonder that Museveni is on the Reporters Without Borders (RSF) list of press freedom predators. A free press empowers citizens, gives a voice to poor populations, and holds governments accountable for corruption. If Uganda wants to improve its rankings in democratised nations, it must begin to enable press freedom.”
Photo by Antoine Plüss on Unsplash
A simple cost-benefit analysis would have undoubtedly shown that fossil fuels would, in principle, have the potential to significantly transform Uganda’s social and economic circumstances on the one hand, but on the other hand, the same analysis would also have shown that Uganda does not have the wherewithal to meaningfully benefit from oil and gas at this stage. The analysis would further have shown that far from benefiting from this natural resource, Uganda is best advised to focus her energies on investing in credible and robust institutions with alternative centres of authority and power away from the all-powerful institution of the presidency. A mad rush to exploit fossil fuels without a clear plan for social and economic development is a recipe for disaster. A slippery slope into anarchy. Uganda, in her present political posture, is a powder keg waiting to go off.
What, then, is the solution? In my podcast conversation with Sir Jonathon Porritt, he expressed sympathy with a key demand campaigners for social justice have, namely, why not harness natural resources to fight poverty? He posited, “If we’ve got hydrocarbon assets, why can’t we use them in the same way that other countries have done elsewhere in the world? So as we campaign to stop some of these fossil fuel investments, we’ve got to campaign to accelerate investments in alternative energy sources, particularly renewable energy.” He added, “by far the most important technology for poor people all around the world is solar energy. Solar energy is bringing more benefits to people today in different countries around the world than any other single source of electricity generation.”
Porritt continued: “If you’re worried about poverty in emerging and developing countries, forget fossil fuels. The benefits of that go to largely rich countries or dictators and their elites in those poor countries. If you want to help poor people in poor countries, forget the fossil fuel story, forget oil, forget gas, forget all that, and get involved in the efforts to create renewable electricity options.” It seems to me that the solution may lie in our accepting Porritt’s thesis that social justice and climate justice are indivisible and therefore two sides of the same coin.
My conclusion is that the best way to get social justice and climate justice done in impoverished countries, such as Uganda, is to first get our priorities in order if we are to avoid mistakes made in other countries such as Nigeria (see video above). This is particularly significant for Uganda, given the recently published World Bank poverty assessment report for 2023. This change in approach may not bear fruit immediately, dramatically, or decisively. It will be slow, halting, partial, and unsatisfactory, yet it will be an important step in the right direction. Poor countries like Uganda face mounting challenges, the magnitude of which is difficult to quantify. But accepting that social justice and climate justice are sides of the same coin would, in the circumstances, be a great starting point.
