Today is World Day of Social Justice

“It must be the responsibility of the privileged to ensure we create a just world where social justice is the norm.” *

Social justice

In 2007 the United Nations declared February 20 to be World Day of Social Justice to raise awareness about inequality, poverty and social exclusion. Keywords for social justice are human rights, equity, access and participation, fairness.

Universal

Social justice is universal, because the bottom line remains the same on micro and macro level all over the world. It is about access to livelihoods in the broad sense of the word for all people. Like healthcare and education and a fair and equitable share of basic goods and services. Imagine what an unconditional basic income would mean for millions of people around the globe!

Climate justice

The first time I heard about social justice was within the climate movement. I did not know there was a term for what to me should be our natural, inclusive way of thinking and behaving.

To me social justice is intertwined with climate justice. The entire earth is effected by climate change, but not in the same way and the effects are not felt equally by all people. There are people in every country who are hit harder by the climate crisis and there are populations, areas and countries that are hit even harder. Privileged countries must take their responsibility to be an ally to areas and countries suffer form the effect of climate change.

Ally up!

Back to Social Justice: What can each of us do today to make the world a bit more just? We could ask ourselves how to be an ally, and how to provide one another with support and tools.

Frigga

* Inspired by an article in National Today.