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| Credit: Nickeled |
Opinion by Naomi Klein and Kshama Sawant
Is capitalism fundamentally at odds with climate? In 2019, 11,000
scientists issued a chilling warning to the world. They predicted countless
sufferings due to the climate crisis until the world community makes a major transformation. But almost two years on, no significant progress has been made on transforming. How we all live
and interact with the environment. Climate change is getting worse Global
warming is rising, not falling. So is it finally time to start a new and
radical approach?
Now in the midst of a global pandemic, we are seeing a bailout for the big
polluters. Billionaires saw the bubble of their wealth. While millions of
people are struggling to meet their needs. In other words, profits are placed
in front of people and the planet. Things are not the same as when I published
the book in 2014 titled Capitalism vs. Climate. There was a tremendous pushback due to linking climate with capitalism as it was making things very difficult for the corporate economy.
Seven years later, the Climate Justice Movement's rhetoric is really
resonating at the highest levels of government. I want to emphasize discourse
because there is a difference between what politicians say and what politicians
do. It really matters when you look at what the Biden administration is
proposing. We are seeing a movement of resources that I have never seen in my
life. It has passed a stimulus bill worth about ً $3 trillion, a large part of
this is going to the so-called green projects. Unfortunately, not only has the
discourse changed in these seven years, but the planet has also changed in these
seven years. It's too hot and will reach 2-5 degrees celsius at the of this century, according to World Meteorological Organisation. So, there is an immediate need to do something. It
may seem hard to accept, but three trillion is not enough if we are going to
deal with this crisis. We basically need three times as much as proposed. (Klein)
Read more: How
climate change will impact geopolitics around the world
How to mobilize the climate movement?
The emergence of large-scale movements, as we have seen recently, such as
the street protests against black lives that took 26 million people to the
American streets in multi-ethnic working-class solidarity against racism. The
fact that climate strikes have been led by young people, has really put
pressure on big business-dominated politics. There have been a large number of
victories, such as Amazon tax to fund, expansion of social housing, Green
New Deal projects, etc., which are taking on big business and winning despite
their opposition. The vast majority of these victories have been achieved
despite the opposition of the progressive democrats in the US. What people have
done to win these victories, they started large-scale action conferences, street
actions, street protests, and so on. We need similar pressure by mobilizing
mass movement across the globe.
Big corporates and battling capitalism:
The battle to tax big businesses, especially Amazon, didn't come without a consequence, for example, Amazon invested heavily in trying to beat the working people. It put
$1.5 million in the council race in the US. This is where the
traditional wisdom of the Democratic Party in the interest of the working
people totally betrays by insisting on not mentioning capitalism in the
context of the climate crisis. In fact, you have to do the exact opposite to
mobilize people and organize ordinary people to use their latent power. Individually;
the working people have no power, you have to fight the political battle and
will have a political clash against big business. It
makes climate movement difficult as it puts capitalist interests at stake. (Sawant)
Climate justice:
We need climate justice, which means communities that have gotten the
worst deals under the current extractive economy, need to get green jobs, green
infrastructure, etc. This is part of climate justice. But that's only half of
it. The other half is the people, who have done the worst to create the crisis,
have to pay for it. We don't talk much about it often, but the truth is that
people are angry about corporate profiteering during this pandemic. People get
angry when they hear that the billionaire class has increased its wealth in the
meantime. Unless we say that polluters have to pay the price, for a few years
down the road, it has led to massive cuts in healthcare to education and many
such policies that help working people. It will come at the cost of
marginalized communities’ interests.
Read more: Climate
change and water issues: A potential to trigger inter-state conflicts
Responsibility factor:
Leading global environmental economists say climate change will increase
income inequality between rich and poor countries. How do some of the poorest
nations go through a crisis in the early stages of development and do the
countries that have contributed the most to climate change have to bear the
brunt of reducing their CO2 emissions in a more ambitious way?
Climate justice is that those who have suffered the most and have
done the least to create the crisis, need to come to the forefront to benefit.
The United States is the world's largest emitter. The United States emits more
greenhouse gases than any other country. It has been spreading pollution on an
industrial scale for hundreds of years. As such, it means that countries like
the United States and the United Kingdom, as well as other so-called developed industrialized
nations, need to pay for the funds that will go to the global south as agreed
in many agreements such as the most recent COP26. These are all
part of the United Nations Climate Agreement, which the United States has
already signed. The UN Climate Convention states that countries have common but differentiated responsibilities. It means that every country has to be part of the
solution, but there are differentiated responsibilities because they have extracted
so much wealth from poorer countries and that's how they became rich. Hence, for years, the United States has been pledging to pay into UN climate funds but has reneged on its promises. However, we cannot think of environmental justice
in a national context alone. It needs to be an international one. (Klein)
There is no solution to the catastrophe of climate, which is tearing us
apart on the basis of nationalism. An international response is needed and it
points to working-class solidarity. For example, 100 global corporations have
been responsible for 70% of emissions since 1988. In other words, the big
corporations conglomerate the billionaire
class. They are responsible for this crisis. The capitalist class in India is
as extractive and exploitative as the capitalist class in the United States.
Therefore, in the midst of racial divisions, the working class is encouraged to
fight unitedly and establish international solidarity with working people
around the world. Because there is no hope of finally defeating and tackling
climate change unless we acknowledge that it is a war on capitalism itself. According
to the Guardian, 60 of the world's largest banks have provided nearly ً
$4 trillion in financing to fossil fuel companies since the Paris Agreement in
2015. Therefore, it really advocates for a socialist green deal. We finally
need a planned economy for renewable energy sources and we cannot waste time in
the hope that one day the capitalist class will understand that it is in the
interest of humanity. They know it's in the best interest of humanity, but they
have no incentive to save it. (Klein)
Organizing movements: Way ahead:
We should organize movements, not NGOs. This does not mean that there are
no good NGOs involved in the movement, but NGOs will not be able to get us out
of it. This is going to be the strength of the movement and the mass
mobilization that will eventually drag people out of this catastrophe.
Consider; the Indian farmer’s movement against Prime Minister Modi, dubbed by
many farmers as a death warrant that would further strengthen the land in the
hands of a few corporate players. They faced tremendous repression from the
Modi government, including arresting and imprisoning young climate activists,
but there was global solidarity from the youth. This is something we need to
look at from the climate movement at the grassroots level. Of course, these
solutions are radical in the best sense. Thus, there is no question whether or
not we like a radical change, we are going to experience a radical change and we
are already in it. As we transit from
fossil fuels, we need to be bold at this moment in the face of the corporatization mark.
War and fossil fuels:
Some estimate that the US military is the world's largest consumer of oil
and, consequently, one of the world's top greenhouse gas emitters. Many modern wars have largely been predicated on
protecting access to fossil fuel resources abroad. The U.S. military has
800 bases around the world, and it is not surprising that most of them
are surrounded by oil and natural gas reserves. There is a link between
militancy and climate change. It is no coincidence that so much of the US
government's military equipment internationally revolves around the question of
protecting the natural resources that these corporations are extracting. Needless
to say, they are determined to get every drop of oil out of the ground if we
allow them. It is the matter of taking funds from the military and moving
towards productive and socially constructive and non-destructive causes. (Sawant)
Read more: Climate
change and the question of war
Many people do not realize how much the climate crisis contributes to mass
migration. According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, in the
last some months alone, more than 80 percent of global displacement has been
caused by disasters. Most of them were born due to climate and extreme weather.
Many of the people who have been forced to emigrate from Central America to the
United States are linked to the effects of climate change. However, there is
never a single driver of immigration. The reasons people choose to move are
complex. Climate shocks do not affect the rich and the poor alike. Thus, we
need to talk about deserving and undeserving immigrants. The idea is that if you
are a political refugee you are a deserving refugee, but if you are an economic
or climate refugee you are not deserving. We just need to get rid of all this
discourse completely because people have the right to move. They also have the
right to live. We need to mobilize hundreds of billions of resources so that
communities can recover from the catastrophe of fueling climate change. And if
people have no choice but to move and or choose to move, then obviously they
need to be welcomed. (Klein)
Naomi Klein, author of the book, “This Changes Everything Capitalism Versus the Climate.”
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