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Strengthening and maintaining Just Transition goals in the EU Budget

par Moreira Ramalho, Tiago ;Crespy, Amandine
Organisme financeur FEPS/Solidar
Publication Publié, 2025-06-16

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Résumé :

The EU’s legally binding commitment to achieve climate neutrality by 2050 demands a far-reaching socioeconomic transformation. While the green transition promises sustainable prosperity, it also carries profound and unequal social and economic consequences. To meet this challenge, a just transition ensuring fairness, inclusivity and social protection is indispensable. This policy brief argues that the EU budget, particularly the forthcoming Multiannual Financial Framework after 2027, must be strategically leveraged to integrate just transition goals across all policy domains. The policy brief highlights the progress made through instruments such as the Just Transition Fund, the Recovery and Resilience Facility and the “galaxy” of funds derived from the Emissions Trading System (Innovation Fund, Modernisation Fund and Social Climate Fund). These tools have helped to identify and address the initial wave of eco-social risks, notably, in carbon-intensive regions and vulnerable communities. Yet, as the climate emergency becomes more acute, so too does the scale and complexity of risks in relation to health, work and income, housing, or mobility. AUTHORS TIAGO MOREIRA RAMALHO Postdoctoral fellow at CEVIPOL-ULB To future-proof the EU’s just transition agenda, five policy goals are emphasised in this brief: (1) ensuring inclusive and participatory governance; (2) strengthening territorial resilience; (3) developing an eco-social security system; (4) preparing workers and communities for profound transformations; and (5) investing in knowledge and governance capacity. The policy brief recommends a major consolidation and reinforcement of EU budgetary instruments through a complementary strategy of dedicated instruments and budget mainstreaming. It argues for the consolidation of the JTF, the generalisation of the “Do No Significant Harm” principle and eco-social earmarking to all EU funds, and the establishment of an EU Just Transition Network. It also calls for deeper investment in local research and policy capacity to address asymmetries across regions. The upcoming EU budget will be implemented at a critical moment for the delivery of a collective project of environmental, economic and social transformation that will last for more than a generation. It needs to be fit for purpose.