[tt] [x-risk] Sherman: Eco-stability requires global authoritaritarianism

Fri Feb 8 15:14:43 UTC 2008

----- Forwarded message from "Hughes, James J." <James.Hughes at trincoll.edu> -----

From: "Hughes, James J." <James.Hughes at trincoll.edu>
Date: Fri, 8 Feb 2008 08:45:51 -0500
To: For discussion of existential risks <existential at transhumanism.org>
Subject: [x-risk] Sherman: Eco-stability requires global authoritaritarianism
Reply-To: For discussion of existential risks <existential at transhumanism.org>

Yikes. Found out about this one through Wesley J. Smith's outraged
reaction.

But the point about China having some advantages over liberal and
federal democracies in implemented eco-policy has some validity. Another
reason to worry about the fate of liberal democracy. - J.

http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=6878

Climate change, is democracy enough?

By David Shearman - posted Thursday, 17 January 2008 	

Perhaps the most significant news last week on the climate change front
was the announcement that plastic shopping bags will be banned in China
in six months' time. Let me analyse why this is so significant.

The science contained in the IPCC reports tells us that the ecological
crisis being generated by climate change is an overwhelming threat to
humanity. Unfortunately it seems increasingly likely that the IPCC
underestimated the speed of climate change and failed to recognise the
likely effect of a range of tipping points which may now be acting in
concert. This is the basis for the statements from many scientists that
drastic reduction of greenhouse emissions must occur in the next two
decades or it may be too late.

To many of us, therefore, a change in light bulbs by the citizenry is
important in terms of the recognition of the problem, but the effect is
infinitesimal in contrast to the actions required by governments. These
are often the governments that pride themselves on greenhouse leadership
yet facilitate and approve vast carbon-generating projects in wealthy
societies in the name of perpetual economic growth.
Advertisement

Let us return to the plastic bags. The ban in China will save
importation and use of five million tons of oil used in plastic bag
manufacture, only a drop in the ocean of the world oil well. But the
importance in the decision lies in the fact that China can do it by
edict and close the factories. They don't have to worry about loss of
political donations or temporarily unemployed workers. They have made a
judgment that their action favours the needs of Chinese society as a
whole.

China has become, or is just about to become, the world's greatest
emitter of greenhouse emissions. Its economic growth suggests that it
may soon emit as much as the rest of the world put together. Its
environment is in a deplorable state, with heavily polluted rivers and
drinking water, serious air pollution, both of which have a heavy burden
of illness. Pollution and climate change are reducing productive land in
the face of an increasing population which is compelled to import some
of its foodstuffs. Its population centres will be candidates for early
inundation by sea level rise and the melting of Himalayan glaciers will
reduce its water supply.

All this suggests that the savvy Chinese rulers may be first out of the
blocks to assuage greenhouse emissions and they will succeed by
delivering orders. They will recognise that the alternative is famine
and social disorder

Let us contrast this with the indecisiveness of the democracies which
together produce approximately the other half of the world's greenhouse
emissions. It is perhaps reasonable to ask the reader a question. Taking
into account the performance of the democracies in the reduction of
emissions over the past decade, do you feel that the democracies are
able and willing to reduce their emissions by 60-80 per cent this
century or perhaps more importantly by approximately 10 per cent each
decade?

If you say "yes" then you fly in the face of a track record of
persistent failure in a wide range of environmental management leading
to depletion of natural resources and fresh water, biodiversity and
ecological service loss, loss of productive land and depletion of
essential food sources such as ocean fish. In Australia, a surfeit of
democracy carries much responsibility for the demise of the Murray
Darling River, where debate has replaced action.

Such an analysis of democracy is conducted in the book The Climate
Change Challenge and the Failure of Democracy, co authored by myself and
Joseph Wayne Smith, in a series from the Pell Center for International
Relations and Public Policy. The fundamental reasons why democracy is
shackled in its present form relate to its fusion with the needs of
corporate enterprise but also important is the human denial to recognise
its limitations and the inhibition to criticise democracy and implement
reform.

Liberal democracy is sweet and addictive and indeed in the most extreme
case, the USA, unbridled individual liberty overwhelms many of the
collective needs of the citizens. The subject is almost sacrosanct and
those who indulge in criticism are labeled as Marxists, socialists,
fundamentalists and worse. These labels are used because alternatives to
democracy cannot be perceived! Support for Western democracy is
messianic as proselytised by a President leading a flawed democracy

There must be open minds to look critically at liberal democracy. Reform
must involve the adoption of structures to act quickly regardless of
some perceived liberties. It is not that liberal democracy cannot react
once it sees a threat, for example, the speedy response to a recent
international financial emergency. If governments can recognise a
financial emergency and in an instant move heaven and earth (and
billions of dollars, pounds sterling and euros) to contain it, why are
they unable to do the same in response to a global environmental
emergency? Quite simply our system is seen to live and breathe by the
present economic system; the problem is that living and breathing within
the confines of the world ecological systems is contrary to the activity
of progress and development as defined within liberal democracy.

The Chinese decision on shopping bags is authoritarian and contrasts
with the voluntary non-effective solutions put forward in most Western
democracies. We are going to have to look how authoritarian decisions
based on consensus science can be implemented to contain greenhouse
emissions. It is not that we do not tolerate such decisions in the very
heart of our society, in wide range of enterprises from corporate
empires to emergency and intensive care units. If we do not act urgently
we may find we have chosen total liberty rather than life.

David Shearman is Emeritus Professor of Medicine and Hon Visiting
Fellow, Department of Geography and Environmental Sciences, University
of Adelaide and Hon Secretary, Doctors for the Environment Australia. He
is coauthor , with Joseph Wayne Smith, of two books: The Climate Change
Challenge and the Failure of Democracy, Praeger, Davenport, Connecticut
2007, a series from the Pell Center for International Relations and
Public Policy; and Climate Change Litigation. Analysing the law,
scientific evidence and impacts on the environment, health and property
Presidian Legal Publications, October 2006.

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