ABSTRACT
This introduction provides an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book discusses climate change as a human rights issue and seeks to evaluate to what extent human rights law can be used as a framework to address both mitigation and adaptation to climate change. The theoretical framework that informs this work is an analysis of the nature of human rights obligations through the typology of duties to respect, protect and fulfill protected rights, which will be fully developed. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a consortium of more than 100 scientists worldwide established by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). Climate change has far-reaching implications for every sector of global society. Climate change originated as an environmental problem and the international community still tends to discuss it in those terms, without truly appreciating the unprecedented impact on human beings.
