Just Transitions to a Net Zero World: Third Annual International Conference

Call for Abstracts is open

Background

Under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Paris Agreement a broad theoretical consensus has been reached towards accomplishing - globally - the paths to a Net Zero World. How to implement this consensus at the national level remains a contested issue. The concept of Just Transitions encompasses a wide range of dimensions and perspectives, reflecting the complexity of global shifts towards more just and low-carbon economy. They include labour-oriented approaches, integrated justice frameworks, socio-technical transition approaches, governance strategies, and public perceptions of what constitutes a ‘just’ transition. At a time when transition pathways and even their scientific necessity are once again subject to political challenge, even the already existing just transition commitments are threatened. Our central concern is not merely what climate law and governance promise, but how these frameworks can be modelled, enacted and operationalised in practice.

Firmly grounded in the theoretical work of the first two conferences, this 3rd edition of our joint conference seeks to move beyond theory and explore the concrete and innovative pathways that translate agreed‑upon changes into practice. We welcome critical, interdisciplinary and practice-oriented contributions that explore multifaceted pathways seeking to balance social, ecological and economic aspects of transitions while remaining sensitive to context-specific factors. We invite contributions that engage with the implementation aspects of just transitions, address the challenge of bridging gaps between theory and practice, and examine the development of processes that shape transition outcomes.

Conference Themes

Submissions may address, but are not limited to, the following themes:

• Just Transitions to Govern Net Zero Strategies and Sustainable Development
• Just Transitions: Reality or Utopia?
• Just Transitions in Industry and Technology
• Just Transition: For Whom, By Whom, With Whom?

Format

The conference will run over two days, with presentations followed by panel discussions. The programme will include invited speakers and contributed papers.

Submissions

We invite submissions of abstracts of no more than 300 words.

Submission deadline: 31 May 2026

Please submit abstracts here: https://forms.office.com/e/g11S3E7AR7

Authors will be notified of acceptance within six weeks of the deadline.

We intend to explore opportunities for a peer-reviewed collective publication (such as a special issue or edited volume) drawing on selected contributions from the conference.

Venue

The conference will be held on Durham University campus. Exact locations to be confirmed.

More information on travel and suggested accommodation in Durham can be found in the conference welcome pack. Third Annual Conference - Welcome pack

Unfortunately, we are unable to cover travel expenses for presenters of contributed papers. However, there is no delegate fee due to any conference presenters or PhD students attending from any university.

Queries

For any queries about the conference, please contact pia.k.andres@durham.ac.uk and csdlp@durham.ac.uk

Thematic Framework

To guide submissions and situate this year’s focus on implementation within the broader just transition debate, we outline below the conceptual framing of each conference theme. These extended descriptions clarify the analytical and normative questions animating the conference while leaving space for diverse disciplinary approaches.

Just Transitions to Govern Net Zero Strategies and Sustainable Development

This theme explores the implementation chains that link practices with global climate law and governance regimes. It foregrounds innovative governance choices that can either bridge or widen the gap between just transition discourse and the intertwined social, ecological, and economic practices of net zero pathways. On the one hand, it discusses the role of international law and courts (ICJ, ITLOS and IACtHR) in strengthening climate responsibility claims and challenging diplomatic euphemisms that dilute accountability. It also explores innovative governance approaches that mediate and translate treaty language and COP Decisions into concrete policies at national, sub‑national and community‑levels.

On the other hand, it discusses emerging innovative community-based governance approaches — such as participatory budgeting, co-governance bodies and other locally driven innovations — that empower citizens, indigenous knowledge systems and civil society actors to shape, monitor and enforce climate action. By juxtaposing top‑down legal instruments with bottom‑up participatory models, this theme seeks to identify pathways that make net zero strategies technically feasible, socially equitable, and environmentally sustainable, thereby ensuring that just transition principles genuinely govern the transition to a net zero world.

Just Transitions: Reality or Utopia?

This theme interrogates whether Just Transitions can move beyond rhetorical optimism to become tangible realities, or whether they remain an unattainable utopia. It examines the ‘green’ veneer that frequently conceals widening/deepening inequality and asks how the material foundations of energy systems can be re-shaped and transformed. By moving beyond the destructive cycles of critical mineral extraction and uncritical techno-optimist narratives that fuel land grabs and human rights violations, the discussion re-imagines supply chain governance. It evaluates a suite of socio-legal instruments (human-rights-based due-diligence obligations, trade clauses to digital traceability tools) and assesses how they can be deployed to re-wire global value chains toward justice rather than exploitation. The theme also explores plural ‘alternatives’ that center local knowledges (such as Mutirão, Ubuntu) and ‘non-market models’ (like cooperatives) as pathways to restructure energy production and distribution.

Ultimately, we seek to operationalise energy sovereignty by addressing how power asymmetries and financial dependencies can be reshaped to ensure a genuinely fair green transition. In doing so, the theme asks how existing material realities of energy systems, supply‑chain governance, and structural economic inequalities can be re‑wired to produce more equitable futures.

Just Transitions in Industry and Technology

This theme refers to the process of shifting from fossil-fuel-based production systems towards low-carbon and environmentally beneficial technologies in ways that are economically and socially equitable across regions, workers, and countries. Because technological and industrial transitions create both winners and losers, a just transition requires policies that support affected workers and regions through reskilling, redeployment, and the development of new productive capabilities, thereby mitigating disruption and enabling participation in emerging low-carbon sectors. It also encompasses the global dimensions of industrial change, including the need for equitable and sustainable supply chains for the raw materials underpinning low-carbon technologies. This implies strengthening labour and environmental standards in extraction, ensuring that resource-producing countries capture economic benefits from the transition, and supporting their ability to move into more complex, higher-value activities to avoid new forms of resource dependence or ‘resource curse’ dynamics.

More broadly, assessing which technologies and industrial pathways are environmentally and socially beneficial requires drawing on diverse forms of knowledge across the climate, ecological, human health and production system dimensions of transition. A just transition recognises the heterogeneous distribution of assets, skills and capabilities across the economy and seeks to manage structural change in ways that promote inclusive and sustainable development.

Just Transition: For Whom, By Whom, With Whom?

This theme relates to the procedural-participatory dimension of just transitions. Discourse, planning and implementation must focus not only on outcomes, but also on agency, participation, and knowledge. Who is bringing about the transition? Is it governments, firms, workers, financial actors, or civil society? Who is most affected by it, whether through exposure to climate impacts, economic restructuring, or changing livelihoods? And who may resist it, due to uncertainty, real or perceived losses, or exclusion from decision-making?

Addressing these questions is essential to ensuring that transitions are legitimate, durable, and socially equitable. In particular, those most vulnerable to climate change and to transition-related economic disruption must be actively involved in shaping the pathways and policies that affect them. This requires inclusive democratic processes, meaningful stakeholder engagement across sectors and communities, and effective science communication to support informed participation. A just transition is therefore not only about distributing costs and benefits fairly, but about ensuring that the transition itself is co-designed with those whose futures it will shape.

Submit an abstract here https://forms.office.com/e/g11S3E7AR7

Registrations for this event are now open. If you would like to attend as a delegate, please register here Third Annual International Conference: Just Transitions in Implementation – Fill in form