Framing energy justice: perspectives from activism and advocacy

Concepts of justice are now routinely mobilised in environmental and climate change activism, with movements for environmental and climate justice emerging around the world. More recently, the concept of energy justice has gained prominence, most frequently framed in terms of access to affordable energy and fuel poverty but also related to the politics of energy infrastructures. To date however, there has been little critical interrogation of energy justice in relation to actions undertaken by activist and advocacy movements. In this paper, we set out an analysis of the concept of 'energy justice' from the perspective of framing. Drawing on research with organisations in Philadelphia, Paris and Berlin, the paper explores the articulation and elaboration of an energy justice frame. In so doing, it explores how such actors strategically frame their interpretation of energy justice, considers the overall emergence of an energy justice frame, and draws out an agenda for future research.