An uncertain climate
The uncharted ethics of climate change mitigation
While the environmental movement — and many other developed nations — have long stressed the imperative to address global climate change, the public ethics of the issue have lagged far behind. On the one hand, it has taken time, aided by the release a blockbuster Al Gore documentary, to transform climate change from an environmental issue to a moral one. On the other hand, the ethical thorns adorning climate change are particularly sharp, with a wide gap between the immediate consequences of action versus the extended and distant consequences of inaction.
Now that the House of Representatives has passed the first ever mandatory cap on greenhouse gasses in the United States, it has become impossible for the political class and the public at-large to dodge the debate. Currently, both lesser and greater philosophical issues have reared their not-quite-congruently sized heads.
The Greater Issue
Nothing has altered the most prominent axis of debate on climate change: whether speculative, long-term consequences outweight immediate, known economic costs. While global weather events that presage the potential impacts of climate change have begun to tip the balance, the political debate remains sharply divided between those who see a need to stave off future global disaster and those who believe the immediate economic toll of massive industrial restructuring is itself disastrous.
This ethical battle line has informed the political context as well. The Obama administration and other advocates for climate change mitigation have worked hard to stress the possibilities of a “green economy” and “green jobs.” They’re pinning their hopes on the idea that “green” really can deliver the green, and therefore rebut the major objection to climate change mitigation.
The Lesser Issue
Curiously, a once overlooked provision in the bill has prompted opposition from Obama, namely, the imposition of trade penalties on nations that do not set emissions limits. Aside from the oddity of such a self-righteous stance bundled in with our own first emissions cap (still without Senate approval and therefore not law), Obama’s objection is that such a measure sends “protectionist signals” during a time of economic hardship worldwide.
Yet this demonstrates the difficulties of how to meet moral imperatives that have global implications. By some accounts, it’s not enough for a nation to simply abstain from what it considers immoral conduct in a global context. This, for example, is the rationale for intervening in genocide or other so-called “crimes against humanity.”
Climate change represents a similar problem. Its impacts potentially extend across all of humanity and the solution demands global participation.
At the same time, active coercion against other nations runs aground on questions of national sovereignty. On this argument, so long as they do not pursue aggressive actions against others, nations have a right to pursue their own course. This principle, some say, it critical to maintaining global peace and order.
America has tended to take an ad hoc approach to the problem of sovereignty, frequently willing to intervene, but only on issues it judges of paramount importance (especially with regard to national security). Perhaps the emergence of climate change as one such issue will permanently change our calculus.
–Sam
Related posts:
- The military makes a non-moral case for responding to climate change
- A tough climate
- “Belief” in climate change
- Obama’s governing philosophy
- A prayer for the economy?
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