Green skills and just transitions: Analysing international organisations' discourses with a focus on the Global South

Margarita Langthaler and Marcela Catalán Lorca

No 82, Working Papers from Austrian Foundation for Development Research (ÖFSE)

Abstract: In recent years, the topic of green transitions has attracted considerable attention. Notably, these transitions are often framed as a skills issue, reflecting perceived gaps in the technical skills required for green technologies. Moreover, skills are frequently presented as central to ensuring that green transitions are socially just. Since the 2010s, international organisations have played a leading role in shaping the green skills debate, with their policy literature exerting significant influence, particularly in the Global South. However, the global debate lacks conceptual clarity. The term 'green skills' encompasses a wide range of meanings. From the perspective of the Global South, additional questions emerge. What do green transitions imply for informal economies and subsistence agriculture? What does it mean, in such contexts, to ensure a just transition? What role can vocational and technical education (VET) systems play and what do they need to meet these expectations? This paper seeks to address part of this gap by analysing green skills publications produced by international organisations, with a particular focus on the Global South. It examines the underlying conceptualisations of green skills and green transitions.

Keywords: green transition; skills issue; vocational education and training; education policy transfer; social dialogue; human development (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/340187/1/1969472499.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:oefsew:340187

DOI: 10.60637/2026-wp82

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from Austrian Foundation for Development Research (ÖFSE) Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics ().