Defining a Just Transition

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According to the Just Transition Alliance, a just transition is:

“a principle, a process and a practice. The principle of just transition is that a healthy economy and a clean environment can and should co-exist. The process for achieving this vision should be a fair one that should not cost workers or community residents their health, environment, jobs, or economic assets.”

There are six major principles of a just transition. They are:

Workers, community residents, and Indigenous Peoples around the world have a fundamental human right to clean air, water, land, and food in their workplaces, homes and environment.
There is no contradiction among simultaneously creating sustainable development, having a healthy economy and maintaining a clean and safe environment.
Liberalization of environmental, health and labor laws and corporate globalization – know no borders. Therefore, solutions call for local, regional, national, and global solidarity.
The development of fair economic, trade, health and safety and environmental policies must include both the frontline workers and fence-line communities most affected by pollution, ecological damage and economic restructuring
The costs of achieving sustainable development, a healthy economy and clean environment should not be borne by current or future victims of environmental and economic injustices and unfair free trade policies.
Workers and community residents have the right to challenge any entity that commits economic and/or environmental injustices. These entities include governments, the military, corporations, international bodies, and mechanisms for securing corporate accountability.

(Just Transition Alliance)

Just transition as a strategy emerged from labor unions and environmental justice groups in predominately low-income communities of color. These communities identified a need for a transition away from polluting industries that harmed workers, communities, and the planet. To make this transition just, these communities also identified the need to create pathways for workers to transition into new, safer jobs. In the video below, Grist explains how Tonawanda, New York justly transitioned is economy and society off coal using the Just Transition framework.

Grist – Just Transition from Coal

In the modern environmental and climate justice movement, a just transition is defined as a set of strategies to transition entire communities from extractive industries, wealth disparities, and exploitation towards democratic systems and regenerative economies. The graphic below, from Movement Generation, provides a framework for understanding just transitions.