How the Rich are Destroying the Earth

How the Rich Are Destroying the Earth
November 24, 2008

http://www.enn.com/lifestyle/commentary/38716
http://www.enn.com/lifestyle/commentary/38716/print

Environment: There is an emergency. In less than a decade we will have to change
course, but there are a few major obstacles blocking the way.

The following is reprinted from the new book How the Rich Are Destroying the
Earth by Herve Kempf and published by Chelsea Green.

There is an emergency. In less than a decade we will have to change course --
assuming the collapse of the U.S. economy or the explosion of the Middle East
does not impose a change through chaos. To confront the emergency, we must
understand the objective: to achieve a sober society; to plot out the way there;
to accomplish this transformation equitably, by first making those with the most
carry the burden within and between societies; to take inspiration from
collective values ascribed to here in France by our nation's motto: "Liberty,
ecology, fraternity."

What are the main obstacles that block the way?

ADVERTISEMENT

First of all, received wisdom -- prejudices really -- so loaded that they orient
collective action without anyone really thinking about them. The most powerful
of these preconceived ideas is the belief in growth as the sole means of
resolving social problems. That position is powerfully defended even as it is
contradicted by the facts. And it is always defended by putting ecology aside
because the zealots know that growth is incapable of responding to the
environmental issue.

The second of these ideas, less cocky although very broadly disseminated,
proclaims that technological progress will resolve environmental problems. This
idea is propagated because it allows people to hope we will be able to avoid any
serious changes in our collective behaviors thanks to technological progress.
The development of technology, or rather of certain technical channels to the
detriment of others, reinforces the system and fosters solid profits.

The third piece of received wisdom is the inevitability of unemployment. This
idea is closely linked to the two previous ideas. Unemployment has become a
given, largely manufactured by capitalism to assure the docility of the populace
and especially of the lowest level of workers. From a contrary position, the
transfer of the oligarchy's wealth for the purpose of public services, a system
of taxation that weighed more heavily on pollution and on capital than on
employment, sustainable agricultural policies in the countries of the South, and
research into energy efficiency are immense sources of employment.

A fourth commonly associates Europe and North America in a community of fortune.
But their paths have diverged. Europe is still a standard-bearer for an ideal of
universalism, the validity of which it demonstrates by its ability to unite --
despite problems -- very different states and cultures. Energy consumption,
cultural values -- for example, the critical significance of food -- the
rejection of the death penalty and torture, less pronounced inequality and the
maintenance of an ideal of social justice, respect for international law, and
support for the Kyoto Protocol on climate are some of the many traits that
distinguish Europe from the United States.

Europe must be separated from the obese power and draw closer to the South,
unless the United States shows it can really change.

The Oligarchy Could Be Divided

Then there are the forces at work.

The first, of course, is the power of the system itself. The failures that will
occur will not in themselves be sufficient to undo the system, since, as we have
seen, they could offer the pretext to promote an authoritarian system divested
of any show of democracy.

The social movement has woken up, however, and may continue to gain power. But
it alone will not be able to carry the day in the face of the rise of
repression: it will be necessary for the middle classes and part of the
oligarchy -- which is not monolithic -- to clearly take sides for public
freedoms and the common good. The mass media constitute a central challenge.
Today they support capitalism because of their own economic situation. They
depend, for the most part, on advertising. That makes it difficult for them to
plead for a reduction in consumption.

On top of that, the development of free papers that depend solely on advertising
further increases the pressure on widely distributed paid newspapers, many of
which have entered the stables of big industrial groups. It's not certain that
the information possibilities generated by the Internet, although immense -- and
for as long as these remain open -- will be adequate to counterbalance the
weight of the mass media should it wholly become the voice of the oligarchy.

Nevertheless, not all journalists are totally enthralled yet, and they could be
galvanized around the ideal of freedom.

The third, wobbly force is the left. Since its social-democratic component
became its center of gravity, it has abandoned any ambition of transforming the
world. The compromise with free-market liberalism has led the left to so totally
adopt the values of free-market liberalism that it no longer dares -- except in
the most cautious terms -- to deplore social inequality. On top of that, the
left displays an almost cartoonish refusal to truly engross itself in
environmental issues.

The left remains pickled in the idea of progress as it was conceived in the
nineteenth century, still believes that science is produced the same way it was
in the time of Albert Einstein, and intones the chant of economic growth without
the slightest trace of critical thinking. Moreover, "social capitalism" rather
than "social democracy" is undoubtedly the more apposite term.

Nonetheless, can the challenges of the twenty-first century be addressed by the
currents of tradition other than the one that identified inequality as its
primary motive for revolt?

This hiatus is at the heart of political life. The left will be reborn by
uniting the causes of inequality and the environment -- or, unfit, it will
disappear in the general disorder that will sweep it and everything else away.
And yet, let us be optimistic. Optimistic, because there are ever more of us who
understand -- unlike all the conservatives -- the historical novelty of the
situation: we are living out a new, never-seen-before phase of the human
species' history, the moment when, having conquered the Earth and reached its
limits, humanity must rethink its relationship to nature, to space, to its
destiny.

We are optimistic to the extent that awareness of the importance of the current
stakes becomes pervasive, to the extent that the spirit of freedom and of
solidarity is aroused. Since Seattle and the protests against the World Trade
Organization in 1999, the pendulum has begun to swing in the other direction,
toward a collective concern about the choices for the future, seeking
cooperation rather than competition.

The somewhat successful, although still incomplete, battle in Europe against
GMOs, the international community's continuance of the Kyoto Protocol in 2001
despite the United States' withdrawal, the refusal by the peoples of Europe to
participate in the invasion of Iraq in 2003, and the general recognition of the
urgency of climate-change challenge are signs that the wind of the future has
begun to blow. Despite the scale of the challenges that await us, solutions are
emerging and -- faced with the sinister prospects the oligarchs promote -- the
desire to remake the world is being reborn.

Herve Kempf is the environmental editor of Le Monde, France's most influential
newspaper and the author of the new book, How the Rich Are Destroying the Earth.