Reimagining Climate Finance: A Blueprint for Liberatory Community-Led Solutions
By Delicia Reynolds Hand and Jacqui Patterson
The 29th Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change closed last month in Baku, Azerbaijan with a sense of outrage from communities and countries that are feeling the brunt of climate change. The deep disappointment was due to the failure of industrialized nations to commit to invest in climate finance at the required scale, particularly given their outsized responsibilities for the greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change.
Black communities — throughout the African Diaspora and on African continent — top the list of those most impacted by climate change. Examples include New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward in Hurricane Katrina, the floods in Madagascar and Kenya, and the utter decimation of Barbuda. As impacts of the crisis accelerate, it’s clearer than ever that those who have contributed the least to the problem are suffering the most from its consequences.
Yet when it comes to money spent to address the crisis, these same communities see only a tiny sliver of the funds. In the United States, it’s a well-documented fact that frontline communities receive a paltry fraction of environmental funding, with estimates ranging from .05% to 10% going to environmental justice organizations and communities. Black communities receive a fraction of that abysmal portion. And the global landscape is just as bleak: Africa bears an extremely heavy load of the global climate burden but receives a mere 3% of climate finance.
These numbers are not by happenstance. They result from explicit intent — from the legacy of colonialism and the ongoing extractive economies and power imbalances that shape our global economic system. The current climate finance architecture, dominated by institutions and interests of the global north, is failing to prioritize the needs and leadership of the communities most impacted by the crisis.
But here’s the thing: the communities getting shortchanged by the current system are also pioneering some of the most exciting and effective climate solutions out there.
From Ghana to Brazil to the U.S. South, Black and Indigenous communities are showing what it looks like to build climate resilience on their own terms. A report by The Chisholm Legacy Project (TCLP), From Adversity to Advancement, chronicles 45 ways Black communities are leading on climate justice. Globally, Black communities and Afro-Descendant nations are creating green banks that keep wealth local, protecting forests while defending traditional land rights, and imagining new models of renewable energy that communities actually own.
These initiatives model a radically different approach to climate finance — one that sees racial and economic justice as non-negotiable. And now, a new paper by TCLP and partners argues that this approach must become the norm, not the exception.
This week Global Afro Descendant Climate Justice Collaborative, The Chisholm Legacy Project, and Gilmore, Khandhar, LLC, released “Transforming Climate Finance Through a Black Liberation Lens,” In this joint paper, we lay out a bold and comprehensive vision for reimagining climate finance grounded in principles of racial and economic justice.
To effectively address the climate crisis, in this paper, we call for a fundamental shift in how climate finance is understood and practiced. Rather than treating climate finance as a matter of technical carbon accounting or market fixes, we must recognize it as a site of struggle over values, power, and resources — one with deep roots in histories of colonialism, extraction, and systemic racism.
To confront these interlocking crises, we propose 10 concrete mandates for transforming climate finance: from centering reparative justice to building community-controlled financial institutions to democratizing global governance. These key tenets of just transition are not incremental tweaks, but rather a thorough overhaul of the system that would put communities in charge of their own resilience and development.
Importantly, we ground this transformational vision in real-world examples of what’s already working, and how we can build on that to make deep systemic shifts. The solutions we need are already being seeded by those most impacted by the crisis. The question is whether funders and policymakers will shift resources and decision-making power to let these solutions flourish at the scale required.
The roadmap we present is urgent and far-reaching — but it’s also actionable. We translate high-level mandates into specific policy recommendations and movement-building strategies, outlining a phased implementation pathway over the coming years.
Achieving this vision will undoubtedly face obstacles, especially given the fossil-fuel-funded climate denial that has regained political power in the countries of the global north, including the U.S. But, as the paper argues, that only makes building power from the grassroots more vital. Transformative climate finance is a necessity with or without political alignment from the top.
Ultimately, “Transforming Climate Finance Through a Black Liberation Lens” is both a moral provocation and a practical blueprint. We pose an imperative to confront the cultural supremacy and myopia that is hard-wired into our global financial system, while illuminating levers for change.
Most of all, we invite imagination of a world where the communities that have been most exploited and excluded from wealth and power take the lead in shaping regeneration. As extreme weather and authoritarian threats escalate in tandem, this is the future we must fight for — one that invests in life, interdependence, and the hard-won wisdom of frontline communities.
It won’t happen overnight. But if we organize, if we divest from the dig-burn-dump economy and invest in life, if we build across boundaries and move money in the service of movement — we will cultivate a future where everyone can thrive. This is not only possible; it’s necessary. Let’s get to work.
—
Delicia Reynolds Hand, Esq is a Consultant with Gilmore Khandar LLC and Jacqui Patterson is the Executive Director of The Chisholm Legacy Project.
