Blog
TCLP at NYC Climate Week
The Chisholm Legacy Project is attending NYC Climate Week, happening Sept. 20-27, and we hope to see you there! Join us as we bring a Black Liberation and Just Transition lens to the discourse throughout the week. We’re honored to join organizers, movement leaders, advocates and partners from across the country. We look forward to…
What the Water Already Knew
I didn’t grow up knowing the word “environmental justice.” I grew up knowing that half the kids in my school on the south side of Chicago had asthma. I grew up knowing that my father – a mechanic, who never smoked a cigarette in his life – died of pulmonary fibrosis.
The Architecture of Liberation — The Role of the Just Transition Mechanism
At the June Intersessionals (SB64) of the UNFCCC in Bonn, Germany, Jacqueline Patterson, Executive Director of The Chisholm Legacy Project, spoke at a panel on June 8, 2026: “How can the Just Transition Mechanism support holistic transition across sectors?” With co-panelists: Eloise Guillon of World Animal Protection, Catalina Caro of Friends of the Earth –…
Global Afro-Descendants Refuse to be Sidelined at the 2026 UNFCCC Bonn Climate Change Conference
Bonn, Germany – The June Intersessionals (SB64) at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) lay the groundwork for COP31, but Afro-Descendant participants continue to face exclusion. To achieve more durable, legitimate climate governance, the Global Afro-Descendant Climate Justice Collaborative is hosting the Afro-Descendant Trans-Atlantic Strategy Convening (AD-TASC) concurrent to official climate negotiations….
At the First Conference on Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels, we – Global Afro-Descendants (GAD) – are confronting interconnected systems of oppression and fighting for REAL solutions to the climate and ecological crises
For the first time in history, Afro-Descendant peoples have been formally recognized and included as an official delegation within a global climate process.
This Earth Day, We Focus on Organizing for Black Rural Communities
We confront an appalling reality: Conditions have only deteriorated for Black rural communities since the first Earth Day was celebrated in 1970. In some places, conditions have worsened thanks to climate change.
Fossil Fuel Foolishness Persists but the Resistance is Rising
The global economy operates on a foundational injustice: treating Black communities, and other frontline communities and Global South nations, as sacrifice zones. Our communities have disproportionately dealt with decades of disenfranchisement, disinvestment, and displacement. We continue to feel the worst effects of climate change and increased toxins in the environment.
Leadership Already Exists in Black Frontline Communities
Tanya Lord PhD, MPH Across the country, Black frontline communities are already leading the work of climate justice. Organizers, advocates, practitioners, and community members are working every day to protect their neighborhoods, strengthen local economies, and respond to the growing impacts of climate change. For many leaders in Black frontline communities, this work is not…
TCLP Announces 2025 Shirley Chisholm Black Femme Leader Wellness Sistership Awardees
To celebrate the 101st birthday of Shirley Chisholm on Nov. 30, The Chisholm Legacy Project (TCLP) is thrilled to announce the awardees of the 2025 Shirley Chisholm Black Femme Leader Wellness Sistership, a personal and professional development award program to support Black femme frontline leaders in climate and environmental justice. Recognizing the entirety of Black…
Ethical Stocktake Reveals the Empty Shelves of the UNFCCC: A Call to Transformation
Context: The Global Ethical Stocktake (GES): An Ethical Mutirão for Climate Action, was launched as part of the lead-up to COP30 (the 2025 United Nations Climate Change Conference), which took place in Belem, Brazil from November 10th through the 22nd. By the start of COP30, GES regional meetings and dialogues across six continents had taken…