By Tamara Szilágyi-Hajdú, May 2026
MA Gender Studies | BSocSC Politics and International Relations
Tamara wrote this piece as part of her thesis research, conducted during her time at Climate Cleanup.
Introduction
The concept of climate justice points out that climate change is a symptom of a system of oppression, a system of extraction and exploitation for material power and wealth.
Environmental degradation and social structures of gender, climate change and patriarchy intersect on a fundamental level, and they cannot be tackled as distinct issues. Natural resource extraction and the exploitation of women rely on the same power structures and forms of oppression. This link is emphasized by ecofeminist scholarship and activism that propose “system change, not climate change”, aiming to resolve the root causes of environmental degradation and societal inequality at once, by deconstructing nature/culture binaries in our dominant ways of thinking.
Climate Justice
Climate change is often viewed as an environmental issue. But in fact, it is shaped by prevailing social structures, history, and political decision making. Moreover, it affects people differently based on demographics and geographic location, with vulnerable populations bearing the brunt of climate change effects. For example, people in developed countries have historically contributed the most to global emissions and continue to have the largest carbon footprint globally, but also have the most resources to adapt, build shelter, and recover from climate events.
Dealing with climate change then requires dealing with the political and social interrelationships that shape climate change outcomes. Therefore, climate adaptation needs to account for social justice goals to prevent further exacerbating situated vulnerabilities shaped by social inequalities. We often refer to these social justice issues as climate justice or climate equality.
Along with wealth and geographical location, climate justice encompasses geopolitical, gendered, and generational differences in situated climate vulnerability. Climate justice is a holistic approach that ensures long-lasting change in all social and economic spheres. It recognises that sustainability cannot be quantified in a singular measure of emissions; rather, it requires a fundamental shift in our relationship to nature and to each other.
Climate Governance
The 30th annual Conference of the Parties (COP) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), took place in November 2025. Each year, the event serves as a forum to coordinate global climate governance, identifying key areas of intervention and actionable steps. To address climate justice aspirations of previous COPs, organizers of COP30 in Brazil proposed a new Gender Action Plan (GAP). But if the UNFCCC aims to tackle climate change, as its name suggests, why does gender matter so much?
Ecofeminism Differentiated Vulnerability
On the one hand, climate change is gendered in terms of outcomes. Across societies, members of the same community are differently affected by climate change. Climate change is a gendered issue, with differences in carbon footprint, opportunities in decisionmaking, and vulnerability at times of crisis. Overall, men tend to have higher emissions than women, according to multiple studies: in Spain, this figure is 10% higher, in Sweden 16%, and in France 26%. Nonetheless, women are more likely to be negatively affected by climate change. Inequality and discrimination devalue the health of women and girls, which becomes more stark in times of crisis, when food crops decrease, when extreme weather conditions become more frequent, or when climate events hit.
When resource scarcity increases, women and girls are more likely to be denied food, education, or healthcare, because they are likely to earn less even if they have the opportunity or capacity to work. This leads to 14 times higher female mortality in ecological disasters. Extreme weather increases maternal and birth complications which often go untreated, both because of lack of healthcare capacities, and a failure to take women’s symptoms seriously. Son preference means that girls are more likely to be pulled from school and married early when the family has economic difficulties. It also means that despite male infants being more vulnerable to stress for biological reasons, female infant mortality often increases in times of hardship for social reasons (even despite higher female birth rates during periods of extreme weather). Moreover, crisis events increase gender-based violence both in public and private spheres, with a marked 28% increase in femicides.
Devaluing the Feminine
On the other hand, patriarchal societies are characterized by a systemic devaluation of femininity/nature in binary opposition with masculinity/reason. By the same logic, “mother nature” is feminized to be exploited, dominated, and oppressed. For example, unpaid care work in the home, contesting abortion rights, and the dairy and egg industries all rely on the devaluation of feminine reproductive labour. The idea that another creature’s flesh can be dispossessed for our own use is a fundamentally patriarchal one, enabling the oppression of women and nature alike.
In our societies, reproductive labour, like breastfeeding for example, is unpaid, despite the fact that breastfeeding a baby takes up roughly 1800 hours of a mother’s time, while working 38 hours a week amounts to 1872 hours a year, not accounting for national holidays and paid sick leave. Devaluing breastfeeding also makes it possible to alienate dairy from the cow and the calf, whose lives are determined by the dispossession of milk. Cow milk only becomes available for human consumption when the calf, for whom the cow’s body produced it, does not get the chance to drink it. Globally, over 270 million dairy cows spend their lives hooked up to industrial milking machines, a production only made possible by their motherhood.
We live in a society that has learned to take what is available. We have learned to increase the efficiency of extraction beyond comprehension. We often talk about carbon footprint, and planetary futures, and what climate adaptation enables us to do or continue doing. But we rarely consider whether we should be doing those things in the first place. Sustainability, and climate justice require more than a simply quantifiable reduction of emissions. Without fundamental changes in the way humans view and treat nature, environmental degradation is bound to continue whether we are able to hit COP targets and limit global warming.
Conclusion
In one definition of sustainability, processes are sustainable if they can be feasibly continued forever with no adverse effects. In a system of finite resources, the only activities that are sustainable are ones that are in a delicate balance of reciprocity and mutual respect. Building on this principle, ecofeminist ethics of care proposes a framework that defines sustainability and climate transition based on relationships, embodiment, and lived experience. Mutual care enables multispecies flourishing, and ultimately, care labour is central to repairing the destruction of pollution; therefore care is at the centre of ecofeminism not only because care labour is considered feminine, but rather because of its life-affirming agency. This theory rejects rigid moral guidelines and instead relies on compassion and empathy to guide climate action and inform systemic change for climate justice.
Shifting our Perspective to ecofeminism ethics of care
Including more women or feminist voices in organisations such as the UNFCCC and especially COP has the potential to transform climate governance. Worldwide, women have been at the forefront of climate action both as carers and as activists. For example, women’s inclusion in land-management strongly correlates with soil-longevity, crop resilience, increased biodiversity, and a drastic increase in local food security. These outcomes are not results of a fixed end-goal, but rather provide long-term benefits to both people and nature. Accordingly, on a global scale, rethinking climate action in terms of an ecofeminist logic of care means moving away from sustainability as a noun towards understanding it as a process, as a system change, ensuring lasting planetary prosperity and vibrant circular economies.
It is now the responsibility of global climate governance and coming COPs to revise sustainability commitments. For this, it is essential that the UNFCCC involves more diverse voices and recognises women, youth, poc, and indigenous peoples as not only the most vulnerable to climate change, but also as highly competent agents of change. Most importantly though, COP negotiations must challenge the nature/culture binary to develop an understanding of humanity as part of nature within complex, reciprocal ecosystems.