The Swiss women’s association Elders for Climate Protection secured a historic victory on Tuesday when Europe’s top rights court criticized Switzerland for not doing enough to combat global warming.
Who are the Swiss senior women fighting to save the climate?
Here is all you need to know about the Swiss seniors who contributed to the European Court of Human Rights’ first-ever reprimand of a country for neglecting to address climate change.
In August 2016, a small group of women above the age of retirement who had come together over their worries about climate change formed the association to demand more action toward meeting the targets set by the 2015 Paris Agreement.
That agreement established targets for governments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and to limit global temperature increases to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
“If everyone acted as Switzerland is doing today, global warming of up to three degrees Celsius could occur by 2100,” the Elders for Climate Protection say on their website.
“Keeping below 1.5 degrees is decisive to avert more serious threats to human rights.”
The association claims to have over 2,500 members with an average age of 73
Today, the association claims to have over 2,500 members, all of whom are women over the age of 64 living in Switzerland.
Their average age is 73, the report stated.
“Elderly women are extremely vulnerable to the effects of heat,” the association stated, outlining its membership criteria.
It does not, however, impose the same limits on its 1,200 supporters.
The organization has been advocating for climate protection to be recognized as a human right, citing the increasingly frequent and intense heatwaves that “pose a real and serious risk to our lives and physical and mental health.”
But the lawsuits it filed in Switzerland were all dismissed.
After being denied a hearing by Switzerland’s Supreme Court, the Elders for Climate Protection filed an appeal with the European Court of Human Rights in 2020.
That court eventually published its ruling on Tuesday, concluding that the Swiss state violated Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which ensures the “right to respect for private and family life.”
Cordelia Bahr, the Swiss association’s lawyer, stated that the court had “established that climate protection was a human right.”
“It’s a huge victory for us and a legal precedent for all the states of the Council of Europe,” she said.
The association has two co-presidents
Anne Mahrer, a Geneva librarian, has always been interested in environmental conservation, beginning with the anti-nuclear movement in the 1970s, according to an annual list of outstanding Swiss citizens issued by the Illustre weekly.
She later entered politics and served as a Green Party parliamentarian.
Rosemarie Wydler-Walti, a Basel-based education and marriage counselor, stands at her side.
As a young mother, she became interested in environmental and feminist causes.
In a profile published by the Organization of Swiss Abroad, she stated that she was inspired to act after the “traumatizing” Chornobyl nuclear tragedy in 1986 and a fire in a warehouse storing chemicals near Basel the same year.
Elders for Climate Protection has had substantial backing from the Swiss chapter of Greenpeace
Since its inception, the Elders for Climate Protection has had substantial backing from the Swiss chapter of Greenpeace, which has served as a guarantor for the organization’s legal expenditures.
According to its website, the association has incurred expenses of over 122,000 Swiss francs ($135,000) since its inception in 2016.
Tuesday’s ruling “is obviously a huge relief for the people who have been working on this case for years,” Greenpeace spokesman Mathias Schlegel told Le Temps daily.
“It is a very emotional moment. I have even seen some of my colleagues in tears,” he said.
