A-Worker-Centred-Framework

Resource Overview: A Worker-Centred Framework for Financing the Just Transition

This guide presents an alternative financing framework designed to address the shortcomings of current models, which often prioritize private profit over the needs of workers and communities. Developed by the Institute for Economic Justice (IEJ) in partnership with the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), this resource argues that a truly "just" transition requires deep systemic change. Moving beyond simple energy sector decarbonization, the framework calls for a shift in macroeconomic policy to prioritize social, economic, and climate justice.

The framework proposes an integrated, worker-led approach centered on the following pillars:

• Mandate from Workers: Ensuring the transition is driven by social dialogue, job retention, and protection of workers' rights, while operating within a system of eco-socialism.
• Restructured Fiscal Policy: Moving away from austerity, this approach utilizes a Climate Response Fund (CRF) and green bonds—supported by redirected tax revenues and restructuring savings—to fund public-sector-led climate adaptation and mitigation.
• Promotional Monetary Policy: Reforming the South African Reserve Bank's inflation-targeting framework to better prioritize job creation and development, while using regulation and credit allocation to divest from fossil fuels and incentivize green industrialization.
• Development Finance Institution (DFI) Reform: Repositioning public DFIs, such as the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC), away from strict profit motives toward providing "patient capital" for long-term, socially impactful public goods.

By holistically applying these mechanisms, the framework aims to provide the necessary scale of financing to move South Africa toward a greener, labor-intensive, and inclusive economy that leaves no one behind.