A fresh wind of change is sweeping Planet Earth that is facing a climate emergency. The United States, a climate crisis denier under the Trump administration, has now reconnected to the global campaign to limit the rise in global temperature to a maximum of 1.5 degrees Celsius (pre-industrial era), as agreed upon in the 2015 Paris Agreement. President Joe Biden and his climate team have re-asserted US leadership in the global fight against global warming by convening last week a “Leaders Climate Summit” attended by 40 heads of state, including Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
As the biggest GHG emitter, US also has the biggest responsibility to reduce GHG emissions and to provide financial assistance to developing nations trying to fortify their countries against climate change risks. As the Asian People Movement on Debt and Development (APMDD) puts it, this is all a question of climate justice.
For who, in the first place, is responsible for rising global temperature? Yes, all countries have been contributing to global warming by burning fossil fuels to run transport and provide electricity for their populations. But who are the biggest contributors? Are they not the big advanced capitalist countries? They have been accumulating a high “carbon debt” since the start of the industrial era (circa 16th/17th centuries). With less than 20 percent of the world’s population, they account for half of the global GHG emission total. It was only in the last three to four decades that China and India have joined the club of big GHG emitters.
And the rest of the developing world? They contribute little GHG emissions, and yet they are the most vulnerable to climate change risks. In Asia, six countries are included in the most vulnerable: Bangladesh, Myanmar, Pakistan, Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam. And yet, the contribution of each of these countries to global GHG emissions is less than 1 percent.
Now back to Biden’s Climate Summit. Almost all the developed countries declared ambitious GHG reduction targets, for examples, US—reduction of GHG emissions by 50-52 percent below 2005 level by the year 2030; Japan—46 percent reduction of 2013 level by 2030; EU—55 percent from the 1990 level by 2030; and UK, 63 percent below 2005 level. The problem, APMDD said, is if these developed countries can be resolute in developing and implementing programs to fulfill their commitments. Secondly, the “climate justice” obligations of the developed countries, that is, providing the developing countries the financial support for various adaptation-mitigation measures have not been clearly fleshed out, with President Biden announcing a doubling of their contribution to global finance.
Thirdly, the socio-economic roots of the climate crisis are critically important. And yet, they were hardly discussed in the Summit.
Why is this topic important? The reality is that climate change is not a mere question of how to reduce GHG emissions. It is also a question of having a new growth paradigm. In particular, there is the need to adjust or overhaul a socio-economic system that is GDP-obsessed while profusely emitting GHG gases allowing the way. This model has been refined by the neo-liberal economists into a globalization model, with the multinationals on top of a global system promoting fossil-based global production and consumption with limited rules under a liberalized global trading regime.
The UNDP, in a special report (HDR, 2007/08) on global warming, called attention to the fact that the poor are the ones “bearing the brunt of climate change.” The UNDP labeled the inability of countries of the world to stop global warming as an “outrage to the conscience of mankind.” Further, the UNDP wrote that:
“Carbon-intensive economic growth is symptomatic of a deeper problem. One of the harshest lessons taught by climate change is that the economic model which drives growth and the profligate consumption in rich nations that goes with it, is ecologically unsustainable.”
This brings us to the challenge of re-thinking the dominant neo-liberal export-oriented economic model, which is now questioned by many as unsustainable. Imagine if all Asian, African and Latin American countries will become dynamic export dynamos like China. Can the world afford three or five or more “Chinas” emitting GHG gases at the same level as China today because of the requirements of export production? Where will they source the materials, minerals and fuels to make their export offensive succeed like what China did? And where are the markets where they will dump their products?
During the 2008-2010 global financial crisis, many economists agreed on one major conclusion: under runaway globalization, there is a tendency for the world to over-produce in a global market that is unable to absorb or consume everything. The over-production/under-consumption contradiction is at the roots of the GFC. Another related conclusion, propounded by trade unionists and labor economists, is that the over-production phenomenon is due to the global Race to the Bottom involving the multinationals (MNCs) and host countries. The Global Race to the Bottom means MNCs and host countries tend to relax the rules protecting not only labor rights but also environmental, health and social standards. This system is obviously unsustainable.
This is why as early as early as 1987, the World Commission on Environment and Development, in the seminal book Our Common Future, called the attention of the world on the urgent need for a rebalancing of the economy—at the national as well as global levels. The Commission came up with a famous definition of what is sustainable development, as follows:
“…development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. It contains within it two key concepts:
- The concept of “needs,” in particular the essential needs of the world’s poor, to which overriding priority should be given; and
- The idea of limitations imposed by the state of technology and social organization on the environment’s ability to meet present and future needs.”
- In line with the above development framework, the Commission listed the following “strategic imperatives” that different countries must address in charting sustainable development path, namely:
- strategizing growth for redistribution and poverty reduction,
- changing the quality of growth to make it less material-and-energy intensive,
- meeting the essential needs of the population for jobs, food, energy, water and sanitation,
- ensuring a sustainable level of population,
- conserving and enhancing the resource base,
- reorienting technology and managing risk to respond to the challenges of sustainable development, and
- merging environment and economics in decision making.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and UN Environmental Programme (UNEP), through the various reports on climate change and sustainable development they have been issuing, have been reiterating the importance of the above environmental-economic guideposts propounded by the Commission report, also called the Brundtland Report (after the chair Bro Brundtland). It is obvious that the one-size-fits-all formula advanced by some neo-liberal economists through institutions such as the World Trade Organization collides with the above imperatives outlined by the World Commission on Environment and Development. The same holds true for the export-or-perish development framework often articulated by the neo-liberal globalizers.
What the Commission, IPCC and UNEP are asking is for countries, big and small, rich and poor, to do a rebalancing of their respective economies based on the above framework of sustainable development.
Now, will Joe Biden have the courage to lead this rebalancing program—at home and in the world?
Dr. Rene E. Ofreneo is a Professor Emeritus of
University of the Philippines. For comments, please write to reneofreneo@gmail.com.