Workers' Liberty Australia
'the emancipation of the working class must be the act of the working class'- Karl Marx
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Workers' Liberty Australia'the emancipation of the working class must be the act of the working class'- Karl Marx
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by Bernard Teissier
As we go to press, representatives of the world's governments are meeting at The Hague to discuss cutting emissions of the greenhouse gases that cause global warming. Capitalism, driven by profit, is short- sighted by its very nature. Future global risks weigh light, for them, against immediate profits. And the hurricanes, floods, and earthquakes which will happen anyway cause much more destruction for poor people in poor countries, whose towns and communities do not yield enough profit to attract spending on protective measures, than for the better- off.
Climate change is probably the biggest ecological challenge for humanity in the 21st century. Its effects are being felt already, and are going to increase in the coming decades, disrupting the lives of hundreds of millions of people: population shifts from zones flooded or made into deserts, losses in agriculture, more "natural" catastrophes, revival of infectious diseases... We have to recognise that such is the shape of a possible future, especially for the poor and the worse-off, who are most vulnerable. The climate negotiations at The Hague are all part of the process of capitalist globalisation: extending the reach of capitalism and dividing up the spoils between the rich of the developed nations. Many Non-Governmental Organisations are demonstrating, not to stop the UN summit, but to demand as advanced an agreement as possible. What is at stake, fundamentally, is the reduction of worldwide greenhouse gas emissions linked to human activities and responsible for climate changes. The Hague conference is supposed to make definite, for the first time, previous announcements and protocols on this issue, in particular the climate agreement at the Rio Earth Summit of 1992, and the Kyoto protocol.
Kyoto Protocol
Adopted in 1997, despite American opposition to any international constraints,
the Kyoto protocol commits the industrialised countries to reduce by 5% their
emissions of greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide (CO2). The reduction
is to be measured by comparing the period 2008-2012 to 1990. But the USA introduced
into the final text the idea that recourse to "mechanisms of flexibility", especially
the creation of markets in "the right to pollute", was necessary to attain those
objectives.
Those provisions symbolise the domination of pro-capitalist globalisation on the environment question. Far from allowing the objectives of Kyoto to be attained at lower cost, the mechanisms of flexibility serve only to let the OECD countries avoid having to carry out measures with any bite inside their borders. The rich countries can continue to pollute with a quiet conscience. Thus the mechanism, under cover of helping Third World countries establish sustainable development, aims above all "to help [the OECD countries] to fulfill their detailed commitments on limiting and reducing their emissions" (article 12 of the protocol).
For the countries of the North of the world and their multinationals, it is a matter of making investments in the countries of the South in activities which will translate into reduced emissions and seeing themselves credited for it. But in relation to what base level should we compare the improvement in emissions arising from a "cleaner" industrial project? Who decides between the different development alternatives, and the corresponding technological choices? When we see the pro-nuclear industry lobby hoping to find a loophole here for a comeback, we can have serious doubt about the sincerity and transparency of these choices. In September, in Lyons, the preparatory discussions focused on "carbon sinks". This expression refers to the absorption of carbon dioxide (CO2) by growing forests. There is no scientific consensus on the balance-sheet of emissions and absorption of CO2 by forests. And even less political consensus. Countries with lots of forests, like the USA, want large allowances for "carbon sinks". If they get their way, that alone will discredit the whole process of global climate negotiation.
No agreement on
sanctions
Many of those who accepted the mechanisms of flexibility at Kyoto thought that
by doing so they were gaining the main point, definite figures for cutting emissions.
Since then the mechanisms of flexibility have shown themselves to be a veritable
"gas factory", and no agreement seems to be emerging on how they are to be applied
or what sanctions will apply to countries that do not respect the targets. After
supporting the idea of a market in emission permits, which it will put in place
in 2005, the European Union now wants to limit the worst loopholes, but it is
slow to take measures in Europe itself... As Philippe Quirion of Friends of
the Earth puts it: "It does not cost much to be pushy in negotiations when [the
European Union] knows that the USA, Japan, Canada and Australia are going to
oppose all its proposals.
Capitalists in
glass houses...
Our rulers would be more credible if they began by applying at home the measures
that they say they want to extend to the whole planet." Why, indeed, have the
member states of the European Union still not ratified the Kyoto protocol, let
alone prepared to put it into action without the USA? What then is the nature
of this European strategy, which is already getting ready for other concessions,
for example on the inspection system and on the penalties to be applied when
the protocol is not respected? It has to be recognised that the USA has succeeded,
up to now, in neutralising an international agreement which it never wanted.
The US Congress has made ratification conditional on the results of The Hague
conference. George W. Bush goes further. He has already said that he does not
think that the fact of climate change is sufficiently proven to justify action,
and that if he becomes president he will not accept the Kyoto terms. Both Bush
and Al Gore are in agreement about imposing cuts in emissions on countries like
India and China, on the pretext that they represent a growing proportion of
the world total! However, at Kyoto, the Third World countries had quite rightly
got it recognised that the Western countries, who have drawn "carbon rents"
for more than a century, cannot use this argument to block their development.
The governments of the industrialised countries should now take their responsibilities
seriously and urgently commit themselves to a much more restrained growth of
energy use.
* Adapted and abridged from the French left-wing weekly Rouge