One time Beijing political dissident and now economics lecturer in the USA Minqi Li presents the case for socialism as the only way to avoid a catastrophe from CO2 emissions. Please follow the links below:
http://www.monthlyreview.org/080721li.php
see also http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqjlDVc5mfI&feature=related
Some excerpts from his paper:
The German Energy Watch Group points out that the world’s proven and possible reserves of uranium would be able to support the current level of demand for uranium for at most seventy years and the world could face uranium supply shortages after about 2020.
Worse, recent studies reveal that taking into account emissions in land development and soil erosion, fuels made from biomass actually emit more greenhouse gases than conventional petroleum.
The mainstream environmental movement, as far as its social composition is concerned, mainly consists of people who belong to the upper middle class in a capitalist society. They include the university professors, engineers, technicians, managers, financial analysts, and other professionals. Although they typically do not own significant amounts of the means of production, they play important managerial and technical functions for the capitalists and enjoy substantial material privileges relative to the working class.
From a purely technical point of view, the most simple and straight forward solution to the crisis of climate change is immediately to stop all economic growth and start to downsize world material consumption in an orderly manner until the greenhouse gases emissions fall to reasonable levels. This can obviously be accomplished with the existing technology. If all the current and potentially available de-carbonization technologies are introduced to all parts of the world as rapidly as possible, the world should still have the material production capacity to meet the basic needs of the entire world’s population even with a much smaller world economy.
From: nirandornp@hotmail.com
To:
Subject: RE: Climate Change, Limits to Growth, and the Imperative for Socialism Minqi Li – excerpts & links
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 2009 01:58:21 +0000
The article with it’s suggestion corresponds well with sufficient way of living.
Nirandorn
I agree with your comment Dr Nirandorn about sufficient living.
The trouble here is that this philosophy seems only to be applied to some
small farmers. Agri-business (e.g. CP) and other sectors are excluded
and need to be socialized. I like the example of the Buddha giving up all
his wealth to find peace. How can we find ways for the mega rich in our
country to follow this example at least to the point of adopting non-Hi-So
lifestyles?
Many here in ChiangMai want Khun Thaksin to return to rule. If he were to hand
the rest of his still considerable wealth to the people and reject the fallacy
of “Economic Growth is Good” perhaps that might now be a bad thing.
Does any body have his phone no?
Ricky
People will not change their lifestyle, will not stop consuming so much unless they are directly affected by climate change.
In many ways we all need to be led by example, this relies on those in the public domain to change their ways first – which is a slow process.
I can see only one solution, which is for all countries worldwide to introduce a new type of currency for every person on the planet, a carbon currency, whereby each of us works to earn not only cash but carbon credits. Everything we buy then comes with a monetary cost as well as a carbon cost. We are then forced to live within our means.
Of course, carbon trading will obviously take place and would need to be monitored and regulated.
Whilst this is a great idea (not my own), could this actually work in practice? be in place quickly enough? and could we really get all governments worldwide to sign-up to the scheme?
Dear Ricky Ward:
Many thanks for your interest in my work. In fact, now there are many socialist activists in China working for a potential social transformation.
If you’re interested, may I refer you to my book “The Rise of China and the Demise of the Capitalist World Economy” published earlier this year (by Pluto Press and Monthly Review Press). It includes discussions on some issues you may be intereted in.
best regards,
Minqi Li
A related paper which draws similar conclusions about the present social paradigm’s inability to deal with the crisis is in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society entitled: ‘Reframing the climate change challenge in light of post-2000 emission trends’ by Kevin Anderson and Alice Bows.