Keishia Taylor is a member of the Socialist Party (ISA in Ireland).
All this week of the COP 26 in Glasgow, Socialist Alternative will have articles on the issues at stake.
The existential threat of the climate crisis has never been more obvious or more urgent. The 2021 IPCC report has confirmed that we are in the throes of a devastating existential climate crisis caused by human activity, or more specifically, by human activity in the interests of the ruling elite under the capitalist system.
The devastation of our planet is brutally unfolding in front of our eyes with raging fires and murderous floods. It is warmer now than it has been for 100,000 years, and climate-related extreme weather disasters have jumped by 83 percent globally in the last 20 years, killing 1.23 million people. Major floods have doubled, and severe storms have increased by 40 percent.
Immediate action is necessary. There are a multitude of steps that governments could take right now if they were serious about curbing climate change. For example, they could immediately end all state subsidies and investments in fossil fuel projects and instead develop efficient infrastructure for genuinely renewable energy, which could employ all those currently working in polluting industries, plus millions more. They even refuse the minimal and straightforward step of massively investing in free, reliable and comprehensive public transport.
But as we have seen, capitalist governments will only take the least disruptive actions to the status quo, and only when forced ─ they will fall far short of what is needed. Instead of implementing change, they blame and punish working class people, and cynically pose our rights, jobs and living standards as somehow being in conflict with protecting people’s lives from the climate crisis so they can further exploit working people.
‘Green Capitalism’ is a Lie!
While big business now cynically promotes a green image, it is fundamentally driving this crisis, not solving it. Elevated levels of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere can be traced to the industrial revolution and the rise of capitalism. As resource-hungry capitalism expanded, it spread the burning of fossil fuels around the world and decimated more and more of the environment for the sake of profit. The majority of greenhouse gas emissions over the last 250 years came directly from corporations, and just one hundred companies have been the source of more than 70 percent of the world’s industrial emissions since 1988. Between 2015 and 2021, the world’s 60 largest banks invested $3.8 trillion in oil companies. They will continue to extract and burn fossil fuels as long as it is more profitable than renewable alternatives. Paying for “greenwashing” PR is cheaper than making real changes.
In a capitalist system, nature is treated as an inexhaustible source of wealth, and the consequences of depleting natural resources, polluting ecosystems, and disrupting the processes integral to maintaining the biosphere are willfully left out of its profit-making formula. This is despite the fact that all wealth comes from the raw resources of the earth, and the work done to extract and process them by workers. According to a recent UN report, if any company did have to pay the cost of their environmental damage, not one of them would actually be profitable.
Society has been operating under a severe climate deficit (taking more from the climate than it has to give) for hundreds of years, with the process speeding up in the twentieth century, but the economic and political system has blatantly ignored this fact because living sustainably is fundamentally contradictory to capitalism’s constant need to expand, cut costs, and maximize profits.
We cannot put any faith in “green” capitalism. Whatever the form, capitalism is incapable of implementing the necessary measures to combat the climate crisis. Instead, we need to tax the super-rich, close down the tax havens, and take the banks and energy corporations into democratic public ownership to fund mass investments in green technology and energy, and for a mass green jobs program. This can only be achieved through a process of real system change, establishing a socialist workers’ democracy which puts people and the planet first.
We oppose ‘’eco-austerity’’ measures like domestic water charges and carbon taxes which penalise working people. These are attempts to pass the blame and the cost of the crisis onto working-class people and will not curb emissions or waste. Eco-austerity is no solution to a crisis that begins with capitalist production itself.
Crime of Humanity or Against Humanity?
We must be clear ─ the climate crisis is not a “crime of humanity.” It’s a crime against humanity. Most carbon emissions and pollution are created by a tiny number of corporations over whom we have no ownership, control or say.
The vast majority of the world’s population is responsible for very little in terms of carbon emissions. A recent UN report shows that globally the richest 1 percent of earners are responsible for an annual per capita average of 74 tons of CO2 per year. Meanwhile for the poorest 50 percent of earners the figure is 0.7 tons.
Further, many working-class people, even in the richer countries, are in poverty or barely keeping their heads above water, do not have access to decent housing or healthcare, or have no economic security for the future, which is completely unjustifiable in a world of incredible abundance.
It is inevitable under capitalism that the ruling elites will try to make ordinary working-class people bear the burden for the climate crisis that they themselves have caused. Any attacks on working-class living standards, even those that are introduced with an environmental veneer, must be opposed by the climate movement, as both unjust and ineffective ─ make the real polluters pay!
Another dangerous myth is that the climate crisis is due to overpopulation ─ that there are too many people on the planet, which will lead to climate catastrophe, food shortages and societal collapse. Of course, there are endless examples of unsustainable consumption, land use, pollution etc., but this is not evidence that there are too many people, only that the systems in place are unnecessarily wasteful, irrational and absurd. There is, in fact, ample evidence that the world can provide for all of those who inhabit it, if the current system is replaced by one that takes the needs of people and the planet as its starting point.
The number of people is far less important than how those people are organised ─ this system is destructive, inefficient and reckless because its goal is private profit and not public good. Socialists understand that the cause of the climate crisis is the capitalist system and its incessant drive to accumulate profits, and that the only way to solve the crisis is to struggle for a socialist world where human need, including a sustainable relationship with nature, comes before private greed.
Fight for Our Planet and Our Jobs!
We must challenge the capitalist lie of “jobs vs. climate” and ensure that workers’ rights are protected. We need a Socialist Climate Action Plan outlining a just transition for working people. This would involve a massive green jobs and public works programme that builds new green industries and carries out the work required to transition to a sustainable economy.
A publicly owned, planned economy with real democratic control by the workers could create millions of well-paid and sustainable jobs and build new green public industries. Workers in environmentally damaging industries could redesign their work in a sustainable way, toward projects that benefit society and the planet, or be retrained and redeployed into new green public industries.
A publicly owned, planned economy with real democratic control by the workers could create millions of well-paid and sustainable jobs and build new green public industries. Workers in environmentally damaging industries could redesign their work in a sustainable way…
For example, publicly-owned construction companies must be set up to build millions of public homes, schools, hospitals, creches and community centres, all built to the highest standards of energy efficiency and with the smallest possible ecological footprint. On top of this, existing homes and public and commercial buildings should be retrofitted to meet the same standards.
All public services should be held under full public ownership, such as waste collection and recycling, water provision, public transport, education, healthcare and of course, energy. National parks would be significantly expanded, complemented by an extensive reforestation and afforestation program, with full-time jobs in planting and maintaining forests sustainably.
Not one worker should lose out. The only real “just transition” is one where workers are at the centre of decision making: where they control their workplaces, communities and the economy as a whole.
Take Back the Land
We can never forget that the fight against environmental destruction is not only being waged by the international climate strike movement, but in the struggles of millions of Indigenous and oppressed communities, especially in the Americas and Africa, against the destructive and poisoning imperialist projects of Western, Chinese and other multinationals. Our movement must stand in full solidarity with every one of them and strive to build the greatest possible unity.
Pipeline projects, deforestation and imperialist exploitation of natural resources must be stopped immediately and any corporate control over energy production must be opposed. We need democratic ownership and control by workers and local communities over natural resources to protect the living standards of Indigenous and other communities, including workers who are financially dependent on the fossil fuel industry.
Similarly, we need to transform our food systems, which we all depend on to survive, away from big agribusiness’ intensive agricultural and land-use practices, which pose threats both to environmental and public health and the workers themselves. The large corporations that harm our environment and our food-systems should be brought under democratic public ownership. This would then enable us to combine sustainable farming practices with new technology, a key step on the way to large-scale and high yield sustainable agriculture.
Part of any ecological transition in farming must be ending the dominance of the capitalist meat and dairy industries, which are such big contributors to carbon emissions. On the basis of democratic socialist planning, this can be done in a way which protects the livelihoods of small and medium farmers and agricultural workers.
Democratic Planning, not Market Chaos
The challenges we face are of world-historic proportions. Nothing comparable to what is needed, in scale or timeframe, has ever been undertaken let alone accomplished. The type of fundamental transformation ─ of production, distribution, consumption, energy, travel ─ required to achieve a truly sustainable world would be nothing short of revolutionary. Much of the technology and knowledge already exist to transition to a carbon-free economy, but private profit interests and market competition are getting in the way. It is inconceivable that the capitalist market, with competition, chaos and self-interest built into its DNA, could bring about this change.
The structure of capitalist society partly conditions our needs as consumers, as well as how we are involved as workers in production. Those who don’t live near reliable affordable public transport “choose” to drive cars, people working long hours might “choose” pre-packaged convenience foods, people on low incomes will “choose” to buy fast fashion (cheaper and less climate-friendly clothes). No amount of ‘eco-friendly’ consumer choices, which are often unaffordable to most working-class people to begin with, can deliver the change we need.
We can’t control what we don’t own. Taking the key sectors of the economy into public, democratic ownership would allow a comprehensive economic plan to be put in place on a global scale, which could mobilise all of society’s resources to confront this crisis.
For example, this would include a global plan to completely rebuild energy grids that rely 100 percent on renewables in the next decade; end new production of oil-run cars, scale up electric vehicle production and massively expand public transit; completely phase out fossil fuel dependence; retrofit and build new green housing and infrastructure to withstand extreme weather and accommodate climate refugees; reforest the planet and overhaul our food system top-to-bottom replacing mass monocrop agriculture with local, organic alternatives; and invest to historic proportions in yet-undiscovered technologies that can help deal with the crisis of water contamination and shortages, infectious disease, coral reef and pollinator population collapse, and so much more.
A democratic, planned economy could do “more with less” as part of a planned ecological transition ─ retooling useless and harmful industries such as weapons manufacturing and marketing for constructive purposes; eliminating duplication, over-production and planned obsolescence; focusing on fulfilling needs not generating artificial wants; and transforming agriculture, transport and energy production on a sustainable basis. In such a system, whole industries, communities and cities would be planned democratically, putting an end to capitalist waste and allowing for a more rational allocation of resources. In a socialist system, the purpose of the economy would no longer be to make profit for a tiny elite, but to fulfil human needs in a sustainable way.
Strike Together — Rebuild a Fighting Climate Movement
The working class not only suffers the worst effects of climate change, but also has enormous power. Workers make society run ─ everywhere from schools to factories ─ and by striking, can bring this system to a halt. The movement for climate action has no real or consistent allies in the capitalist ruling class. Only by basing itself on the methods of social and workers’ struggle can it effectively fight for the real changes needed.
We need to get organised and rebuild a fighting climate movement that is interlinked with a fighting workers’ and trade union movement. A united struggle could link, for example, the need for free public transport with the demand for higher wages, or the need to roll out green technologies with the need for quality jobs for young people. In all our demands, we should target governments, wealth hoarders and major polluters ─ those with power ─ and not working-class people.
The explosive and militant school and college strikes have shown that the young people will lead the way. But while the school strikes and youth actions put pressure on governments to pay lip service, they were not yet enough to win significant change. To force real action, we need to build a mass movement and organise grassroots committees in schools, colleges, workplaces and local communities to build for economic strikes that paralyze the economy.
Bureaucratic union leaderships have a history of blocking struggle ─ in many countries, we can’t rely on the official leadership and should instead build among rank and file workers and union members, and fight for new union leaderships which are prepared to fight. All effective campaigning tactics should be utilised, from petitions, protests, boycotts, to walkouts, occupations, blockades and of course strikes of varying durations and intensity.
Finally, the struggle for climate action should be inextricably linked to all struggles by working class people against oppression and inequality of every kind. It must be a struggle of and for the working class for a system of their own — it is capitalism, the system of the rich, which is behind both their immiseration and the destruction of the world’s ecosystems.
International Workers’ Solidarity, not Imperialist Rivalry
Due to immense global inequality, poorer countries currently bear the brunt of the climate crisis. To take first steps against this enormous injustice, all foreign debts must be cancelled and patents on crucial technology and knowledge scrapped. In a capitalist system, profits, property, patents, and “intellectual property” will be prioritised over the needs of humanity and our planet.
Due to immense global inequality, poorer countries currently bear the brunt of the climate crisis. To take first steps against this enormous injustice, all foreign debts must be cancelled and patents on crucial technology and knowledge scrapped. In a capitalist system, profits, property, patents, and “intellectual property” will be prioritised over the needs of humanity and our planet.
This has been clearly exposed during the Covid-19 pandemic, as big pharma hoarded vaccines while accepting the death of millions. Green technology, as well as medical and pharmaceutical knowledge and technology, must be shared freely between workers in all countries on the basis of international solidarity and cooperation among the working class and poor.
Capitalism is a system incapable of genuine global cooperation. Today, when united global action to save the planet is more necessary than ever, capitalism and imperialism only pull the world further apart. The climate crisis is already being weaponized in the New Cold War between the US and China in their great power rivalry.
Only ridding the world of national competition and inter-imperialist rivalry and replacing it with global cooperation can provide the conditions to end the climate crisis. This can only be won through coordinated action by the international working class and poor for global revolutionary change, against the national and international capitalist classes that defend their interests.
Organise Now to Fight for International Socialism
The defenders of capitalism sometimes argue that their system is inevitable; that ‘there is no alternative’ to their system. For anyone who wants to avert climate disaster and build a just and sustainable future, we say there is now no alternative but to fight to end the rule of the capitalist system. We need to wrestle the wealth and resources of the world from the billionaire class and use it to rebuild society on the basis of democratic control and solidarity to meet human needs sustainably.
But the wealthy elite will never give up power voluntarily ─ we must get organised to fight for revolutionary change. We need a mass movement, but also a revolutionary organisation with a clear program to link up struggles, fight capitalism and transform society.
To win system change on a world scale, such an organisation must be built internationally, which is why International Socialist Alternative (ISA), an organisation of workers and youth, is actively fighting for socialist change in over 30 countries. To win the revolutionary change necessary to end capitalism, the destruction of our planet and all forms of oppression, join ISA.
