Capitalism vs. the Climate by Naomi Klein - One of the best pieces I've read this year

[robertpaulsen]

This is a long piece, but it's one of the most well written and most important that I've read in a long time. I've always loved her research and writing ever since I read The Shock Doctrine, one of my top ten favorite political books. But here I really became impressed with her wide-ranging vision of how the present and future is shaping up. I hope you read the whole piece, but these paragraphs in particular stood out for me:

Capitalism vs. the Climate
Naomi Klein
November 9, 2011

The fact that the earth’s atmosphere cannot safely absorb the amount of carbon we are pumping into it is a symptom of a much larger crisis, one born of the central fiction on which our economic model is based: that nature is limitless, that we will always be able to find more of what we need, and that if something runs out it can be seamlessly replaced by another resource that we can endlessly extract. But it is not just the atmosphere that we have exploited beyond its capacity to recover—we are doing the same to the oceans, to freshwater, to topsoil and to biodiversity. The expansionist, extractive mindset, which has so long governed our relationship to nature, is what the climate crisis calls into question so fundamentally. The abundance of scientific research showing we have pushed nature beyond its limits does not just demand green products and market-based solutions; it demands a new civilizational paradigm, one grounded not in dominance over nature but in respect for natural cycles of renewal—and acutely sensitive to natural limits, including the limits of human intelligence.

snip

In addition to reversing the thirty-year privatization trend, a serious response to the climate threat involves recovering an art that has been relentlessly vilified during these decades of market fundamentalism: planning. Lots and lots of planning. And not just at the national and international levels. Every community in the world needs a plan for how it is going to transition away from fossil fuels, what the Transition Town movement calls an “energy descent action plan.” In the cities and towns that have taken this responsibility seriously, the process has opened rare spaces for participatory democracy, with neighbors packing consultation meetings at city halls to share ideas about how to reorganize their communities to lower emissions and build in resilience for tough times ahead.

snip

But here is where things get complicated. There is a growing body of economic research on the conflict between economic growth and sound climate policy, led by ecological economist Herman Daly at the University of Maryland, as well as Peter Victor at York University, Tim Jackson of the University of Surrey and environmental law and policy expert Gus Speth. All raise serious questions about the feasibility of industrialized countries meeting the deep emissions cuts demanded by science (at least 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050) while continuing to grow their economies at even today’s sluggish rates. As Victor and Jackson argue, greater efficiencies simply cannot keep up with the pace of growth, in part because greater efficiency is almost always accompanied by more consumption, reducing or even canceling out the gains (often called the “Jevons Paradox”). And so long as the savings resulting from greater energy and material efficiencies are simply plowed back into further exponential expansion of the economy, reduction in total emissions will be thwarted. As Jackson argues in Prosperity Without Growth, “Those who promote decoupling as an escape route from the dilemma of growth need to take a closer look at the historical evidence—and at the basic arithmetic of growth.”

snip

We know the answers already. The corporate quest for scarce resources will become more rapacious, more violent. Arable land in Africa will continue to be grabbed to provide food and fuel to wealthier nations. Drought and famine will continue to be used as a pretext to push genetically modified seeds, driving farmers further into debt. We will attempt to transcend peak oil and gas by using increasingly risky technologies to extract the last drops, turning ever larger swaths of our globe into sacrifice zones. We will fortress our borders and intervene in foreign conflicts over resources, or start those conflicts ourselves. “Free-market climate solutions,” as they are called, will be a magnet for speculation, fraud and crony capitalism, as we are already seeing with carbon trading and the use of forests as carbon offsets. And as climate change begins to affect not just the poor but the wealthy as well, we will increasingly look for techno-fixes to turn down the temperature, with massive and unknowable risks.

more...(all emphasis added)

http://www.thenation.com/article/164497/capitalism-vs-climate?page=full

What I found most exhilarating about this article is that it is far from a "doom and gloom" piece. Klein does a wonderful job exploring the positive possibilities of a future with a "new civilizational paradigm" and rightly credits Occupy Wall Street with leading the way as a commendable example.

[snagglepuss]

1. to read later.

[slay]

2. K&R - Excellent!

She really know her stuff.

[txlibdem]

8. Another K&R, excellent

[abq e streeter]

3. Also will read later this everning. Naomi Klein is always worth reading.

[Uncle Joe]

4. I believe Naomi knocked this one out of the park!

Kicked and highly recommended!

The deniers did not decide that climate change is a left-wing conspiracy by uncovering some covert socialist plot. They arrived at this analysis by taking a hard look at what it would take to lower global emissions as drastically and as rapidly as climate science demands. They have concluded that this can be done only by radically reordering our economic and political systems in ways antithetical to their “free market” belief system. As British blogger and Heartland regular James Delingpole has pointed out, “Modern environmentalism successfully advances many of the causes dear to the left: redistribution of wealth, higher taxes, greater government intervention, regulation.” Heartland’s Bast puts it even more bluntly: For the left, “Climate change is the perfect thing…. It’s the reason why we should do everything wanted to do anyway.”

Here’s my inconvenient truth: they aren’t wrong. Before I go any further, let me be absolutely clear: as 97 percent of the world’s climate scientists attest, the Heartlanders are completely wrong about the science. The heat-trapping gases released into the atmosphere through the burning of fossil fuels are already causing temperatures to increase. If we are not on a radically different energy path by the end of this decade, we are in for a world of pain.

(snip)

Not only do these economic models create jobs and revive communities while reducing emissions; they do so in a way that systematically disperses power—the antithesis of an economy by and for the 1 percent. Omar Freilla, one of the founders of Green Worker Cooperatives in the South Bronx, told me that the experience in direct democracy that thousands are having in plazas and parks has been, for many, “like flexing a muscle you didn’t know you had.” And, he says, now they want more democracy—not just at a meeting but also in their community planning and in their workplaces.

In other words, culture is rapidly shifting. And this is what truly sets the OWS moment apart. The Occupiers—holding signs that said Greed Is Gross and I Care About You—decided early on not to confine their protests to narrow policy demands. Instead, they took aim at the underlying values of rampant greed and individualism that created the economic crisis, while embodying—in highly visible ways—radically different ways to treat one another and relate to the natural world.

http://www.thenation.com/article/164497/capitalism-vs-climate?page=full

Thanks for the thread, Robert Paulsen.:thumbsup:

[robertpaulsen]

13. Excellent choice of highlights, Uncle Joe!

The future is ours because the truth is on our side. We just need to keep hammering these points loud and clear so that fair weather independents don't have the excuse of ignorance to remain apathetic. The hope for humanity depends on ending an economic paradigm rooted upon infinite growth while raping a finite planet. There are no sidelines to stand on and the time has come to stand collectively on the side of truth or perish on the side of delusion. The Teabaggers have made their choice. We've made ours. Now the rest of the world needs to wake up, realize what the stakes are, and DO THE RIGHT THING!

[Uncle Joe]

14. I was just going to bold a few sentences but it was difficult to narrow down, the

entire column deserves to be read in order to get an ideal perspective of this excellent piece, the emotional power behind the opposition, the desperate need for change and ultimately the only logical path to take.

Peace to you, Robert.

[truedelphi]

5. Is Naomi Klein only one person?

Damn, she gives me more to think about than just about anyone else.

[azul]

6. The much larger crisis-

that we can't tell fact from fiction in making critical lifestyle decisions. Critical thinking got tossed in the oil rush.

"Human beings are about 1000 times dumber and meaner than they think they are."
~ Kurt Vonnegut

[Moostache]

7. I only wish Vonnegut was even partly wrong...(n/t)

[Overseas]

9. K&R. Yes please!

[txlibdem]

10. I wish I could give this a 2nd REC

[blackspade]

11. +1000

K&R for Ms. Klein!

[raouldukelives]

12. K&R

[marmar]

15. But people, let alone corporate and government officials, aren't ready to accept what this means:

A radical change to our "lifestyle" and the end of conspicuous consumption, which is what capitalism depends on.

[txlibdem]

21. The end of conspicuous consumption

Yes and definitely the end of the "throwaway" society where items are made more and more flimsy, less robustly, easier to break or wear out.

I'd like to have an upgradeable iPad with an easily accessible slot to put in a new faster processor when one comes out, stuff like that.

Of course the ultimate will be when 3D printing gets a little more advanced, you will be able to print out that new processor yourself and never go to the store, no warehouse full of boxes of these things, no shipping parts and products around the world using highly polluting cargo vessels, no manufacturing except right there on your table top. This is possible today but too expensive. In a couple of decades, the idea of "manufacturing" may be outdated.

The printed world

Three-dimensional printing from digital designs will transform manufacturing and allow more people to start making things
Feb 10th 2011 | FILTON | from the print edition

FILTON, just outside Bristol, is where Britain’s fleet of Concorde supersonic airliners was built. In a building near a wind tunnel on the same sprawling site, something even more remarkable is being created. Little by little a machine is “printing” a complex titanium landing-gear bracket, about the size of a shoe, which normally would have to be laboriously hewn from a solid block of metal. Brackets are only the beginning. The researchers at Filton have a much bigger ambition: to print the entire wing of an airliner.

Far-fetched as this may seem, many other people are using three-dimensional printing technology to create similarly remarkable things. These include medical implants, jewellery, football boots designed for individual feet, lampshades, racing-car parts, solid-state batteries and customised mobile phones. Some are even making mechanical devices. At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Peter Schmitt, a PhD student, has been printing something that resembles the workings of a grandfather clock. It took him a few attempts to get right, but eventually he removed the plastic clock from a 3D printer, hung it on the wall and pulled down the counterweight. It started ticking.

Engineers and designers have been using 3D printers for more than a decade, but mostly to make prototypes quickly and cheaply before they embark on the expensive business of tooling up a factory to produce the real thing. As 3D printers have become more capable and able to work with a broader range of materials, including production-grade plastics and metals, the machines are increasingly being used to make final products too. More than 20% of the output of 3D printers is now final products rather than prototypes, according to Terry Wohlers, who runs a research firm specialising in the field. He predicts that this will rise to 50% by 2020.
Related topics

Using 3D printers as production tools has become known in industry as “additive” manufacturing (as opposed to the old, “subtractive” business of cutting, drilling and bashing metal). The additive process requires less raw material and, because software drives 3D printers, each item can be made differently without costly retooling. The printers can also produce ready-made objects that require less assembly and things that traditional methods would struggle with—such as the glove pictured above, made by Within Technologies, a London company. It can be printed in nylon, stainless steel or titanium.

http://www.economist.com/node/18114221

Using 3D printing technologies such as laser sintering and electron beam melting, "rapid prototyping" evolved into "rapid manufacturing," in which short runs of actual finished parts are made. Such techniques are also used to create products customized for each person, such as hearing aids, dental crowns and medical implants.
http://www.pcmag.com/encyclopedia_term/0,2542,t=3D+printing&i=37077,00.asp#fbid=cqA6T115xeV

http://gpiprototype.com/ - GPI Prototype & Manufacturing Services, Inc.

And you can buy your own 3D printer for less than $1500 now. With further advancement and mass production the price will come down as the capabilities of these home 3D printers advances.

[certainot]

16. our universities must stop broadcasting sports on global warming denying RW radio stations

the RW radio monopoly and its unchallenged think tank coordinated repetition keeps the deniers in denial.

RW radio stations depend on university and pro sports for community standing, to bring in advertisers, and legitimize their denial. 15 of 16 universities in last year's NCAA final 16 basketbal tournament broadcast on limbaugh radio stations. those stations are licensed to operate in the public interest but all RW radio stations do GW denial as a rule.

it reaches 50 mil a week and enables and intimidates politicians and media to continue the denial. it has been a major factor in obstructing climate action in the US in the last 20 years. petro think tanks constantly provide guests and phony studies for the local and national talkers to blast all over the country, like free political advertising.

students and faculty need to get on this problem with petitions and protests. universities broadcasting on those stations are basically requiring their students to listen to the games broadcast from those partisan, global warming denying, racist, sexist radio stations. no university mission statement can possibly be consistent with such an association, especially with the racism and sexism also. some of the associations may date back before the stations went to right wing talk. those contracts need to be negated and the universities need to find alternatives. they have no excuses consistent with their mission statements.

the argument that RW talk radio just free speech from political entertainers fulfilling a community need and an expression of the market for right wing perspective is ridiculous. it is a protected monopoly and the national talkers especially insulate themselves from criticism with sophisticated call screening software that also allows them to put paid callers at the top of the line.

[swilton]

17. The myth that we can consume our way out of the environmental

crises was equivalent in fancy to the myth about Iraqi WMD.

[Utopian Leftist]

18. 2012: the True Mayan Prophecy

Follow them on Facebook, seriously! Beginning in January, PBS will broadcast their film, 2012: the True Mayan Prophecy, across the country . . . look for it, it's excellent!

According to Mayan and Nobel Peace Prize Winner Rigoberta Menchu Tum, Hollywood got everything about 2012 wrong. According to the Maya, 2012 was not intended to be a "doomsday scenario" meant to scare people. It is supposed to herald a new beginning, a time of balance and equality. We still have time to prevent global catastrophe of previously unseen proportions. But not much time.

[fascisthunter]

19. people's worship of this economic system is killing us all

[JDPriestly]

20. Great article!

Don't go shopping. Hug somebody and then share some tea (or whatever) with them.