What now for climate policy?
My (ir)regular newsletter on what I've been doing and writing about
Hi everyone, I hope you’ve all been as well as can be hoped in these dark times. I’ve managed to avoid Covid so far, and will soon be lining up for my fourth shot.
It’s been a couple of months since my last newsletter. I’ve decided to separate my report on what I’ve been saying and doing in media, journals and so on from more general reflections on life, Australia and everything (a couple more reports coming soon).
My main focus at the moment is climate and energy policy, and it’s been a bit of a roller-coaster. In the leadup to the election, the major parties appeared to have reached a consensus on doing something, but not very much, a prospect that left me full of gloom.
Then the election happened with big wins for Greens and teal independents. That was a real boost, showing that voters actually cared, and giving Labor the opportunity to do something more ambitious. So, I’ve been watching closely to see if this actually happens.
So far, the news isn’t good. Having taken a minimal policy platform to the election, Labor appears likely to implement most of it, but seems unwilling to do any more. And the need to cut the budget if Stage 3 tax cuts are to be delivered looms over everything. Still, it’s too soon to give up hope.
I’ve also been working on the closely related topic of electricity policy, saying the same things as I’ve been saying for years - scrap the National Electricity Market and renationalise the grid. But a few more people seem to be listening now.
Looking away from day-to-day politics, I’ve been involved in starting trials of a 4 day week, working with some great colleagues including John Buchanan and Juliet Schor. I’m hoping to have more news on this soon.
As well as research, I’ve finished teaching my Politics, Philosophy and Economics course (on climate change, naturally). It’s a rewarding experience for me, and I hope for the students, but a lot of work for everyone. With two 5000 word essays, and regular blog submissions from 50 students, I’ve read and commented on more than 500000 words, about the length of War and Peace.
Feel free to comment, suggest things you’d like me to work on, or just have your say in comments
Keep well
John
John, please give John Buchanan my regards.
" Having taken a minimal policy platform to the election, Labor appears likely to implement most of it..." That was very funny. I would have full-stopped it there, if I had been witty enough to come up with it. That do-nothing approach is the problem of course. It is so late to do anything about climate change and Labor still won't move much. Surely it is the time now to stop ALL new fossil fuel projects dead in their tracks, but it seems coal and gas projects are still getting through.
The COVID-19 pandemic has wrong-footed everyone and it ain't over yet. The most alarmist person I know (me) under-called it, at least until late last year when I termed it a punctuated equilibrium evolutionary event. That implies, of course, accelerated evolution (for the virus in the short term) and immense impacts on humans. I am predicting a black death scale event which will play out over many years to come if we continue to refuse multiple controls. Combined with out of control climate change the impacts will be immense. Excess deaths ranging in the 100s of millions per decade are quite possible now.
Two proximal causes of the pandemic were capitalist and technological hubris, "We are in control and nature can't touch us," and the sclerotic, maladaptive unwillingness of the elites to ever amend the standard circuits of capital, which run to further enrich rich people and for no other purpose. It is really just capitalism showing its true colors. It exploits and kills populations, starting with indigenous peoples and then moving on to third world, second world and first world. It has long been willing to kill workers (adults and children) for profit. Now, it has moved on to killing all classes except the genuinely rich. The "aristocrats of labor" (well-paid, professional and intellectual workers) plus the entire middle class and all old people, and vulnerable young children as well, are now fully expendable. This is what the promotion of the pandemic with the sop of non-sterilizing vaccines has taught us about late stage capitalism.
Personal opinion: No book on climate change or the COVID-19 pandemic will be able to come grips with what has happened and likely will happen without excoriating capitalism as entirely immoral and unsustainable. Another possible project is to step back from daily hurly-burly and assay a rebuild of economic ontology from the ground up: in terms of formal and empirical ontologies (roughly relatable to prescriptive and descriptive economics). Economics still awaits it Francis Bacon.