Climate change impacts our health, environment, and economy, with differentiated effects on communities and peoples around the United States and the globe. Human activities have been the dominant driver of climate change and it is inextricably tied to a history of human development and decision-making from individuals to organizations to entire societies. For these reasons, we cannot fully understand or respond to current or future changes in climate without understanding the history of human organization – that is, without understanding the social systems that influence these climactic changes.

This webinar shares findings from the Fifth National Climate Assessment’s Social Systems and Justice chapter. This is the first-ever chapter to address whether and how the actions taken to create, mitigate, or adapt to climate change are expected to produce just or unjust outcomes. This webinar will review the chapter’s three key messages: social systems are changing the climate and distributing its impacts inequitably; social systems structure how people perceive and communicate about climate change; and climate justice is possible if processes like migration and energy transitions are equitable. It will also discuss related materials from the report’s sectoral and regional chapters.