A juridical Minka in times of climate emergency

This article develops the concept of a juridical Minka to explain how civil society interventions shaped the Inter-American Court of Human Rights’ advisory opinion on the climate emergency. Inspired by Andean traditions of collective labour, the Minka captures a conjunctural alignment in which Indigenous organisations, grassroots movements, NGOs, and expert institutions pooled their capacities to widen the interpretive horizons available to the Court. Rather than reading the Advisory Opinion as a purely judicial creation, the article reconstructs the collaborative field formed through written statements, hearings, and the Manaus Declaration. Focusing on four recurring clusters – mitigation, extraterritorial obligations, reparations, and fair shares – the article compares participants’ proposals with the Court’s decision. The result is neither wholesale adoption nor rejection, but translation. Claims become generalisable standards and burdens of justification. Reciprocity, therefore, lies in the return of portable normative infrastructure, enabling renewed mobilisation across litigation, policy, and territorial struggles.

Advisory opinion · Civil rights · Constitutional court · Human rights · Public opinion · Climate Change, Adaptation, Migration · Environmental law and policy · Indigenous Peoples' Rights and Law