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The Hidden Gender Cost of Ecocide in War
The climate crisis is a symptom of different systems of oppression that serve profit over people and nature, including capitalism, racism, patriarchy, colonialism, and militarism. These consider forms of life as objects to be owned, controlled, and consumed, and women, indigenous peoples, and poor communities are often exploited and disproportionately impacted. As the crisis continues to escalate, the international community has continued to fail to address these systems and their impact. Instead, many states have continued to finance military activity, causing significant climate and environmental destruction as well as insecurity and violence.
Women’s rights to access, use, and own land are inseparable from climate justice
Women have the right to enjoy, on an equal footing, all their land rights, including the right to access, use, inherit, control, and own property. To achieve full gender equality, states must fulfill their obligation to eliminate all forms of discrimination against women—including those related to land ownership—recommends the United Nations. Although 164 countries recognize this right for women, only 52 guarantee it in practice, as shown by a 2019 OECD study.
Island Women and the Climate Crisis: A Focus on Intersectionalities
Climate change affects different groups unequally, and women and girls are among the most vulnerable and exposed to immediate risks. In island nations—considered to be on the front lines because the impacts are already severe—they have been forced to develop their own adaptation strategies in the face of a daily life marked by climate-related disasters.
Gender in climate negotiations: history, disputes, and the Belém Plan
Between November 10 and 21, during COP30 in Belém, Brazil, a central disagreement over the definition of the term gender stalled negotiations on the new Gender Action Plan(GAP). More conservative countries, such as Iran, Russia, and Argentina, called for a version based on a binary biological gender, classified as male or female, without mention of social roles and structural inequalities between men and women. The term is seen as controversial due to its multiple interpretations, influenced by different traditions, religions, and gender identities, which ends up creating opposing camps that find it difficult to engage in dialogue without conflict. Gender ends up falling into the realm of concepts that many call politically charged.
Shedding light on gender and female empowerment within current NDCs revisions at COP30
During COP21, 195 parties signed the Paris Agreement intending to hold off “the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels”. To pursue this, they introduced Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), where all parties to the Convention must create climate action plans that include mitigation and adaptation efforts, involve multiple actors and sectors of the economy, and offer unique opportunities to integrate gender. NDCs function as a country’s main mechanism for national climate policies and planning within the country’s own budget, so they must include, shape, and account for those most impacted.