In “The paradox of Degrowth Communism: Left-wing doomerists are empowering global elites“, UnHerd writer Thomas Fazi responds:
“This is where the most concerning element of degrowthism and any other form of apocalyptic environmentalism comes in: by constantly engaging in “doomerism” — the idea that either we fix everything or we’re all screwed — they’re effectively saying that anything is justified in order to ‘save the planet’, including all manner of authoritarian interventions. It’s like Zero Covid on steroids. After all, if the very survival of life on Earth is at stake, surely we can’t allow the complexities of democratic debate and deliberation to stand in the way of doing what’s needed?”
The broader danger of climate crisis is that it does not merely demand improved “sustainability”. It threatens what it means to be free. In a “smart society” in which digital-only banking, travel, shopping and energy usage are surveilled — and rationed — for the ostensible purpose of limiting carbon emissions, there isn’t a whole lot of room left for old-fashioned concepts like privacy and private property ownership. Even the things we take for granted, such as dietary choice and the companionship of non-essential pets, may become a thing of the past. If the radical left has any say, it is difficult to foresee how elections, even, can be left to chance. After all, climate crisis is existential.
In the comments section, reader Jim Veenbaas responds:
“You would think after nearly three centuries of being utterly discredited, this Malthusian garbage would die an ignoble death. Yet it still persists. … The most perplexing thing for me is why the political elite and technocrats are so invested in climate alarmism and net zero.”
That question is a comparatively easy one. If climate change is the top global threat — as President Biden has said, repeatedly, despite also saying we have never been closer to “nuclear Armageddon“! — it gives global leaders license to consolidate power, cast themselves as superheroes who will save the planet and, for all intents and purposes, enslave humanity for the sake of that victory.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Intrinsically, we know this: When power is concentrated, the rich become richer and the powerful become more powerful. In a deindustrialized world, even scarcity of essentials such as food and energy can serve to inflate the bottom line. In a degrowth future, it stands to reason that corporations will drive novel forms of inflation. In the end, however, debates about private vs. public control obscure the fact that control by the few at the expense of the many is a state of human affairs as old as time itself.
If we were pragmatists foremost and ideologues or partisans second, we might build consensus around smaller, more achievable goals such as cleaning up our communities, term limits on elected office to discourage our representatives from becoming too cozy with special interests, stopping the practice of rewarding those who “fail up“, closing the so-called revolving door between the private sector and government regulators, challenges to Citizens United, the aggressive adoption of antitrust law enforcement and, perhaps most important, the wholesale rejection of digital IDs and Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDCs), which comprise the last, great temptation for “civil societies” to normalize draconian behavior.
Climate change may no longer be up for debate. By the same token, it is time to acknowledge the “green con”. For one, the exponential growth of an AI-dominated virtual world comes at the expense of the natural one, in large part because AI energy demands are gargantuan. For another, the mining of rare-earth minerals, such as lithium, may inflict equal if not greater damage for paradoxically less return. Next, the comparatively short service life of wind, solar and battery-powered alternatives commits us to far greater costs than anyone wishes to acknowledge. And finally, just as the pandemic created over 40 new Big Pharma billionaires, the emerging climate economy promises to concentrate still more money and control into the hands of the few.
Truth be told, climate scientists are skeptical that top-down climate policies will achieve the temperature-lowering objectives the political class has promised. But breaking the silence caries risks given how much of science is dependent upon public funding. Three climate scientists, with more than 80 years of professional experience between them, had this to say in a piece titled “Climate scientists: concept of net zero is a dangerous trap”, on The Conversation:
“[P]olicymakers and businesses appear to be entirely serious about deploying highly speculative technologies as a way to land our civilization at a sustainable destination. In fact, these are no more than fairy tales. …
“In private, scientists express significant skepticism about the Paris Agreement, BECCS, offsetting, geoengineering and net zero. Apart from some notable exceptions, in public we quietly go about our work, apply for funding, publish papers and teach. The path to disastrous climate change is paved with feasibility studies and impact assessments.
“Rather than acknowledge the seriousness of our situation, we instead continue to participate in the fantasy of net zero. What will we do when reality bites? What will we say to our friends and loved ones about our failure to speak out now?
“The time has come to voice our fears and be honest with wider society. Current net zero policies will not keep warming to within 1.5°C because they were never intended to.”
How many times must we learn life’s lessons the hard way? Big Government and Big Business are a self-licking lollipop known as “Our money, your expense”. If we are asking why the rich never “pay their fair share” or why the Military-Industrial Complex always manages to find money for other people’s geopolitical problems while domestic problems are ignored, look no further than the unsustainable nature of endless government growth. If there is one truism limited-government proponents should be able to impress upon their socialist counterparts, it is this:
Big isn’t always better. Consensus isn’t always accurate. And bureaucrats will never care about us as much as we care about ourselves.
In Marxist-speak, Big Government will always be of, by and for the bourgeoise. Nearly 100 million people have died since the “communist con” was cooked up ~100 years ago and still it seduces tens of millions of people to believe human nature is but a bump on the road to Utopia. Its proponents need to spend less time on social theory and more time grounding themselves in human psychology. There is no real-world scenario in which promises, big or small, eradicate the suffering of the proletariat — only a game of musical chairs in which tough choices demand compromise and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Where we went wrong is not “Capitalism” but its antithesis: Privatizing profits and socializing risks.
Rather than pull the degrowth communism ripcord — and watch helplessly as the global economy spirals into a doom loop — the best anyone can do is what we should have been doing all along: Double down on anti-corruption, anti-cronyism and equal treatment under the law. Rather than put up with “too big to fail“, tackle “too big to care”. After all, when bad actors are held to account in the private and public sectors, it interrupts the taxpayer-subsidized, debt-based accumulation of resources by which to pillage the environment, mismanage still more financial resources and disadvantage the rest of us.
Accountability is the emergency brake we have forgotten to pull.
No system is perfect. But human-scale Capitalism — as opposed to the opaque, winner-take-all globalist variety — is as close as we may ever come to a future that does not forcefully override what it means to be human.
The challenge of governance in any form is the tedious and often thankless job of holding the public and private sectors accountable. It does not, however, require “radicalization” to adopt higher standards. To the contrary, the notion that existing norms and values must be “dismantled” to make way for better ones is akin to setting out bait for anarchists, fascists and sociopaths — hardly principled “believers” who can be expected to set aside their own self-interest at a later date!
If the selling point of Fabian-style socialism is its “answer” to inequality, appreciate that no one is stopping the alleviation of suffering even within a Capitalistic framework. It is only our imaginations — conscience and commitment — that is lacking! (Rather than degrowth for degrowth’s sake, imagine a world in which corporations that employed child labor, for example, stood to receive more than a slap on the wrist?) If such convictions are lackluster now, in what universe does the spirit of equanimity arise given that the conditions that make for Marxist revolution also lay the groundwork for demagoguery? These are not distinct phenomena but two faces of the same antisocial impulse!
Good People, Good Governance
In the end, transparency and accountability are the make-or-break points for any form of governance. Admittedly, it is much more sexy to contemplate grand, unifying philosophical theories than to perform the tireless work of making the private and public sectors work in the interests of ordinary people. But in this respect, complexity is the enemy of progress. (Redistribution of wealth, for example, is paradoxically dependent on the assumption that the excesses of Capitalism are all but constants.)
In a post-growth world, to live in a state of abundance is an oxymoron. Recommitting to tried-and-true fundamentals is our only clear path forward.
Just as a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, the time has come to replace climate panic with a “Climate Manhattan Project”. Contrary to the pessimists, there may indeed be a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. According to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, that rainbow may end in Devens, Massachusetts. MIT writes:
“On an overcast day in early December [2022], a yellow earth mover scooped dirt from the edge of a deep pit in Devens, Massachusetts, on the site of an old Army base some 50 miles outside of Boston.
“This is the future home of SPARC, a prototype fusion reactor that, if all goes as hoped, will achieve a goal that’s eluded physicists for nearly a century. It will produce more energy from fusing together atoms, the same phenomenon that powers the sun, than it takes to achieve and sustain those reactions.”
Don’t believe the doomsayers who would have us trade liberty and representational democracy for ecosocialism (feudalism) even as a new class of climate billionaires — who emit a million times more greenhouse gasses than the rest of us! — continue, despite the degrowth hype, to indulge in Kobe steaks, superyachts, multiple homes and private air travel.
God is not dead. The universe is not without a sense of humor. And the brightest minds are hard at work. The future is bright. As bright as the blazing sun. They can only dim that sunshine if we allow fear to get the better of us.
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Resources
Is America Ready for ‘Degrowth Communism’? | The Atlantic
Shrink the Economy, Save the World? | The New York Times
The Paradox of Degrowth Communism: Left-wing Doomerists are Empowering the Global Elite | Unherd
The Surprising Roots of Fascism | Hoover Institution
The Environmental Pollution Behind the Boom in Artificial Intelligence | CTECH
The Staggering Ecological Impacts of Computation and the Cloud | MIT Press Reader
CBDCs will be the End of American Freedom | Newsweek
How to Resist CBDCs — 5 Ways you can Opt Out of this Dystopian Future | Doug Casey’s International Man
15-Minute Cities: The Green Dream is a Dystopian Nightmare | GB News (UK)
Megacities on the Move: Plannedopolis: The year 2040 as imagined in 2011 | YouTube
The Social Critic 