CULTURAL RIGHTS & CLIMATE CHANGE Climate change and its effects on cultural practices and on cultural heritage sites and access to culture is a rather complex issue. UNESCO in an info sheet titled Culture & Climate Change43 suggests that: “culture is a powerful resource for addressing climate change impacts. Natural heritage sites serve as vital ‘sinks’ for greenhouse gas emissions, and are key for the protection of biodiversity. Intangible cultural heritage practices have proven to be highly effective tools for helping communities prepare for, respond to and recover from climate change-related impacts and emergencies. (….) Creativity is essential for finding new solutions to environmental challenges. Artists and creators have an enormous role to play in inspiring climate action.” The paper suggests that artists and creators may be important “tools” for creating awareness, “thinking” that has similarities to how development policies over decades have made use of artists as “tools” for certain issues such as health. UNESCO therefore “calls on countries to fully integrate culture into their climate change policies and strategies and is working to support the inclusion of culture in global climate action.” Climate change will, no doubt, have a grave impact on the cultures and cultural heritages of all humankind and hence on the related human rights of billions of people. While most human rights are affected by climate change, cultural rights are particularly affected, in that they risk being simply wiped out in many cases. The former UN SR, Karima Bennoune, addressed this in a report submitted in August 2020.44 “The 43 https://en.unesco.org/sites/default/files/info_sheet_ climate_change.pdf 44 https://www.undocs.org/A/75/298 38 universality of human rights, including cultural rights, has no meaning today without a liveable environment in which they can be enjoyed”. Adding that “not least indigenous peoples and people living in extreme poverty are affected by climate changes, which in some cases even lead to what is termed as ‘harmful cultural practices’ (...) against women such as child marriage of girls and female genital mutilation. Humanitarian assistance such as in disasters attendant on climate change tends to ignore caste dynamics and caste-related power structures, thus exacerbating existing caste-based exclusion.” The gendered impacts of climatechange, resource scarcity, and disasters, which may result for women in increased caretaking responsibilities and time poverty, may according to the report “create further obstacles to their ability to participate in cultural life and access educational opportunities [and] cultural restrictions on women’s mobility can limit their access to environmentally friendly methods of transportation such as cycling.” The relationship between cultural rights and climate change may not necessarily be obvious to most people. The UN SR suggests that, “we must think broadly about the relationship between culture and addressing climate change,” including: (a) Through cultural change; (b) In ways related to our modes of interacting with nature; (c) The promotion of green cultures. Such efforts require the marshalling of cultural resources.