Clearing Skies: Opening a New Path on Climate and the Future – Yale E360

Source: Clearing Skies: Opening a New Path on Climate and the Future – Yale E360

Adapting to climate change does not address the societal systems and values that spawned the current crisis. What’s needed is “systemic adaptation” that fundamentally changes our economy, our politics, and our priorities in ways that put community and the planet first.

BY JAMES GUSTAVE SPETH • NOVEMBER 28, 2023

Of the many climate struggles going on today, the great one, played out in hundreds of arenas around the world, is the struggle to rein in and then halt the buildup of greenhouse gases. Gaining ever-more attention is the struggle to adapt to the climate impacts already upon us. But there is a new struggle that needs to be joined now: the struggle to learn from our mistakes — the Big Mistake of climate catastrophe. What is it about our society, our economy, our politics, and our culture that has let this giant failing happen? What is it that has led us to this tragedy?

There are a set of readily available answers to this question, the conventional wisdom of the matter. Soulless corporations bent on ever-increasing profits at any cost and on controlling both natural resources and political reality to ensure that their paths stay clear. Pliant consumers susceptible to advertising’s great skill and endlessly, obliviously enjoying the historically unprecedented benefits of cheap energy.

These answers have the ring of truth. But it is critical, particularly for today’s children and the generations after, to understand at a deeper level what has driven the climate emergency. If we can identify the underlying factors and forces that have caused the Big Mistake, then we can say with conviction that these are things that must be different in the world we want for today’s kids and future generations.