How to inhabit our common home at the present time is an ethical question of great urgency. The environmental crisis is impacting individuals and communities differently around the world, exposing inequalities and vulnerabilities that become more stark with every passing decade. Within this context human rights can provide a framework for response in which the interconnectedness of the economic, political, environmental, and cultural dimensions of the crisis are foregrounded, and in which the perspective of vulnerable individuals and communities is made central.

This lecture will explore how women’s existing vulnerabilities are amplified and re- inscribed as the effects of environmental degradation become ever-more severe, and will consider the value of human rights perspectives as a means to address these challenges.