Just transition (social)

“A transition is not just because its destination is greener; justice depends on who decides, who pays and who can thrive afterwards. ”

Just transition emerged from labour movements concerned that environmental policy could protect the climate while abandoning workers and communities dependent on high-emitting industries. The concept has since broadened to include distribution across households, regions, supply chains and future generations.

The International Labour Organization describes just transition as a process towards an environmentally sustainable economy that is well managed and contributes to decent work for all, social inclusion and the eradication of poverty. Its 2015 Guidelines emphasise social dialogue, rights, employment policy, skills, social protection and coherent industrial and environmental policy. The word process is important.

Justice cannot be added as compensation after a transition pathway has been decided.

Workers, farmers, Indigenous Peoples and affected communities should have meaningful influence over goals, timing, alternatives and support. Coal closures provide the familiar example. A national emissions pathway may require rapid phase-out. For a mining region, the decision affects jobs, public revenue, housing, identity and local services.

Retraining alone is inadequate if new work is insecure, lower paid or located elsewhere. Agricultural transition raises related questions. Buyers may require lower emissions, no deforestation, new data and costly farm practices. If farmers finance the change, absorb yield risk and receive no longer-term contract or price adjustment, environmental progress rests on a cost transfer.

Smallholders can be excluded from markets in the name of compliance. Justice includes distribution of benefits.

New green industries, finance and infrastructure should not flow only to places already advantaged. Women, migrants, young people and informal workers may face distinct barriers to new opportunities. Aggregate job creation can conceal who loses and who gains. Procedural justice concerns voice and decision-making. Social dialogue among governments, employers and workers is central in the ILO framework.

Community engagement and FPIC may be required where land, resources and Indigenous rights are affected. Consultation after key decisions have been made is not participation. Recognition matters as well. Different groups hold identities, knowledge and relationships to land that economic compensation cannot fully capture. A transition plan should understand what people value, not only what income they may lose.

Timing creates tension. Delay can deepen climate harm, while abrupt change can devastate livelihoods. Just transition does not justify postponing necessary action. It requires early planning, predictable policy and investment so social measures are not improvised after closure or exclusion. Social protection, public services, skills and regional development often exceed the capacity of one company.

Governments carry central responsibility, but businesses influence outcomes through site decisions, purchasing practices, tax, workforce planning and engagement. Responsibility should follow leverage and contribution. Not every existing job or activity can be preserved. Justice concerns the conditions of change rather than a promise that nothing will end.

Honest planning should identify decline, provide pathways and protect rights instead of using vague green-growth language.

Justice has several dimensions. Distributive justice concerns who receives benefits and carries costs. Procedural justice concerns who participates and has influence. Recognition justice asks whose identity, knowledge and rights are respected. Restorative justice addresses harms produced by past systems and by the transition itself.

A programme can offer compensation and still fail if affected groups had no meaningful voice or if historic dispossession is ignored. Agricultural transitions make this concrete. New traceability, pesticide, land-use or emissions requirements can improve public outcomes while imposing data, finance and production risk on smallholders.

A just approach tests affordability, phases requirements, supports capability and protects market access without weakening legitimate standards.

Justice is not an argument against transition; it is a condition for a transition that can endure. The discipline is to evaluate transition from the position of those whose livelihoods, rights and communities are most exposed. A lower-carbon outcome is essential. Whether the pathway strengthens or fractures society depends on governance and distribution.

Practical application

Identify affected workers, suppliers and communities early and involve them in planning. Assess employment, income, rights, gender, regional and cultural effects. Link transition milestones to decent-work standards, social protection, skills, finance and local economic development.

Align purchasing and contracts with supplier transition costs. Publish distributional impacts and grievance routes. Review whether benefits and decision power reach groups carrying the greatest burden. Develop a transition compact with affected workers, producers and communities that covers participation, rights, timelines, finance, skills, social protection, grievance routes and review.

Disaggregate costs and benefits across groups rather than relying on net job or income figures. Include independent monitoring and a route to remedy where transition decisions create avoidable harm.

Why it matters

Climate and ecological transition will reshape assets, jobs and markets. If costs are transferred to people with the least power, resistance and inequality can undermine both legitimacy and delivery.

Common misconception

Just transition is often reduced to retraining workers or compensating communities after closure. It is a broader governance process covering participation, rights, decent work, social protection and fair distribution of costs and benefits.

Connections

Transition Plan sets the organisational pathway. Decent Work, Living Wage and Social Dialogue shape labour outcomes. Equity, Community Engagement and FPIC determine participation and distribution, while Trade-off exposes who carries unavoidable losses.

A question worth asking

Who is expected to absorb the cost and uncertainty of your transition, and how much power did they have in designing it?

Selected references

International Labour Organization. 2015. Guidelines for a Just Transition Towards Environmentally Sustainable Economies and Societies for All.

International Labour Organization. 2023. Resolution Concerning a Just Transition Towards Environmentally Sustainable Economies and Societies for All. United Nations. 2015. Paris Agreement, Preamble. International Labour Organization. 2021. User's Manual to the ILO's Guidelines for a Just Transition. Newell, P. and Mulvaney, D. 2013. The Political Economy of the Just Transition. Geographical Journal 179(2): 132-140.