[Marxism] On Global Warming: A Socialist Response

[Sukla Sen <suklasenp@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I/II.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/climatewarmingarctic

Arctic ice loss: Northwest Passage now open, says
space agency

Fri Sep 14, 2:53 PM ET

PARIS (AFP) - The Northwest Passage, the dreamed-of
yet historically impassable maritime shortcut between
Europe and Asia, has now fully opened up due to record
shrinkage of Arctic sea ice, the European Space Agency
(ESA) said on Friday.

It released a mosaic of images, taken in early
September by a radar aboard its Envisat satellite,
which showed that ice retreat in the Arctic had
reached record levels since satellite monitoring began
in 1978.

Snipped

II.
http://www.isg-fi.org.uk/spip.php?article441

Leaving us to pay the price

George Monbiot, Heat, published by Allen Lane, 2006
Roy Wilkes
 

The importance of George Monbiot?s latest book Heat,
and the reason why every socialist should read it is
that it raises the level of debate on the politics of
climate change, as well as on the science and
technology. What the book lacks however is a class
analysis of the issue. Monbiot, viewing the world
through the prism of the English middle class, assumes
that all of us enjoy the unprecedented luxuries and
comforts that are afforded by ?our? exploitation of
fossil fuel, that all of us are equally responsible,
as ?carbon emitters,? for the environmental crisis. In
reality of course, it is the ruling class that has
made a Faustian pact with the devil, leaving the rest
of us staring into the flames of hell as we pay the
price for its profligacy.

Monbiot calculates that global emissions of carbon
dioxide will need to be cut by at least 60 percent by
2030. (And in the rich countries, who are by far the
biggest polluters, an average of around 90 percent
will be needed.) If we fail to achieve this target,
temperatures could well rise above the critical 2C
degree threshold. Beyond this ?tipping point? positive
feedback effects come into play, irreversibly driving
temperatures still higher. Ice caps melt; ocean
currents fail; huge quantities of methane are released
from the permafrosts and from the ocean beds; tropical
rainforests desiccate and burn. And from there we
enter the uncharted territory of chaotic and
cataclysmic change, to both the climate and the
ecosystems on which we and every other species depend.
Mass extinctions would follow, probably on a scale not
seen since the end of the Permian period.

But Monbiot remains optimistic; he doesn?t claim, as
some climate apocalyptics do, that it is already too
late. And in Heat he sets out to demonstrate the
practical steps that would be needed to achieve that
90 percent cut in emissions.

Little of this is new science. Climate scientists have
been warning about the dangers of high atmospheric
carbon levels for many years. So why have we, or more
importantly our governments, been so slow to act?
Monbiot exposes the role of fossil fuel corporations
in promoting an entire industry of climate denial. In
reality there is a remarkable consensus among serious
scientists (those required to publish peer-reviewed
studies) about climate change. The sole aim of the
deniers is to cast doubt on this consensus.
Carbon rationing

Monbiot advocates carbon rationing as the main
mechanism for achieving the 90 percent cut. Green
taxes wouldn?t deliver, and neither would they be
equitable. Instead we should calculate a fair
allocation and issue each person with carbon units,
which he prefers to call ?ice caps.? He believes that
this measure would automatically stimulate a market
for low-carbon technologies, such as public transport
and renewable energy.

.......

We will of course still need to generate energy,
however efficiently we use it. Nuclear power is
discussed by Monbiot but dismissed, rightly in my
view, as being too dangerous in the long term. Carbon
capture, which would enable us to continue burning
natural gas without releasing carbon dioxide to the
atmosphere, is more promising. Wind, solar, wave and
tidal energy are all subjected to a rigorous
appraisal. The development of efficient high voltage
DC cables would help to make wave power and offshore
wind farms viable; they would also offer the
possibility of turning deserts into vast solar farms
whose energy could be distributed far and wide

Transport is the second biggest contributor of
greenhouse gases after housing, but it is, according
to Monbiot, the easiest problem to fix. He provides a
wonderful critique of the motor car, and of the way
the image of ?the freedom of the road? fails to live
up to the reality. The economist Alan Storkey has
developed an innovative solution based on extending
the coach network and moving coach stations out of
city centres. Frequent high quality coaches would
enable journeys to be completed more quickly and in
greater comfort than can be achieved by clogging up
the motorways with cars. Air travel however gets a
decisive thumbs down ? Monbiot can find no way of
squaring air travel with our need to reduce carbon
emissions. Jet setting is one of the Faustian
pleasures we will simply have to forego.
But the market is the obstacle

Monbiot tries to demonstrate that all of these
measures can be achieved within the existing market
system. He therefore avoids the most obvious
conclusion, that the market is in every case the
biggest obstacle to reducing emissions. Capital will
always try to circumvent any measure which threatens
its profitability, however good those measures are for
the environment. Monbiot?s targets will be achieved
not by accommodating to capital but by confronting it.
Instead of trying to regulate private coach and rail
companies, for example, a simpler and far more
effective solution would be to bring transport into
public ownership and to allow its workers to run it as
a service rather than as a means of generating profit.
A massively expanded, free public transport system
would end road congestion almost immediately.

The same logic applies to every other industry.
Workers control of production would be far more
effective at reducing emissions than decrees issued by
a government via a civil service to private business.
Democratic planning would also enable us to transform
social relations outside the workplace. By socialising
domestic labour, for example, we could drastically
reduce our energy consumption while simultaneously
improving our quality of life. The only losers would
be the capitalists who sell us our washing machines,
microwaves and cookers.
Alliance with the organised working class

Monbiot ends his book by calling on its readers to
join the climate change movement. I would echo that
call. Read the book and join the campaign. Hundreds of
thousands of young people across the globe are already
doing just that, fighting for their right to a future.
But the movement needs a clearer direction, and in
particular it needs to build a strategic alliance with
the organised working class, and especially with those
workers engaged in power generation, motor
manufacturing, public transport, retail and
construction. Without such an alliance, the trade
union bureaucracy will set itself against the movement
in the name of protecting members? jobs. With it, we
will be in with a serious chance of saving the planet,
and of transforming social relations in the process.


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