Climate Change Mitigation through Civil Procedure? Justiciability in Two Nordic Climate Cases

Abstract

Abstract Although the phenomenon of climate change litigation has flourished in certain European countries, it has so far been limited in the Nordic countries. A reason might be that the Nordic countries do not have a strong tradition of judicial review or rights-based litigation. The role of the courts was long considered to be less about controlling that the legislature lived up to constitutional and international obligations, than ensuring the realisation in practice of the substantive law, by resolving concrete disputes. Through the analysis of issues of justiciability in one Norwegian and one Swedish climate case, this article discusses the role of the judiciary in climate cases. It is argued that the cases illustrate a tension between on the one hand the right to access to a court and judicial review, and on the other, a more limited and traditional understanding of the role of the court, which focuses on the resolution of concrete disputes. At the same time, the cases are considered to indicate that climate change litigation can bring about change in the judicial interpretation of procedural law.