This last weekend, tens of thousands of people took part in “climate walks”. These demonstrations were organized following the publication of an alarming report by UN climate experts. According to the authors of the report, if global warming continues at the current rate, its consequences may become irreversible within the next two decades. We would then witness more severe cyclones and extreme rains is some parts of planet Earth, heat waves and fires in others, the extinction of many animal species, food insecurity and health-harming conditions.
Limiting global warming is not impossible. “The laws of physics and chemistry allow it”, said one UN expert. But the laws that govern the organization of society are the laws of capitalism, based on the race for profit, economic competition between bosses and clashes between the states at their service. As long as this is the case, it will be impossible to adopt any of the measures that could prevent the predicted climate disaster.
World leaders regularly attend conferences, summits and forums on the climate, but none of these has ever led to any kind of constraining measure. Trump, solidly resting on the almost limitless power of the United States, cynically claims the right to pollute for US industry. In so doing, he brutally reminds everyone that, under capitalism, each and every state is above all concerned with defending the interests of its own corporations, and that the stronger states can impose whatever they want on the weaker ones.
Heads of state, whether they are genuinely preoccupied by environmental issues or completely indifferent, are just as powerless to address climate-related problems as they are to face economic crises. Even when, under public pressure, they blather away about ecology or environmental protection, their action is limited to organizing campaigns to fight waste, by reducing for instance the use of plastic or the number of cars on the roads.
Most often, the measures that are taken consist in making consumers pay the cost of pollution control. For example, Macron and his government have explained that they increased fuel taxes because they wanted to “fight against polluting diesel vehicles”. Car owners, especially the millions of workers who have no choice but to take their car to go to work, will have to foot the bill of Macron’s anti-diesel crusade, though the decision to develop diesel engines was taken by the car manufacturers without regard to the consequences for the environment or people’s health.
Of course, insofar as the general public’s concern for environment can create a new market, capitalists are ready to develop technologies which are presented as “environmentally friendly”. They multiply their lines of “green” products and advertise supposedly “organic” foodstuffs. But their goal remains the same: to enrich themselves. Profit is their only criterion and determines all their decisions. We saw this with the asbestos scandal. This mineral was used on a large scale for decades, though it was known to be a deadly poison which still causes 100,000 deaths worldwide each year.
In their race for profit, capitalists have no qualms about destroying the environment or putting workers’ lives at risk.
Really effective action to protect the environment can only be based on the collective determination to defend the future of the planet and of humankind. The use of natural resources and waste management should be planned on a global scale, because the climate knows no national borders. All of this is impossible in a capitalist society founded on the private ownership of the major means of production, the pursuit of individual profit and the laws of the market. Overthrowing this anarchic and uncontrollable system is a necessity if we want to control our destiny and the fate of our blue planet.
Workers have no interest in maintaining this exploitative system. Placed at the heart of production, we are the only ones who can put an end to the domination of the bourgeoisie and reorganize the economy on a collective basis in order to satisfy the needs of the majority while preserving the environment. More than ever, the future of humankind depends on the working class.