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Interrogating Climate Apartheid: Law, Economy and Culture - Conference

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24 March 2026 - 25 March 2026

9:30AM - 5:15PM

Rooms 1001 / 1002, The Waterside Building, Durham Business School, Riverside Place, Durham, DH1 1SL

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This two-day conference provides an interdisciplinary platform for academic and non-academic stakeholders to interrogate the concept of climate apartheid.

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March 24-25, 2026

Organisers:
Professor Andrew Baldwin (Geography, Durham University)
Dr Simona Capisani (Philosophy, Durham University)
Dr Christopher Szabla (Law, Durham University)

For the full programme please click here.

Programme 

24 March 2026

9-9:30    Coffee/Tea & Breakfast Snacks

9:30-10:00    Introductions
Andrew Baldwin, Simona Capisani, Chris Szabla

10:00-10:45    Keynote Talk and Q&A
Carmen Gonzalez (Durham Institute of Advanced Study / Loyola University Chicago)

10:45-11:00    Break

11:00-12:30    Session 1—Climate Apartheid: A Contested Concept
•    Charlotte Lemanski (Cambridge University), “The Politics of Reappropriating Apartheid in Climate Discourse and Language”
•    Mori Ram (Newcastle University), “Climate, Apartheid and the Politics of Privilege”
•    Jennifer Adese (University of Toronto), “Apartheid is Not a Metaphor: Métis People's Experiences With Climate Change, Apartheid and Indigenous Environmental Justice”

13:30-13:45    Break 

13:30-15:30    Session 2—Boundaries of/and the Law
•    Alessia Agostelli (University of Florence), “Climate Apartheid at Europe’s Borders: Migration, Security, and Climate Change in EU Law”
•    Emily Jones (Newcastle University), “The Hauntology of International Environmental Law: Climate Apartheid and The Slow Cancellation of the Future”
•    Ola Szkodzihska (University of Warsaw), “Reimagining Violence in International Criminal Law: Towards Criminal Protection of the Right to a Healthy Climate”
•    Nataliia Hendel (National Academy of Legal Sciences of Ukraine), “Climate Apartheid in Times of War: Russia’s Environmental Impact and Implications for Justice”

15:30-15:45    Break (tea & snacks)

15:45-17:15    Session 3—Legacies of Apartheid
•    Sampson Adese (York University), “Beyond Metaphor: Problematizing the Conceptual Convergence of Climate Apartheid and South African History”
•    Thembi Luckett (Durham University) and Matthew Wingfield (University of the Western Cape) “Undoing Climate Apartheid: Confronting Palimpsest Histories of RaciaLized Dispossession”
•    Juliana Mazzucotelli (Grenoble Alpes University / Vrije Universiteit Brussel), “Climate Apartheid: A Multiscalar Analysis of Environmental Privilege in Los Angeles and Cape Town”

17:15    Drinks Reception (Waterside 1020- Restaurant Dining Room)
(optional, self-funded) Dinner

25 March 2026

10-10:50 Coffee/Tea Breakfast Snacks
10:30-12:30 Session 4—Imagining Climate Apartheid
• Sophia Brown (Durham University), “Justice is Always Spatial’: Examining the Representational Politics of Climate Mobilities Through the Lenses of Climate Apartheid and Abolition Geography”
• Daniela Dora (Cambridge University), “Climate Apartheid Fiction: Law as Narrative Infrastructure in the Anthropocene”
• Elena GiacomeLLi (University of Bologna), “Imaginary Wor(L)ds: Reframing Habitability Imaginarles in Climate Immobilities”
• Alexis Radisoglou (Durham University), “World-Making in the Panicocene: Imaginarles of Geoengineering in Contemporary Fiction”
12:30-13:30 Lunch
13:30-15:00 Session 5—Climate Apartheid as Legal Structure
• Fahim Abrar (University of Glasgow), "Climate Apartheid Without Criminalisation: Law’s Quiet Production of Climate Inequality"
• Deng Zhishan (East China University of Political Science and Law), "Climate Apartheid as Legal Structure: Rethinking Inequality in International Climate Finance and China’s Alternative Approach"
• Rahul Desarda (Jindal Global Law School), “Climate Apartheid as Structural Discrimination: Reinterpreting Equality and Non-Discrimination Norms under International Human Rights Law”
15:00-15:15 Break 
15:45-17:15 Session 6 —Mobilities & Materiality
• Wanjing Yang (Imperial College London), “Crossing the Bridge: The Materiality of Climate Apartheid in England’s Brownfield Regeneration”
• Neha Arya (Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi), “From Consumer Comfort to Worker Vulnerability: Climate Apartheid in India’s Digital Labour Platforms”
• Kirsi Pauliina Kallio and Jouni Häkli (Tampere University), “Rejecting Climate Apartheid in the Classroom: Developing Decolonizing Pedagogies on Climate Mobilities”
Concluding remarks - 16:45-17:00

For online participation/engagement please see the link below:

https://events.teams.microsoft.com/event/778e4186-6cd8-49df-97ba-395739ebb140@7250d88b-4b68-4529-be44-d59a2d8a6f94

All enquiries can be directed to Professor Andrew Baldwin w.a.baldwin@durham.ac.uk, Dr Simona Capisani simona.capisani@durham.ac.uk or Dr Chris Szabla christopher.j.szabla@durham.ac.uk  

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