The International Court of Justice (ICJ) released a significant advisory opinion on July 23, finding that the production and consumption of fossil fuels “may constitute an internationally wrongful act”, for which a nation state is responsible.

It is widely regarded as being as creating the possibility for “big emitters” to be “successfully sued”.

Meanwhile, the big emitters and their governments are fighting back. Democracy Now! reported on August 1 that United States President Donald Trump is attempting to revoke the power of the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from cars, power plants and other sources under the Clean Air Act.

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These two developments illustrate the competing ways in which capitalist elites and their institutions are responding to the inevitable crises that accompany the climate emergency.

Some are attempting to find legal and institutional avenues to restrain, or manage, runaway carbon pollution. Others are waging a war against climate science and any restrictions, whatsoever, which may be placed on the profiteering of fossil fuel conglomerates.

But the ICJ ruling is important for the climate movement. Notably, it supported the premise of the Pacific Island Students Fighting Climate Change (PISFCC) which pushed for the decision.

As Cynthia Houniuhi of the PISFCC

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