Maybe not so hopeless

The December conference in Copenhagen on climate change was supposed to be the last change for humanity to save itself from its own contribution to global warming and catastrophic climate change. This view is based on an assumption that emissions in the future would continue to grow as they have in the past. But what if the future is one of contraction and disorganisation anyway, asks Brian Davey in a thought provoking article for “openDemocracy”.

He argues the possibility that human society might be entering a future in which its economic, organisational and lifestyle environment might look dramatically different to what we have become used to.

In the lead up to Copenhagen it was repeatedly said that this was "the last change to save the climate". This idea was constructed on an assumption about "business as usual". If emissions continue to grow on current trends then, with little time left to put on the brakes and decarbonise the global economy at a sufficient rate, the task appears to be totally unfeasible.

With many scientists credibly arguing that we are already over the safe limit for greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere, this may be true. There is now a good case that we need to go beyond decarbonising in the economy to actually finding technologies and processes to take CO2 that is already in the atmosphere out again.

So is the situation now quite hopeless? Perhaps so, but perhaps not. A reason for being at least a little hopeful is the questionable assumption of what "business as usual" will be like. The common assumption is that the global economy will continue to grow as it has done over the last few decades. But is this assumption true in the light of peak oil and peak gas, Davey asks as he points out that some dramatic enforced changes in the present global energy regime might be coming humanity’s way.

He points out that during the last year global emissions did not grow as the economy slid into recession. One way of constructing the events of the last year are that rising energy prices played a major role in undermining many people’s ability to service their debts. A reckless financial system was undermined. Of course there was more to the financial crisis and the recession than merely a rise in energy and food prices, but that was surely an important part of the crisis. There is good reason to believe that the energy crisis has only just begun, he argues.

There might be a near term peak in global oils supplies at hand. If correct, there is an energy crunch down the tracks as the real economy picks up with resultant rising energy prices and business as usual emissions will not be quite the same as projected in some studies.

According to Davey, the future might not be one of continued expansion, but one of contraction and disorganisation as in line with the thesis of archaeologist Joseph Tainers' that our society has simply become too complex for governing, management and technical arrangements of society to cope. The future is likely to be one of considerable disorganisation.

He concludes,"The current discourse about the aftermath of Copenhagen assumes a future that is merely a projection of the past. Nothing could be further from the truth. Humanity has now reached the limits of economic growth. Climate change is just one manifestation of this. Having overshot and overused natural capital humanity stands before turbulent times.

"The complex governance and management arrangements underpinned by plenty cheap energy will not be up to dealing with the problems we face. A totally different politics and totally different lifestyles are necessary if humanity is to have any chance of seeing out the century.

"At the same time, the future may yet prove malleable than we think. Whether this is really cause for hope after Copenhagen remains to be seen. But let us at least discuss the real issues rather than the banalities of the official narrative." (To read Davey's full article, click here.)