#5a - Impossibility of Effective Climate Change Action?

(This is the sixth of a nine-part installment, offering a fresh new perspective on Climate Change.  For the big picture summary, see Turning Climate Change on its Head.)

Either effective action to halt or mitigate climate change is possible, or it’s not.  Let’s consider both options, starting with the second.

Climate Change is already well underway.  (Check out one of the best, very short videos I've ever seen to make this point.)  There’s a belief that what’s needed is serious political or corporate will, but I suggest the reality is that our predominant societal value system simply cannot accommodate the required actions.  If we also accept the inevitability of the law of consumption, and the fact that immunity from consequences is a myth, climate change WILL be in our future.

COP1 happened in the middle (1995),
followed by COP2 through COP27.
Note the absence of any change to trajectory.

I'm not going to hide my bias on the question of whether or not humankind is going to have any kind of significant impact on climate change.  This post is intentionally one-sided, because I will argue the opposite case in the next part.

History and Scope

Let's look at the history here.  We just wrapped up COP27.  COP stands for Conference of the Parties and will be attended by countries which signed the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) - a treaty agreed in 1994.  28 years ago.  We have had 27 annual meetings to implement some actions since then.  And nothing meaningful has happened.  Nothing.  No one is even close to on track for promised targets, and the best outcomes just reached this year were some adaptation measures and an agreement to pay for some of the damage.  In other words, it looks like the participants are sort of assuming that climate change is now a done deal.  And the science tends to agree with that.

The scope of what would have to be undertaken now in order to make the slightest dent in climate change impacts is staggering.  And we recently got proof.  The best movement towards UNFCCC targets happened during the worldwide lockdowns inspired by the CoViD-19 pandemic.  Those changes to the level of economic activity are good illustrations of the tip of the actions-required iceberg.  And how well did we do with those?  Effective mitigation would likely require many more years of a similar scope of change.  Only bigger and lasting much longer.

Follow the Money

There are some who believe that this is a simple case of having the political and corporate will to make the changes necessary.  The actual driving forces in those two sectors are simple and widely recognized - stay in power and make a profit, respectively.  For the politicians, it is not just the case of waiting until enough people demand effective action - they also know that the electorate is not going to like the side effects of those actions.  Everyone wanted the pandemic to go away, but very few were long-term supporters of the measures required.  As a result, the governments bounced back and forth between healthcare and economic priorities - a strategy that helped create the multiple waves of pandemic surges.

My personal guess is that climate change action will follow the markets, just as it does now.  Up until this point, the money has been on climate change denial and ignorance (as in "ignoring"), because economies running at full speed is where the profit is.  As the world's population begins to get behind the climate action movement, a great deal of money will be made by corporations selling 'solutions' that are not really going to do much.  The temptation will be to apply economic solutions to a problem for which economic activity is the problem.  It won't work.

The Value Change Conundrum

Truly effective climate change action, in my books, calls for changes to which value systems take precedence in society.  Changes to the priority of value systems are tricky because people have to get past what I call the Value Change Conundrum.  It works like this:

You won't change your predominant value system until you see the benefits for doing so.
And yet the benefits may only be apparent after you have made the change. 

For example, if someone suggests that you should put more emphasis on organic eating, but you are presently focused on money, then you might never grasp the benefits of organic eating because the price of organic food is a significant downside under your current value system.  If the money is presently the most important thing, why would you choose to switch to a set of values where you will lose money?

In terms of climate change action, the costs of mitigation attempts will likely be significant in jobs, convenience, standard of living (quantity of stuff), GDP, etc.  Many people will suffer great hardships.  Who would choose this?  Especially, when many of the decision-makers are what I call NIMPLEs (Not In My Personal Life Expectancy).  They figure they may never see the benefits of their 'sacrifice' (as seen from their existing value system), so why do it?

The Facts

Here are the facts, as I see them:

• The global population will continue to rise, unless taken out by catastrophe.
• The lifestyle changes needed to reduce consumption and energy will not happen voluntarily.
• Economic forces will oppose effective climate change action at every turn (because they have to).
• Even the richest nations cannot duck the climate change forces coming in ever-increasing strength.
• At best, COP28 through 40+ will continue to look at simply paying off the most climate-vulnerable.

In short, I don't think our civilization will achieve effective action against (or to seriously mitigate) climate change in time to avoid the most serious consequences.  I suggest that there are much better things we could be doing with our time and energy right now, in order to ensure the best possible outcomes for our species.

Admittedly, many would consider that a harsh reality, so if you disagree with that prognosis, let's consider the opposite one in the next part.

(Continue to part 7 of 9)