Is Germany headed for a climate constitutional crisis?

Climate protection is written into Germany's constitution. But as the current government weakens laws designed to reduce emissions, a confrontation with courts could be on the horizon.

Dear Reader,

Only five years ago, Germany became one of the few countries in the world to elevate climate protection to a constitutional right.

A group of youth activists had argued that the government’s goal of becoming “carbon-neutral by 2050” was little more than a slogan—one that offloaded the burden onto younger generations while politicians stalled.

In part to the activists’ own surprise, the Constitutional Court pounded down its gavel in their favour. In 2021, it ruled that young people have a “fundamental right” to a healthy climate, and that the government needed to set out credible, legally binding pathways to cut CO2 emissions now.

If it failed to do so, the judges warned, the courts could intervene when policies were too weak, too murky, or too slow (in other words: typically German). The then–traffic-light coalition scrambled to respond, committing to a 65 percent reduction in greenhouse ga…