By: Mike Balkwill
Climate change are words that form a constant hum in the background of my thoughts. It is an anxious hum and is the result of a lot of gathering a lot of information about climate change, its causes, its current and anticipated impacts on the ecosystem and therefore on human society.
The hum goes like this – “Everything is going to change, everything has to change. Will the people I love survive?”
In order for humanity, (and many other species) to survive the effects of the changing climate people who live in societies with capitalist economies are going to have to change everything about how we live. One source I have read says that in the industrialized economies that means reducing everything we do that uses fossil fuels by 90%. This means anything that we do ten times in a day, or ten times in a week, or ten times in a month that requires fossil fuels we would now be able to do only once a day, one time in a week, or just once in a month. If I think about everyday activities like driving, cooking, heating and cooling at a fraction of my current use – I feel anxious and afraid.
I have read so much information and talked to so many people that my anxiety hums along at a pretty constant level but new information can startle me and register a ‘spike’ on my background EEG (Environmental EncephaloGram). Here are two recent articles that triggered my climate change startle reflex.
The first article is entitled ‘NASA Study: Civilization May Be Headed for Irreversible Collapse’ http://tiny.cc/sfnvcx . The distinct contribution of this article to the discussion of how climate change can lead to social collapse is the idea that social collapse is determined by “economic stratification of society into elites and masses”, co-inciding with overconsumption of resources. The ‘active ingredient’ in the social collapse in previous civilizations was ‘inequality induced famine that causes a loss of workers, rather than a collapse of nature’.
The authors of this article says the signs of possible social collapse are ignored by the elite and their supporters because “elite wealth monopolies mean they are buffeted from the most detrimental effects of the environmental collapse….. allowing them to continue business as usual during the impending catastrophe”.
The article concludes by saying the “two key solutions are to reduce economic inequality so as to ensure a faired distribution of resources, and to dramatically reduce resource consumption”
The second article illustrates this premise by describing one current example of the disassociated behaviour of the wealthy in the face of possible climate change induced catastrophe.
This article describes Eko Atlantic, an island city under construction off the coast of Lagos, Nigeria which will create a safe home for the elite amid the rising oceans (See ‘New Privatized African City Heralds Climate Change’ http://tiny.cc/nseucx and ‘Gleaming new Eko Atlantic city leaves historic Lagos in dust’ http://tiny.cc/9xkucx ).
Eko Atlantic – in effect a ‘gated island’ - will host 250,000 wealthy people, and will be privately built, with private administration, services and infrastructure. In contrast an equal number of people (250,000) who live in just one Lagos slum are left to fend for themselves. A low cost proposal to build a ‘floating settlement’ for the people who live in Makoko, modeled on a prototype floating school, http://tiny.cc/xojucx struggles to receive support, while Eko Atlantic receives approval from the Clinton Global initiative. Naomi Klein calls this kind of opportunism ‘disaster capitalism’. (Disaster Capitalism: The New Economy of Catastrophe http://tiny.cc/8lnucx ).
The rich are developing a lifeboat, shaped like an island. No doubt some people who will live there think it is their insurance against the real and metaphorical ‘flood’. It is striking that it relies on the same economic strategy (capitalism) that causes the environmental crisis. (Naomi Klein calls this kind of opportunism ‘disaster capitalism’ - Disaster Capitalism: The New Economy of Catastrophe http://tiny.cc/8lnucx ).
Eko Atlantic and the Makoko Slum is the perfect illustration of the thesis of the first article. Building lifeboats for the wealthy diverts resources from the projects that may be able to help humanity – including the rich – to survive.
It will take the collective effort of all of civilization for some of humanity to survive – lifeboats will not save the rich. They will just float a little bit longer.
Indigenous people on Turtle Island (North America) believe that every generation cannot simply think of its own survival; each new generation is responsible to ensure the survival of the seventh generation.
If a generation is about thirty years – seven generations is a little more than two hundred years. The dominant culture does not have a seven generation perspective. The business cycle is little more than the next quarter. What do those of us living now in the capitalist societies have to do to ensure humanity – the rich and the poor - will have a chance to survive climate change in the next two hundred years? What tradition might the dominant culture have to inspire a seven generation perspective?
Next month – Building Cathedrals
The hum goes like this – “Everything is going to change, everything has to change. Will the people I love survive?”
In order for humanity, (and many other species) to survive the effects of the changing climate people who live in societies with capitalist economies are going to have to change everything about how we live. One source I have read says that in the industrialized economies that means reducing everything we do that uses fossil fuels by 90%. This means anything that we do ten times in a day, or ten times in a week, or ten times in a month that requires fossil fuels we would now be able to do only once a day, one time in a week, or just once in a month. If I think about everyday activities like driving, cooking, heating and cooling at a fraction of my current use – I feel anxious and afraid.
I have read so much information and talked to so many people that my anxiety hums along at a pretty constant level but new information can startle me and register a ‘spike’ on my background EEG (Environmental EncephaloGram). Here are two recent articles that triggered my climate change startle reflex.
The first article is entitled ‘NASA Study: Civilization May Be Headed for Irreversible Collapse’ http://tiny.cc/sfnvcx . The distinct contribution of this article to the discussion of how climate change can lead to social collapse is the idea that social collapse is determined by “economic stratification of society into elites and masses”, co-inciding with overconsumption of resources. The ‘active ingredient’ in the social collapse in previous civilizations was ‘inequality induced famine that causes a loss of workers, rather than a collapse of nature’.
The authors of this article says the signs of possible social collapse are ignored by the elite and their supporters because “elite wealth monopolies mean they are buffeted from the most detrimental effects of the environmental collapse….. allowing them to continue business as usual during the impending catastrophe”.
The article concludes by saying the “two key solutions are to reduce economic inequality so as to ensure a faired distribution of resources, and to dramatically reduce resource consumption”
The second article illustrates this premise by describing one current example of the disassociated behaviour of the wealthy in the face of possible climate change induced catastrophe.
This article describes Eko Atlantic, an island city under construction off the coast of Lagos, Nigeria which will create a safe home for the elite amid the rising oceans (See ‘New Privatized African City Heralds Climate Change’ http://tiny.cc/nseucx and ‘Gleaming new Eko Atlantic city leaves historic Lagos in dust’ http://tiny.cc/9xkucx ).
Eko Atlantic – in effect a ‘gated island’ - will host 250,000 wealthy people, and will be privately built, with private administration, services and infrastructure. In contrast an equal number of people (250,000) who live in just one Lagos slum are left to fend for themselves. A low cost proposal to build a ‘floating settlement’ for the people who live in Makoko, modeled on a prototype floating school, http://tiny.cc/xojucx struggles to receive support, while Eko Atlantic receives approval from the Clinton Global initiative. Naomi Klein calls this kind of opportunism ‘disaster capitalism’. (Disaster Capitalism: The New Economy of Catastrophe http://tiny.cc/8lnucx ).
The rich are developing a lifeboat, shaped like an island. No doubt some people who will live there think it is their insurance against the real and metaphorical ‘flood’. It is striking that it relies on the same economic strategy (capitalism) that causes the environmental crisis. (Naomi Klein calls this kind of opportunism ‘disaster capitalism’ - Disaster Capitalism: The New Economy of Catastrophe http://tiny.cc/8lnucx ).
Eko Atlantic and the Makoko Slum is the perfect illustration of the thesis of the first article. Building lifeboats for the wealthy diverts resources from the projects that may be able to help humanity – including the rich – to survive.
It will take the collective effort of all of civilization for some of humanity to survive – lifeboats will not save the rich. They will just float a little bit longer.
Indigenous people on Turtle Island (North America) believe that every generation cannot simply think of its own survival; each new generation is responsible to ensure the survival of the seventh generation.
If a generation is about thirty years – seven generations is a little more than two hundred years. The dominant culture does not have a seven generation perspective. The business cycle is little more than the next quarter. What do those of us living now in the capitalist societies have to do to ensure humanity – the rich and the poor - will have a chance to survive climate change in the next two hundred years? What tradition might the dominant culture have to inspire a seven generation perspective?
Next month – Building Cathedrals
Thanks for this Mike. We have simply got to come to grips with not only the issue of climate carnage but the totally tilted playing field on which the discourse is being played. The rich (see my blog on Rob Ford) do not care. Indeed they are not, as famously noted in "The Great Gatsby" like the rest of us. Their disgusting glut of money has made them (they think) enured to the results to even the most horendous results of their depredations.
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