<
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2021/04/an-outdated-idea-is-still-shaping-climate-policy/618652/>
"Reading news of the China talks, I thought of a recent paper by the political
scientists Michaël Aklin and Matto Mildenberger. They argue that, since the
1990s, policy makers and academics have conceived of climate change in a mostly
useless way. Officials have taken their cues from economists and imagined
climate change as a free-rider problem, in which the goal is to prevent nations
from taking advantage of one another.
In fact, Aklin and Mildenberger say, climate change is a
distributive-conflict problem—a term that was new to me and that I will now
explain. In essence, climate policy restructures the economy, creating new
economic winners and losers. This is familiar enough: Coal mines suffer;
electric utilities prosper. Because political leaders want, above all, to
maintain the support of key constituencies, climate policy flows from
a
societal negotiation between potential winners and potential losers, a fight
between climate reformers and climate obstructionists. The challenge of global
climate action isn’t that other people will benefit from your emissions cuts;
it’s that many interests actively
oppose decarbonization. The key to passing
climate policy is stitching together a coalition that will support and sustain
decarbonization."
Via
libramoon@pluspora.com.
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
