The case for socialism hots up

Recent reports detail how, as a result of human activity, we are on track for a four-degree Celsius increase in average global temperatures. Should this come to pass, the Earth would be hotter than at any time in the last 30 million years.  Already as ecosystems destabilize we witness ever-more erratic and extreme weather events. 2012 was a record year of heat in the continental U.S., which set 362 new record high temperatures and not a single record low.

While the World Bank concludes that avoiding a 4-degree temperature increase is “vital for the health and welfare of communities around the world”– it nevertheless is still handing out loans to construct more than two dozen coal-fired power plants, to the tune of $5 billion. Carbon emissions are at record highs and set to rise further in a world where 1,200 new coal-burning power stations are under construction, and oil and gas extraction are on the increase around the world. By 2030, the entire Western Hemisphere will be energy independent, due to the expansion of new techniques for oil and gas exploration, such as fracking in shale deposits, and horizontal and deep-water drilling. Fossil fuels are expected to remain at 81 percent of the energy mix, in an energy economy that will be 39 percent larger than today. As corporations hunt every square meter of land and sea for more fossil fuels to sell, and to  line the pockets of their shareholders, millions of people know that the world is changing in ways that threaten the beauty, diversity and stability of life on Earth. Rather than limiting the power of the corporations, politicians are greasing the wheels of capitalist expansion.

To understand climate change it’s necessary to examine the structure and ideology of the system of capitalism. To get to the root of the issue, it becomes necessary to analyze the intertwined workings of the whole economic system of production and exchange of goods and services — that is, capitalism. The insane capitalist “logic” is short-term profit-taking must be maximized at all costs. If capitalism is not growing, it is in crisis. Growth must occur continuously and in all sectors. If the sector in question is highly profitable, it will grow even faster, regardless of any social considerations. Like, for example, the fossil-fuel sector. Oil production, rather than declining, as is desperately needed to stop climate change, is predicted to increase from the current 93 million barrels per day to 110 million by 2020. Instead of optimism about acting on climate change, the real optimism these days among capitalists is about the profits they can make from the oil and gas bonanza.

 This senseless waste is evident in the practice of gas flaring. The natural gas that comes up with the oil, rather than being collected and utilised, is simply set on fire. In Texas, the natural gas flared in 2012 could have provided electricity to 400,000 homes. Companies are in such a rush to make money from oil that they can’t be bothered to develop the infrastructure necessary to cope with associated natural gas. Stanford University academic Adam Brandt explains: “Companies are in a race with their competitors to develop the resource, which means there is little incentive to delay production to reduce flaring.” We also are confronted by the idiocy that while one set of capitalists is fracking for natural gas, a different set of capitalists is setting fire to the exact same gas because it’s a nuisance that slows down production! Nothing could exemplify the utter waste and anarchic insanity of capitalism than this fact.  One of the government regulatory bodies supposedly in charge of overseeing the oil corporations, North Dakota’s Industrial Commission, gave their logic for refusing to take action against this senselessness: “If we restricted oil production to reduce flaring, we would reduce the cash flow from oil wells fivefold…As well as cutting waste, we are mandated to increase production, which we would not be doing.”
Coal has gradually declined in use in many countries. One might think this is a good thing. However, capitalism is a global system, so any coal not sold in one place, finds a market overseas. The Chinese population is literally choking to death on grotesque amounts of air pollution in cities such as Beijing. And who’s to blame? The U.S. government says China is building too many coal plants — but the coal destroying people’s lungs and poisoning the air in Asia is coming from mines in Europe, Australia and the U.S. Economic competition between countries makes it impossible for effective international agreements on climate change and emissions reduction to be negotiated.

As socialists, we argue that we need to live in a world where there are no classes with diametrically opposed interests, in perpetual conflict over social and political power. Only in such a socially just and ecologically sustainable world will there be any long-term hope for humanity to live in peace with itself, other species and the planet upon which we all depend. The stepping-stones of that  road are the acts of struggle needed to create it. Whether we travel that road or not — and whether we leave behind a world to our descendants as beautiful as the one we were born into — will depend on our own independent, organized self-activity to wrench control away from a ruling elite that is quite happy to continue making money from a system that must be overturned.

Adapted from this article