unions and climate change

Climate Change:Trade Unions and the “Paris Contradiction”

Sean SweeneyGLI New YorkGLI SS, July 6, 2016

Health impacts of fossil fuel use: 7.2 million premature deaths in 2012 (WHO)

Air-pocalypse

The Paris Accord – Dec. 2015

Threshold: “well below 2 degrees Celsius”

Energy Information Agency (US) 2015

Unions staying “on message”

Green Jobs

Decent Work

Just Transition

These policies deserve to be supported… but they cannot resolve the “Paris Contradiction”

International trade union bodies have largely accepted pro-market ideas

World Bank ILO

Unions have tried to be constructive….

But the ‘social dialogue’ approach has failed

Many unions seek a new path

New strategy, and program – that can integrate class with climate – for ‘socioecological’ transformation

ITF

“A Whole Economy Approach”

The union-based “Climate Jobs”

“Climate Jobs” campaigns are an important part of this new approach

If we can’t control the energy system – we won’t be able to stabilize the climate

TUED / GLI at the Paris Talks