The concept of a Just Transition has gained increasing traction in academic and policy debates in recent years as global efforts to attain “net zero” accelerate in the face of climate change. The ILO (2015) advocate that a Just Transition should enhance environmental and labour objectives at the same time, in the pursuit of “well-managed environmentally sustainable economies and societies, decent work for all, social inclusion and the eradication of poverty”.*
Yet the structural shifts that have underpinned the emergence of global supply chains that dominate modern manufacturing have created divisions in themselves between North and South, and those in polluting industries as opposed to carbon-neutral industries that cut across traditional class divides.
However, a Just Transition can have wider understandings, imaginations and experiences, and these can lead to contestation. As such, the impact of a Just Transition on industry also needs to be considered alongside other coterminous developments such digitalisation and automation. In this special issue, we explore these issues and their implications for workers, business and industry, communities affected and attendant notions of justice, capability and empowerment.
Hence, we welcome submissions to a special issue of Contemporary Social Science on the multi-dimensional and multi-scalar nature of a Just Transition. We encourage the submissions of original articles, both theoretical and empirical, that investigate and analyse from single disciplinary and multi-disciplinary perspectives on the following, but not exhaustive, topics:
• Implications for workers, trade unions and employment relations;
• Organisational governance and regulatory change
• Global Value Chains (GVCs);
• Industrial and sectoral scenarios;
• Implications for industrial policy;
• Territorial challenges for devolved nations and regions;
• Environmental policy and management;
• The impact on the lived experience of marginalised communities;
• Social policy and welfare reform, and;
• Cultural dimensions.
* https://www.ilo.org/global/about-the-ilo/newsroom/news/WCMS_826717/lang--en/index.htm
