Guest essay by Eric Worrall
According to Valentin Dupouey, head of communications for the European Greens, a pan-European federation of green parties, a major overhaul of Democracy is required to force acceptance of the economic de-growth required to address the climate crisis.
He also thinks its important to explain to China that because of climate change, “a Chinese average citizen … will never be able to reach the material lifestyle of a French minimum-wage worker.“
DEMOCRACY NEEDS A COPERNICAN REVOLUTION TO SURVIVE CLIMATE CHANGE
22 March, by Valentin Dupouey
Democracy and climate change: framing the question and setting a discussion ground
I believe this broad framework boils down to three core questions:
1) Can democratic infrastructures react quickly enough to prevent the climate meltdown and societal collapse foreseen by scientists?
2) Can democracy, human rights and the rule of law survive the climate meltdown if it can’t prevent it?
And if, as I increasingly believe, the only solution will be a half-planned, half-forced degrowth:
3) Can democracy accompany degrowth and its societal impacts?
…
Scenario 2: Half-forced, half-controlled degrowth
The only assumption needed here is the belief that decoupling cannot happen or will not happen fast enough – which in my opinion is much more likely. We also need to accept that continuous growth in the extraction of fossil energy is neither desirable (because of the climate meltdown) nor even physically possible; there is increasing evidence showing that we are approaching the peak extraction of oil, and that we could be reaching it for other fossil fuels soon.
…
Controlled degrowth means being able to say to voters at the next electoral cycle: “If we want to reduce our CO2 emissions, we need to decrease our GDP. Therefore, we won’t promise you more. We will need to decide which needs and desires we want to live without first and which ones we want to safeguard. You can’t have a starter, main dish and dessert anymore. It’s either/or. Which one do you want to keep?”
It is unspeakable at the level of one country but it is even more unthinkable on a global scale. We need to be able to tell a French minimum-wage worker that his lifestyle is not compatible with the planet’s boundaries, and we need to be able to say to a Chinese average citizen that he will never be able to reach the material lifestyle of a French minimum-wage worker.
…
Read more: https://www.thenewfederalist.eu/democracy-needs-a-copernican-revolution-to-survive-climate-change?lang=fr
I’m glad the European greens put their head of communications on the case, a person with inferior communication skills might have made a total mess of the topic of climate rationing, by producing a stream thoughtless bombastic statements of breathtaking arrogance and insensitivity.
I don’t know why a European like Dupouey thinks decoupling CO2 from cheap energy is such a problem. France, a leading member of the EU, is also the world leader in decoupling; the French successfully decoupled economic growth from CO2 emissions in the 1970s, when they replaced most of their coal plants with nuclear power plants.
If the rest of the world copied the 1970s French nuclear program, global CO2 emissions would plummet by at least 25%, likely a lot more.
As for Dupouey’s comments about Chinese workers needing to understand their position in life, that place being somewhere below the living standards of French workers, I hope Dupouey is considering a personal visit to the Middle Kingdom, explain his thinking to Chinese workers. I’m sure they would be very moved by his words.
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These green guys are living on high level, use airplanes , big cars and drink champaign, often financed by tax and request people to change their live and give up all the positive developments of the last 70 years in Europe What a nonsense, because there is no scientific prove of there opinions and public shouting
The Greens are declaring themselves a new Planetary Royalty. What a farce!
I wonder what his position is on the standard of living for millions of Africans?
Aren’t Africans the new Europeans and many minimum wage earners in France?
Is there a place I can contribute to the cost of his ticket to China? I agree it would be great for him to break this news in person. My suggestion is not to worry about a round trip.
From the article: “Can democracy, human rights and the rule of law survive the climate meltdown if it can’t prevent it?”
What climate meltdown?
2) Can democracy, human rights and the rule of law survive the climate meltdown if it can’t prevent it?
Paragraph 2 of the statement above asks about surviving the ‘CLIMATE MELTDOWN’. I have a Science degree and have some understanding of the subject, but the ONE thing I cannot get my head around is the regularly mentioned Emergency or Crisis and now Meltdown. WHAT is going to occur to make this happen (and when)?
I note that CO2 is increasing in the atmosphere but not what I would consider at an alarming rate, and even if it did would (or could) this create a Meltdown? Has this ever, in Earth’s history, occurred?
So, can someone much more informed than myself, give me a clue as to how this Emergency/Crisis/Meltdown will come about (and when – this century or this millennia)?
Recently watched the video below on the End Permian Mass Extinction 250 million years ago. Its interesting until you get to his conclusion: this is what we face if we don’t become 15th C peasants next week to reduce CO2. Similar messages in all sorts of geology and paleontology lectures, at which point I turn them off.
The arrogance of these people is just breathtaking.
And the “peak oil” canard again? Haven’t they learned from reality?
Something tells me we’ll see Cold Fusion before we see Peak Oil
“Can democratic infrastructures react quickly enough to prevent the climate meltdown”
The five year annual average cooling degree-day value near Paris over the past five years is 566. In 2017 the total cooling degree-days were 520, in 2018 it was 735, and in 2019 it was 584. This does not indicate a current climate meltdown in France. 2018 was certainly a hot summer in France but 2017 and 2019 were just about normal.
When and how are all these politicians coming up with an imminent “climate meltdown”? Do they never actually venture outside at all in the summer?
This highlights the problem we have with the greens and green thinking: They cannot gasp the basic economic principle that, in a given area, further technological development and efficiencies leads to reduced consumption of natural resources, not increased consumption.
Today the wealthiest countries really are the “greenest” countries. Trying to turn back the clock is not the answer to the greens’ perceived problems. The world was not actually the perfect Garden of Eden before humans. Without too much effort, we could indeed make it better in very many ways. To do that we need abundant cheap energy to do it. Wilfully making energy more expensive is anti-human. Yes we can be viewed as the curators of this planet, but we won’t fulfill any destiny by shooting ourselves in both feet.
Weird that China would build city after city their people can’t afford to live in!
Someday the “brilliant” people in the CCP will recognize the disparity and realize that wasting so much of their industrial might is just stupid!
Or maybe not!
I think this craziness is a consequence of too much surplus cash.
It’s not that people can’t afford to live in the empty cities, the biggest problem is the buildings are fake, made of cardboard, and structurally incredibly dangerous. It’s all a giant Ponzi scheme – nobody dares look too closely or everyone loses everything.
I always thought of it as a way for them to claim reaching Peak CO2 early. Create vacant cities and electrify them with Coal Power then claim to have peaked CO2 several years early, regardless of a lack of both demand and necessity
re: “Someday the “brilliant” people in the CCP”
No doubt there are brilliant ppl in the so-called Chinese Communist Party, for to succeed in China in business party membership, per se, is probably required, whether or not you really embrace the communist ideology.
I think the real beef is with the actual communists in China, what we have, for decades now, called the Chinese communists, or Chicoms for short … so why are we using a term (CCP) that soft-peddles and misdirects where the ‘ire’ of the free world ought to be focused (onto the Chicoms)?
RE: “The only assumption needed here is the belief that decoupling cannot happen or will not happen fast enough ”
Uhmmmm…. That isn’t the only assumption you made, Valentin! Let’s go back to your first irrational assumption. “…the climate meltdown and societal collapse foreseen…” You started with irrational fear, delusion, and fear mongering and tried to use THAT to justify the destruction of democracy and human society. False assumptions and irrational fears inevitably lead to disaster. You need professional help with your mental health issues. This is not a personal attack, Valentin. It is a personal plea to get help, before you harm yourself and others.
Ignorance aside, he’s right. Fortunately for the Chinese people their leaders have no intention of going down
the CO2 suicide path and nor are they expected to by the UN, Globalists, or Ecoloons. How China has been spared the CO2 shame should be a lesson to everyone about the politics that drives AGW.
..they intinctively know that its CO2 wot feeds ’em!
We can see the effects of the corona virus. We can see no sign of the tipping point that is now more than three years overdue so should be spectacularly up the curve by now.
Perhaps it is the climate scientists who need to learn from the corona virus what a tipping point curve looks like as clearly they are too ignorant and narrowly educated to have learnt such basics. I still have my heating on and climate change was not correctly predicted so to me three strikes and you are out applies to them as much as any other scam artist.
I know he said “half-forced, half-controlled de-growth”, but I somehow think he really meant “pre-planned, fully-forced de-growth”. Must be my reading comprehension…?
Just imagine the lefty outrage if President Trump had said this or anything close…
Funny isnt it that their position so often distills down to lecturing aspirational people that they cant have what others have. Control, denial, superiority.
Well, we certainly have some battle lines being drawn for how Eastasia, Eurasia and Oceana form into the 3 major Orwellian geographical super states.
The breath-taking arrogance of Valentin Dupouey, head of communications for the European Greens, is typical of the French who think that their country has some god-given right to denigrate and overlord the World’s longest continual civilisation in China. Fortunately, it is beyond the control of these Green Lunatics to do anything about China’ rise and rise.
This arrogant guy could be wiped out by “chinese” corona
“If we want to reduce our CO2 emissions, we need to decrease our GDP. ”
So basically these ‘Greens’ are confessing that the ‘Green Economy’ and ‘Green Jobs’ are an open lie.
Congrats to finally confessing to what we have all known for years.
Well worth a read is the recently published 2019 BP Energy Outlook.
https://www.bp.com/content/dam/bp/business-sites/en/global/corporate/pdfs/energy-economics/energy-outlook/bp-energy-outlook-2019.pdf
Have a look at the chart on page 12 and think about how well the developing world will accept the premise that they should stay poor.
And also the projections on carbon taxes required to achieve this Brave new world, shown on page 30.
The US will have to go from $5/t to $200/t. France, which has had year long riots over carbon taxes (currently $50/t) which the ongoing increases were suspended indefinitely.
The Warmest Greens just don’t get it, they will never get it because the climate is not their aim, their aim is World communism.
Since the aim of the warmists greens and socialists is world domination and the elimnation of the human race I propose we start off by eliminating all warmists, greens and socialists once that done we can reevaluate.
“And if, as I increasingly believe, the only solution will be a half-planned, half-forced degrowth:”
will be just another half-a*sed idea.
This person sounds like he has never had a real job.
In Roman times it was give them bread and circuses,
In more recent times it was keep them alarmed with an endless scare of demons and hobgoblins.
The endless scare tactic seems to be the modis operandi.
So now one has to take everything with a pinch of salt.