Newsletters
October Newsletter
This newsletter was first sent by email to the members of our Research Network. If you would like to be part of it, sign up here.
Hello and welcome to the October edition of our Youth Climate Justice Research Network newsletter!
This network is supported by the Youth Climate Justice project at University College Cork. The project is led by Prof. Aoife Daly and funded by the European Research Council (ERC). For more about the project and our team, feel free to visit our website. You can also watch the recordings of our online research forums here!
If you have any events, publications, or opportunities you’d like featured in the November edition, please email youthclimatejustice@ucc.ie by November 10th with ‘Research Network Newsletter’ in the subject line.
Project News
Special Issue: This month the YCJ project released our special issue on children's rights and climate justice in the world's leading children's rights journal - The International Journal of Children's Rights! Articles are written by legal scholars, practitioners and youth on different ways children/youth access climate justice around the world. It arose from our 2024 International Conference 'Child/Youth-Friendly Climate Justice: Progress and Opportunities' at UCC. Check out the special issue here!
Online Book Launch: On 22 October 1pm GMT+1, JOIN US! For a Youth Climate Justice project event (with our partners at the Universities of Stockholm/Upsalla): Treated Like a Child: Age Discrimination and Children’s Rights (Brill). This event considers discrimination against children, including in the climate crisis. Register here.
Litigation Interviews Ongoing: As part of our work researching how to make climate justice more child/youth friendly, we are now conducting interviews with lawyers, young litigants, and judges in North America. If you would like to participate — or know someone who would like to — please contact PI Aoife at aoife.daly@ucc.ie
Social media: Do you follow us? Catch up with project news as it happens by following us on:
LinkedIn - youthclimatejustice@ucc.ie; X (Twitter) - youthclimatejustice@ucc.ie; and
Instagram - youthclimatej
Youth Climate Applications/Litigation
Our Children’s Trust with 15 Juliana Plaintiffs v. The United States of America: On 23 September 2025, Our Children’s Trust and 15 of the 21 original Juliana plaintiffs relaunched their case at the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, after they denied a full hearing at the US Supreme Court in March 2025. They contend that the U.S. government's actions, like subsidising and permitting fossil fuels, violate the youth's human rights by causing significant climate harm. The petition also argues that the U.S. government's efforts to block the case from going to trial in U.S. courts violated their procedural rights to access justice and an effective remedy.
Lighthiser v. Trump: 22 young people in the US are challenging Trump's fossil fuel orders in court. They suffered a setback last week, when a federal judge in the US dismissed their case. They did, however, gain some ground in that the judge acknowledged some key points, like the point that climate change is a children’s health emergency, that Trump's orders are harming children and youth, and that the orders will drastically increase U.S. carbon emissions. The youths are appealing the finding to the Ninth Circuit.
Climate and Environment Facts!
In each newsletter, we try to include some climate facts for our younger audience😊
AMAZING ANTS! Did you know that ants are super strong, able to lift 50 times their body weight? They have existed since the age of dinosaurs! They also have two stomachs, one they use personally, and another to feed the colony. Read more HERE. By Maeve, age 6 and a half.
Open Calls and Events
YCJ Online Book Launch: 22 October 1pm GMT+1, Youth Climate Justice project event (with our partners at the Universities of Stockholm/Upsalla): Treated Like a Child: Age Discrimination and Children’s Rights (Brill). Register here.
YCJ/Centre for Child Law Event: 21-22 November: A Joint Centre for Child Law (University of Pretoria, South Africa) and Youth Climate Justice project event will be held. Children’s rights and participation in the climate crisis will be examined. Children and youth will attend online and in person. More information will follow in next month’s newsletter.
Publications
Special Issue: Youth Climate Justice project Special Issue! Special Issue on Children’s Rights and Climate Justice by Aoife Daly, Florencia Paz Landeira and Nabin Maharjan. International Journal of Children's Rights.
Journal Article: Youth Climate Justice project publication! Participation and Postpaternalism: Child/youth Climate Action and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child by Aoife Daly, Niamh Purcell, Esther Montesinos Calvo-Fernández and Emily Margaret Murray. International Journal of Children's Rights.
Journal Article: Youth Climate Justice project publication! COP and the Experiences of Children and Youth Considering the Rights of Children and Youth in Global Climate Governance by Florencia Paz Landeira, Alicia O’Sullivan, Aoife Daly and Katie Reid. International Journal of Children's Rights.
Journal Article: An Intergenerational Exploration of Participation, Power and Praxis in Re-Imaging Children’s Right to a Clean, Healthy and Sustainable Environment by Prathit Singh, Kristen Hope, Dhruv Bhatt, Januka Jamarkatel, Sumaita Ferdous, Sumaiya Raiyan, Akorede Aboyade, Amrit Rijal, and Preyashi Agarwal. International Journal of Children's Rights.
Journal Article: Meaningful Participation or Tokenism? by Gilbert Ajebe Akame. International Journal of Children's Rights.
Journal Article: Learning from Ridhima Pandey in: The International Journal of Children's Rights by Therese Boje Mortensen. International Journal of Children's Rights.
Journal Article: Navahine v. Hawai‘i Department of Transportation by Andrea K. Rodgers and Maria Beaucage. International Journal of Children's Rights.
Journal Article: ‘This is about every child’s future!’ by Aoife Deane, Katie Reid, Diarmuid Torney, Benjamin Mallon, Valery Molay, Brian Ó Gallachóir, and Clodagh Harris. International Journal of Children's Rights.
Blogpost: Looking for an African perspective on the ICJ’s Climate Advisory Opinion by Dina Lupin
Report: The Right to a Healthy Environment in Practice: A Decade Before the Courts (2015-2025) UNEP and Terra NYU.
Research Report: The Mana of the Pacific Youth Voice in Climate Action : Exploring the Impact of Human Rights-Based Approaches on the Operations of Pacific Youth-Led Organisations and the Empowerment of their Members by Emma West.
Journal Article: Youth engagement in climate action: why we need a systematic review of effective practices | Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences by Samuel Mwangi Wanjiku.
Book Chapter: Ripple Effect: The Role of Climate Change Anxiety, Nature Connectedness, and Pro-environmental Behavior in Building Climate Resilience and Mitigating Psychological Distress Among Flood-Affected and Non-affected Youth | SpringerLink by Mehnaz Awan, Iram Gul, Sadia Aleem & Mukhtar Ahmed.