On 7 and 8 June 2018, the Asia-Pacific Centre for Environmental Law (APCEL, National University of Singapore) co-hosted a climate change litigation scholarship workshop with Yale Law School.
During the workshop, researchers explored the role of the courts in adjudicating climate change, including how courts might determine responsibility for mitigation and adaptation, or liability for climate-related harms. Researchers presented papers covering different perspectives of climate litigation, including human rights based cases, options for private law litigation, attributing responsibility for the impacts of climate change, and different approaches and barriers to climate litigation within Asia and the Pacific.
ADB was delighted to attend the workshop. The workshop theme resonates with ADB’s current work on climate change litigation for judges in Asia and the Pacific. ADB is working on a climate litigation benchbook aimed at providing judges with important developments in climate change laws and litigation. The book will discuss key litigation trends in Asia and the Pacific and explore jurisprudence that might be useful for judges in Asia and the Pacific. There have also been some exciting developments within Asian jurisprudence recently. These are ideas that ADB thinks are worth sharing globally. Research is underway on ADB’s project and we are looking to publish the benchbook in 2019.