Category: Climate Change

Ecological breakdown: What are externalities external to?

G眉ney I艧谋kara1 Comment

The 2018 Bank of Sweden Prize (falsely known as the Economics Nobel Prize) winner William Nordhaus opens the revised version of as follows: 鈥淚 begin with the fundamental problem posed by climate change 鈥� that is a public good or externality. Such activities are ones whose costs or benefits will spill outside the market and are not captured in market prices.鈥�

The concept of externalities is a catch-all term, or, an empty box to capture the so-called spillover effects. Under the presumption that the market mechanism brings about the efficient allocation of resources, mainstream economic theory as well as many of its heterodox critiques argue for internalizing these spillovers by determining their costs (or benefits) and including it in the price of the commodity. In other words, the spillover effect itself must be turned into a commodity so that the market can efficiently handle it through the price mechanism.

Insofar as human-induced global warming has not been priced, so the story goes, it is an externality. In fact, it is today 鈥渢he most significant of all environmental externalities鈥� even in Nordhaus鈥� wisdom. Make no mistake 鈥� Nordhaus fiercely advocated inaction for over three decades, and portrayed projected levels of global warming, which are defined as devastating, or even catastrophic by scientists, as optimal.

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Can we electrify our way out of climate change – or do the rich also need to consume less?

junwong971 Comment

As the Artic sea ice rapidly melts and the communities across the world suffer dire consequences, we are experiencing the tragedies from emitting greenhouse gases from human activities into the atmosphere. Climate scientists warn humans are running out of time to bring down CO2 in the atmosphere to stay below even 2 degrees celsius, as the planet鈥檚 ecosystems become unstable and the earth becomes increasingly uninhabitable. Arguably, we already have the policies and the technology required to combat climate change. Climate scientists at COP 21 in Paris 2015 laid out roadmaps for how to transition to clean energy in time, and these clean energy roadmaps show how more jobs are created, consumers save money, and together save life on earth as we know it.

Public discussions about how to convince people and governments to stop using fossil fuel energy take two paths. One is to emphasize that people鈥檚 lifestyles don鈥檛 have to change, as long as they electrify cars and homes–putting their faith in technological progress. The other is to emphasize climate justice and point out that many middle-income and affluent families need to consume less and share their prosperity. Lifestyle changes include living in smaller homes closer to work, flying less, eating mostly plant-based diets, and not buying so much stuff that ends up in the landfill. More broadly, and creating a that replaces wasteful private consumption with essential public services can improve the well-being of people today and in the future.

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鈥楥limate Emergency鈥�, COVID-19 and the Australian capitalist state

Anna Sturman3 Comments

covid-19-4926456_1920Now is the hour of our collective discontent. In order to pursue the agenda set out for this blog post series, namely: 鈥榯o precisely identify the strategic, structural/epochal, or more contingent factors involved in the emergence of particular state鈥揷apital hybrids, as well as the specific institutional, organizational, and legal forms that facilitate such emergence鈥� () my contribution examines the Australian state over the summer of 2019-20, into the COVID-19 pandemic. I argue that the COVID-19 pandemic highlights the instability and amenability to capital of our present conjuncture in ways that the bushfire crisis did not. Further, the pandemic renders our present conjuncture potentially far less stable and amenable to capital than declaration of a national 鈥榗limate emergency鈥� could have, and therefore the left should consider how to force deep reorientations of state-led action (and therefore form and function) while it can.

The need for an adequate state theory

Existing scholarship on neo-Marxian theories of the state are the foundations of an appropriate diagnosis of this moment, though in the heart of an historic conjuncture is not the time to attempt a full synthesis or unified theory. Instead we should begin by using our compounding crises to work through our existing analyses and critiques. In keeping with this research agenda, I will begin with a Poulantzean reading of the state – not the blunt Althusserian structuralism of his , but his on . The state is thus conceived of as a material condensate of the balance of class struggle, meaning it is possible to isolate points of rupture and work upon and through them to alter the balance of power.

Without a reconfiguration of political and economic power, the crises we face will not resolve, but escalate by orders of magnitude. A neo-Marxian theorisation of the state reframes this political moment with a materialist analysis of the issues confronting our societies. The points of possible rupture have now become more apparent and should guide leftist strategy into and through the COVID-19 pandemic.

From 鈥榗limate emergency鈥� to global pandemic (from theory to praxis)

Over the 2019-20 summer, . Vast swathes of the country were covered in marauding fires; communities were evacuated; homes were destroyed; irreplaceable heritage landscapes were lost forever and millions of animals perished. Those physically distant from the fires were by the resulting cloaks of particulate matter draped across the country at levels 鈥�鈥� in Australia鈥檚 recent memory.

Much of the resulting political jousting that would have ameliorated the situation. Over the course of the summer, communities mobilised to meet the relentless blazes, with set up to try and resource volunteer fire services. Rolling demonstrations and protests were held across the country, demanding action from state and federal governments.

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The risk of being misled by climate economy models

hectorpollitt6 Comments

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This post deconstructs the following statement:

If reducing greenhouse emissions had economic benefits then we would do it anyway without new policy.

The statement above is used by economists to argue against the introduction of policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions on the basis that the costs would outweigh the benefits of reducing climate change. It is part of a wider narrative that regulatory policy can only lead to economic costs. However, the statement is perhaps one of the most perverse conclusions from neoclassical economics. It depends on a raft of assumptions that run contrary to real-world experience. Further, as discussed below, if just one assumption is taken out, the conclusion changes.

Sadly, economists and (in particular) economic modellers, have played a key role in turning this fallacy into accepted reality. They have done this by using simple optimisation-based approaches that make strong assumptions about human behaviour. Often the modellers do not critically question or even fully understand these assumptions.听Read More »

Is Degrowth an Alternative to Capitalism?

G眉ney I艧谋kara4 Comments

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The newest book by Giorgos Kallis, one of the most prolific degrowth advocates is entitled Limits: Why Malthus Was Wrong and Why Environmentalists Should Care. It is a short and accessible read which contains some important and unconventional arguments. In what follows, I will first briefly summarize the core arguments of the book, which promises to provoke important discussions on the matter of limits and subjects. Then I will reflect on the fuzziness of the primarily cultural conceptualization of capitalism, and argue that neither self-limitation nor degrowth qualifies as a mode of production, such that they could constitute an alternative to capitalism.Read More »

The Green New Deal: Whither Capitalism?

G眉ney I艧谋kara3 Comments

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By G眉ney I艧谋kara听and

The Green New Deal resolution by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ed Markey sparked an immense amount of discussion on all layers of political discourse, national and international. The way Ocasio-Cortez, Sanders and many others phrase the problem in the broader context of social, economic, and environmental grievances caused by capitalism is crucial for setting the terms of debate and struggle. This opens up space the left can use to address such issues in a systematic way rather than being content with symptomal healing. In fact, theoretical and grounds. In this piece, we build on those contributions, and unpack the dynamics inherent to the capitalist system that would need to be addressed in the ongoing discussions. We also shed light on the limitations of a market-based and growth-centered approach to tackling climate destabilization, while offering other domains of political intervention such as property relations and demarketization of subsistence.Read More »