2. Readings

Political Theory on Climate Change

Summary

• Political Theory from 1990-2015

• Justice

• Politics

• Expertise

• A stronger link between climate justice discussions and historical injustice literature

• Emphasis on the role of ethos and imagination in political action

• More research between expertise and democracy

• Anthropocene concept

  • Significant framework in understanding humanity’s impact on the planet

  • Need for a political analysis of human agency in shaping geological and ecological processes

• Significant overlap between political theory and related disciplines like climate ethics and economics

Notes

• Climate change used to be one environmental concern for many, but now it is front and centre.

• Rethink basic assumptions.

• Question of Justice: Who shoulders the responsibility? Ethical dilemma.

  • Slavery, long-term consequences, and interesting parallels: Can we learn from past injustices?

• Politics: Beyond law and regulations, fundamental shifts in values.

  • New ethos.

  • Competence strap: how we cling to familiar institutions.

  • We need to develop a new social imagination and new mental maps.

  • Historical examples: Abolition of slavery required a change in thinking regarding fundamental human rights.

  • Large-scale social change is possible.

    • Requires grassroots movements, political will, and a shift in cultural norms.

    • Changing systems and strictures that shape our systems.

The Role of Institutions and Democracies in Addressing Climate Change

• Climate change is challenging our traditional ideas of public goods like clean air, a stable climate, and access to resources, which are now politicised.

• Climate change forces us to rethink our understanding of democracy.

• New forms of governance: models of ecological democracy where environmental concerns are directly implemented into decision-making.

• Stronger global governance structures are needed to coordinate international actions.

Expertise

• Difficult to navigate scientific knowledge in a democracy.

• Climate science is full of probabilities and uncertainties, making it hard to come to informed decisions.

• Need for experts and democratic decision-making that is accountable to the public.

  • How do we ensure scientific knowledge is used without falling into the trap where experts are the only decision-makers?

  • Importance of communication: scientists must communicate findings in a universal language to avoid disconnect and erosion of trust.

  • Scientists need to go beyond presenting data and frame their findings to connect with people’s values and concerns.

  • Need to explain not just what they know but also what they don’t know, acknowledging uncertainty inherent in climate science.

  • Public engagement is crucial, encouraging the public to learn and engage.

How We Define and Value the Environment

• Definition of the environment is up for debate:

  • Ecocentric Perspective: Emphasises the intrinsic value of nature.

    • Impact of climate change on human well-being; protecting nature to protect humans.

    • Prioritise conservation and biodiversity.

  • Anthropocentric View: Focuses on mitigating impacts of climate change on human societies.

Who Benefits and Who Suffers?

• Environmental Justice: Vulnerable communities often have fewer resources and are disproportionately affected by climate change, even though they contribute the least.

• Compensation: Should wealthy nations bear a greater burden and compensate developing countries for the impacts they suffer?

• Climate change challenges fundamental principles of justice, politics, and our relationship with the environment.

Solutions

• Systemic Change: Require individual actions and global treaties.

  • Reducing our carbon footprint, lifestyle, and consumption patterns without putting all the emphasis on individual responsibility.

  • Overwhelming guilt-inducing feelings must be avoided.

  • Importance of collective action and political will.

• Policy Options:

  • Carbon taxes, cap and trade systems, investments in renewable energy, and creating economic incentives to move away from fossil fuels.

  • Cap and Trade: Governments sets a limit on total emissions; companies can buy permits to pollute within that limit. The market for pollution gradually lowers the cap over time, forcing companies to reduce emissions.

• International Cooperation: Global treaties face numerous obstacles, and the current international system is not equipped to handle growing concerns.

Positive Change

• International agreements such as the Montreal Protocol phased out ozone-depleting substances, showcasing growing understanding.

Leadership

• Role of political leaders is crucial in shaping public opinion and driving policy change.

• Disconnect: Exists between experts and political leaders, with pressure from special interest groups.

• Tension between short-term political gains and long-term sustainability emphasises the importance of informed and engaged citizens who hold leaders accountable.

• Power of social movements and grassroots organisations in driving political change.

Anthropocene

• A proposed geological epoch that recognises the significant impact of human activities on the planet.

• We have entered a new era where humans dominate earth’s systems, raising questions about the limits of human control.

• Power and Danger of Human Agency: Highlights our ability to change and the responsibility to do so wisely.

• Political dimension: confronts questions of power, responsibility, and justice.

  • Who benefits from our current way of life?

  • Who pays the price?

  • Who decides how we manage the planet’s resources?

• Everything is interconnected.

Takeaways

• Climate change is not just one issue; it is a symptom of a deeper set of problems.

• Forces us to examine our lives and how systems consume the world.

• Need for a paradigm shift from a mindset of domination to stewardship; we are interdependent with nature and must recognise that we borrow the earth from our children.

Distributing the Burdens of Climate Change

Summary

Ethical Distribution of Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation Costs

Critique of four approaches to burden-sharing:

• Contribution to the problem

• Ability to pay

• Beneficiary pays

• Comprehensive distributive justice / patterns and hybrids

Robust solutions require a principled reconciliation of at least the first three approaches, with emphasis on the need for both theoretical coherence and practical application.Existing burden-sharing indices (Oxfam’s Adaptation Finance Index, Caney’s Hybrid Account, and ExoEquity’s Greenhouse Development Rights Framework) highlight their strengths and weaknesses in achieving a fair and effective distribution of responsibilities.Proposed: a pluralist approach that combines aspects of all four initial frameworks.

Contribution to the Problem

Developed countries are responsible for a substantial portion of historical emissions, at least 60% of current emissions and around 75% of human-made CO2 emissions from 1750 to 2005.

• Stock pollutants: build up over time, meaning emissions from centuries ago still affect the climate today. This raises the question of whether we can truly hold current generations accountable for actions taken by their ancestors.

• National borders: shifts over time complicate how to address past emissions.

• Beneficiaries of past emissions: It's crucial to consider who benefits from these emissions, particularly how they contribute to the challenges developing countries face today.

• Historical emissions are directly linked to rising sea levels, disproportionately impacting low-lying island nations.

• Even if a country has low emissions today, we cannot overlook its past contributions.

Ability to Pay

This concept, while straightforward in theory (wealthier countries pay more), is often not so clear-cut.

• Does wealth automatically confer responsibility?

• Focusing solely on ability to pay may wrongly imply that those who can solve a problem are always those who caused it, overlooking important nuances in historical contexts and economic developments over time.

Beneficiary Pays

This approach ties responsibility to those who have benefitted most from industrialisation, even if they were not directly responsible for greenhouse gas emissions.

• The principle of fair reciprocity: despite past generations' lack of awareness regarding long-term consequences, they still reaped the benefits of industrialisation.

• Developed nations have inherited a legacy of economic and social advancement built on fossil fuels, now carrying the burden of rectifying environmental damage.

Patterns and Hybrids

This examines how different societal values may influence climate responsibility:

• Equality: everyone contributes equally to combat climate change.

• Priority: assisting those most vulnerable.

• Sufficiency: ensuring everyone has adequate resources, even at the cost of some inequality in contributions.

Pluralistic Approach

This is a mix-and-match approach that acknowledges there is no single correct answer and seeks balance among different fairness aspects.

Proposals on how to share this burden

Three Different Frameworks:

1. Oxfam’s Adaptation Finance Index:

   • Combines a country's contribution to climate change with its ability to pay for climate change adaptation—suggesting a 50/50 split.

   • Utilises the UN HDI, which factors in past emissions and a country’s development level.

   • Critiques: Creates loopholes for poorer countries (below a certain HDI threshold) and doesn't account for emissions after 1992.

2. Caney’s Hybrid Account:

   • A person-centred approach focused on ethics, emphasising individual rights and protection from climate change's consequences rather than just national responsibilities.

   • Enforces four principles: two centred on historical responsibility and two on ability to pay.

   • Critique: Lacks clear guidelines for balancing these principles and similarly ignores emissions before 1990.

3. ExoEquity’s Greenhouse Development Rights Framework:

   • Comprehensive and ambitious goals aiming to fight poverty and keep global warming below 2 degrees Celsius.

   • Introduces Responsibility and Capacity Indicator (RCI) for fiscal contributions based on a country's affordability and historical emissions since 1990, whilst ignoring pre-1990 emissions.

   • Critique: Weighs capacity over responsibility with a 60/40 ratio without justification; questions the feasibility of its emergency climate programme.

All proposals face challenges with historical responsibility and unintended consequences.

Beneficiary Pays

Consideration of who benefitted the most from industrialisation is key.

• Developed nations built their wealth upon fossil fuels, still obliged to address the fallout of their past emissions.

• This requires reflection on how to hold current generations accountable for benefits they did not individually receive.

• Fair reciprocity: recognises that current generations have an obligation to manage the burdens that accompany the benefits they inherited.

Conclusion

The need for a more holistic approach is evident.

• The principle of beneficiary pays is an important aspect of this puzzle.

• It prompts us to ask the right questions, stressing that climate responsibility goes beyond emission figures, encompassing an understanding of the historical and ethical contexts influencing those emissions.