Land devastated by climate change.
Credit: Getty
In 1962, American playwright James Baldwin wrote that “Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.” Today, his words should give us succour. We need more than ever to face the reality of environmental change.
I’m a researcher at IPPR, a think tank. We have been observing warnings of rapid, negative environmental change from the scientific community. So we decided to understand what that means for our work, for policy, and for politics.
In a report released today, we bring together the latest science on human-induced environmental change and seek to understand how politicians should respond. We conclude that when it comes to climate change, political debate has failed us in three different ways.
First, the term “climate change” no longer captures reality. The scale of environmental change that our earth is currently experiencing far exceeds it. We are depleting soil, killing species, damaging oceans. This is happening at a pace that is unprecedented in human history and in some cases millions, […]
Very good article with a good shift in the awareness of the exchange using the phrase Environmental Breakdown. Yet, nowhere is there any reference to the current capitalist model of unlimited growth that is causing all of this. Taking the cue from James Baldwin, until we face our economic system it will continue to kill us all.
As a Canadian, I’m used to many publicly funded schemes to manage the most overt excesses of capitalism, such as Medicare. Americans are not used to having government [the state] act as the intermediary between profit and wellness [to use your phrase, Stephan].