Wealth, power, justice and climate change policy: A critical research framework for the evaluation of justice and sustainability concerns regarding the efforts of the European Union to respond to the problem of climate change

The continuation of unhindered industrial development poses a threat to the global climate, a threat that brings with it associated effects on humans, nonhumans, and ecosystem processes. From the justice perspective, a sensible discussion of climate change requires a respect for the commons character of the atmosphere. The future of the atmosphere has implications for global, yet also regional and local ecological sustainability and equity, which are both essential aspects of a justice formulation. Consideration of these issues in regard to policies aimed at addressing the climate change problem requires a complex and multidimensional strategy.;The central claim of this thesis is that the climate policy as presently formulated allows for the burden of action to be transferred to a group of EU new member states (NMS) from Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). This raises concerns in terms of both sustainability and equity. These concerns are emphasized by the fact that the CEE countries have hitherto been absent from theoretical analyses on equity and sustainability aspects of the climate policy.;To support the thesis claim, this study reviews theories of environmental, ecological and climate justice that discuss equity and sustainability risks in relation to development. The research strategy of this dissertation emerges from the perspective that diverse theories of justice carry specific propensities for different levels of the problem: environmental justice theory corresponds best to micro-scale problems, while ecological justice and climate justice theories relate best to mezzo and macroscale problems, respectively. Overall, the existing body of theory concurs that risks associated with development are assigned to those with least political and economic power and the greatest vulnerability to environmental harm.;Within the above platforms, a critical research framework of climate justice will be situated. The construction of the critical research framework of climate justice requires a systematic integration of the relevant positions noted above to formulate a multiscale analysis. Hence, while climate justice discourse ensures that justice issues are coherently analyzed on the macro scale, bringing in the knowledge of environmental justice and ecological justice ensures a consistent analysis on the micro and the mezzo scales. By analyzing the climate issue on all three platforms, the study of equity and sustainability can produce a meaningful interpretation.;Case studies chosen at the micro-level focus on activities of joint implementation (JI). At the mezzo level, the research focuses on region-based activities: Kyoto flexibility mechanisms, the EU ETS, and the EU energy liberalization. On the macro level, the following phenomena are analyzed: political economy and the international climate policy, the EU's projections of power, and political economy and climate policies in the EU. All three levels of analysis (micro, mezzo, macro) identify justice and sustainability concerns in the EU.;This dissertation uses the critical framework of climate justice to analyze a status and potential for climate justice for the European Union. Its postulates are used to present alternative climate policy strategies sensitive to the multiscale nature of the problem. These strategies are founded on principles of equity and sustainability, rather than on principles of efficiency.