ANNUAL CONGRESS 2025

Suing Like a City: How plaintiff cities pursue climate litigation against the state and corporations

Not scheduled

20m

Yildiz Technical University, Istanbul

Oral Track 02 | PLANNING AND LAW

Speaker

Alexander Stanley (HafenCity Universität Hamburg)

Description

As in previous waves of public interest litigation (Morris 2016), plaintiff cities are turning to the courts in their efforts to seek climate justice against more powerful opponents. But can, and are, cities leading the way on climate justice? Here we analyse plaintiff city litigation with a climate-relevant purpose – what we call ‘city climate litigation’ – as the latest incarnation of an old strategic tool to pursue climate action and fairer, more effective climate governance (Swan 2018). We analyse 97 city climate litigation cases collected from international legal databases, with a focus on the unique city interests plaintiff cities seek to protect through litigation (Clopton and Shoked 2023). We summarise our review with key statistics and geographical trends (cf Setzer and Higham 2024). We then turn to discuss cities’ climate litigation strategies in more detail, including what challenges cities face and how cities contribute to broader climate litigation. Our analysis is divided in two based on the category of defendant: claims against the state and claims against ‘carbon major’ corporations. This reflects basic differences in the nature of cities’ legal claims against each type of defendant, as well as the different strategies and challenges used against each. We find that many city climate litigation cases remain pending before the courts. However, we demonstrate that cities led previous waves of climate litigation and currently lead many pending 'second wave' cases identified in the broader climate litigation literature (Setzer and Higham 2024). But how long will cities continue to lead the way on climate justice in the courts? We conclude with key cases to watch in the years ahead and some reflections on the limits of city climate litigation, based on historical dynamics in public interest litigation.

References

ZD Clopton and N Shoked, ‘The City Suit’ (2023) 72 Emory L J 1351
K Morris (2016) ‘Cities Seeking Justice: Local Government Litigation in the Public Interest’ in Brescia and Marshall (eds) How Cities Will Save the World: Urban Innovation in the Face of Population Flows, Climate Change and Economic Inequality, (Routledge, Oxon and New York 2016)
J Setzer and C Higham, Global Trends in Climate Change Litigation: 2024 Snapshot (2024) London: Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment and Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy, London School of Economics and Political Science
S Swan, ‘Plaintiff Cities’ (2018) 71 Vand L Rev 1227