Europe - Collapse dynamics

[SATire]

I am faintly surprised that no one has brought up the possibility that Europe might be better off without Britain.  There used to be very old phrasing most recently reincarnated in Maoist literature referring to "running dogs of  capitalism." It is hard to deny that the UK has functioned as one such for the capitalists in NY and DC in efforts to weaken the European Union, most lately observed in reaction against financial and privacy controls.

[...]

Sir Humphrey Appleby: "Yes, and current policy. We had to break the whole thing [the EEC] up, so we had to get inside. We tried to break it up from the outside, but that wouldn't work. Now that we're inside we can make a complete pig's breakfast of the whole thing: set the Germans against the French, the French against the Italians, the Italians against the Dutch. The Foreign Office is terribly pleased, it's just like old times."

As the EU is a win-win situation the Brexit clearly is a loose-loose. EU will be left with a smaller common market and UK without any but the absolute loose is about the same. In rest EU it is just devided over more partners and thus easier to carry.

To comment about your "Britain messing up EU": Some things like that happened (e.g. blaming the German austerity the reason for Greek crisis while UK rejecting any solidarity). But others in EU acted similar quite often, too. We know each other quite well in our family. It is better to do such "messing up" in a common house, since then all have to remove the shit together after the party with some educational effects. If we are sitting all in our own houses again it is to risky that some of the houses might catch fire for some reason... 

[GeoffBeacon]

pikaia

CONCRETE??

The gap between your view and mine may be too large to bridge. I believe I am trying to come to terms with the physical reality of climate change and still envisage a quality of life that most people would like. That may now be impossible but to give it a try we must cut consumption and therefore cut production so I warm to silkman saying

Climate change I’m afraid won’t get a look in though the resultant recession may seem to solve the problem for a while.

But this won't cut consumption nearly enough. The consumption we must cut includes

• Building with concrete and steel
• Driving cars
• Flying in planes
• Eating beef and lamb
• &etc

So no new concrete cities. In my mind (&elsewhere) I plan idyllic green settlements where I don't have to live next to motorists. They have wooden houses, most food locally produced, clean air, lots of bicycles &etc.

If real climate disaster is to be avoided consumption must be cut quickly as our remaining carbon budgets are tiny and production cannot be decarbonised quickly enough.

After BRexit I feel ashamed to be British but the EU's plans for cutting emissions have been pathetic. Any Brexit recession in Europe will be tiny compared to what is required by the physics of climate change.

Physics trumps politics and economics.

Yes. Physics wins, humanity looses.

[Theta]

pikaia

CONCRETE??

The gap between your view and mine may be too large to bridge. I believe I am trying to come to terms with the physical reality of climate change and still envisage a quality of life that most people would like. That may now be impossible but to give it a try we must cut consumption and therefore cut production so I warm to silkman saying

Climate change I’m afraid won’t get a look in though the resultant recession may seem to solve the problem for a while.

But this won't cut consumption nearly enough. The consumption we must cut includes

• Building with concrete and steel
• Driving cars
• Flying in planes
• Eating beef and lamb
• &etc

So no new concrete cities. In my mind (&elsewhere) I plan idyllic green settlements where I don't have to live next to motorists. They have wooden houses, most food locally produced, clean air, lots of bicycles &etc.

If real climate disaster is to be avoided consumption must be cut quickly as our remaining carbon budgets are tiny and production cannot be decarbonised quickly enough.

After BRexit I feel ashamed to be British but the EU's plans for cutting emissions have been pathetic. Any Brexit recession in Europe will be tiny compared to what is required by the physics of climate change.

Physics trumps politics and economics.

Yes. Physics wins, humanity looses.

Seems a brexit recession is enough to cause global dimming loss and the death of earth well before 2030

[JimD]

JimD, I sympathize with the sentiment and the general distrust that people have towards TPTB, but not if they then let themselves sheepishly be used by Adolf-light-populists like that horrible Farage and those other reactionary nitwits.

The EU is not the enemy, just like terrorism, immigrants and climate change regulation aren't. The enemy is the system that has been built around the interests of the 1%. As long as we the people do not demand a cap on how much someone can own and make, nothing will ever change to the better.

The system will find a way to use Brexit to serve its own interests. And if Brexit doesn't go through, no problem either, proceed as planned.

If you set hard limits on what someone can achieve in material terms, a lot less people will get caught in their egotistical ambitions.

I really believe this is the only solution that has any chance of being successful.

Hmmm...

In a perfect world perhaps?

The basic issue I have with how Chris and many are framing the argument is that they are approaching this issue in a manner similar to those who advocate what I call the Green BAU solutions to climate change issues.  In other words what they are doing (or saying in the comments above) are all good in their own way but they do not and cannot properly address the core of the issue and thus are not solutions.  Green BAU does not solve climate change since it does not address the core causes of it and the comments above are of a tactical nature when the problem is strategic.

How can one make an argument about how the masses are supposed to rationally think of these types of situations and then present them some sort of road map to a solution?  How are the ones doing this going to be perceived by them as any different than the populists you so disagree with?  The methods of manipulation you so decry in the populists are not materially different than the propaganda spewed out by the main stream media which is in the employ of the PTB is it?  You do realize that the masses are not really stupid about these things.  Literally everyone knows that almost everything they are told by the media, the politicians, the spokesman for the ruling class, and anyone who is well off is basically a lie intended to manipulate them into some actions which will benefit the speaker more than it will benefit them.  This is a certainty of life and how human interaction works.  Is it not?  In those circumstances all choices are bad and the worst perceived evil is the one which currently has the most power over you.

So when Neven tells them this

The EU is not the enemy, just like terrorism, immigrants and climate change regulation aren't. The enemy is the system that has been built around the interests of the 1%. As long as we the people do not demand a cap on how much someone can own and make, nothing will ever change to the better.

and, even if Neven really means what he says, the way it is going to be perceived is that it is just another argument to work within the system that we have been hearing for a 100 years and what this type of action always results in is the 'system' dragging its feet for years and diluting change and the folks on the bottom ending up with less or nothing.  That is the sum of the experiences of their lives and you ask them to be rational in their decision making?  But the rational thing to do in their circumstances is pretty hard to describe and it asks them to do something which few humans are capable of.  Let us not forget we are not rational decision makers us humans.

People are not really letting themselves be sheepishly used by the populists any more than they have been by the PTB are they.  To them it is just one side fighting with the other.  They are not totally ignorant that both sides are lying to them.


Side stuff:

I do have particular disagreements with Chris on Russia even after his modification.  Kelptocrat's to some extent (but we can hardly complain about that when our 1%er's make them look like pikers - right?), but I don't see any of them in any definitional way being any sort of communists.  But it is also not an important point in the decision process of how to deal with them. 

SATire in trying to define the EU as any real democratic system one has to dance around what democratic means pretty fast.  There is next to zero accountability in Brussels and the various countries are played off each other and only select ones have much say in matters and not in a particularly democratic way at that.  Guess we will just not agree on this issue.

[ChrisReynolds]

Geoff,

I do get extremely annoyed by the meme that we have ample room (so can invite unlimited numbers of immigrants from all over the world). The UK is far too overcrowded already.

How do we define overcrowded?

The answer is IMO very simple.

The UK imports 40% of total foodstuffs.
http://www.foodsecurity.ac.uk/issue/uk.html

UK Land usage does not permit for an immediate transition of other categories of land to food production. In any case there is not enough land to immediately transition to food.

Category / 1000hectares / %useage
Agriculture   15333   67%
Forestry   3059   13%
Urban   2748   12%
Other   1658   7%
Total    22798   

One might argue that we could convert pasture to crops, but this could not happen within one growing season. And much pasture is land unsuitable for crops, e.g. upland and wet flood plain pasture.

Thus if some catastrophe were to happen that led to other countries ceasing exports in order to feed their own population. If the catastrophe did not affect domestic food production we would face severe difficulty feeding our population, but would probably just about manage with organised rationing. In the event of a massive volcanic event, comet/meteor impact or some climatic event (tipping point) that does affect food production it seems we would have no choice but to let some people starve to death, especially if the catastrophic event happened in the Spring.

Thus we probably need to drop our population not increase it.

[ChrisReynolds]

Jim,

"Politics is the art of the possible.", so said Otto Von Bismarck.

I said above in my reply to you that I am the only person I know who doesn't own a car because of AGW, everyone at work drives to work and flies on holiday. When you and people like you are able to persuade say 50% of people to stop driving and flying we might be at a point where we can seriously talk about reducing CO2 and a paradigm shift. Until that point, I am sorry, but I view claims that we should shift the paradigm from the existing one of exponential growth as idle day dreams. So I will continue to reason under the prevalent paradigm.

[JimD]

  So managing the decline is the better path perhaps than going all in on BAU.

Therein lies the rub.

If I felt that the success of the Leave campaign and the consequent destabilisation of the structure of the U.K. and of Europe had anything to do with the concept of a transition to a new order that recognised the unsustainability of BAU (Green or otherwise) I'd be cheering from the roof tops.

The sad fact is that the driving force behind this outcome is an attempt to shore up the UK's position in the old world driven by exponential growth. It's all about "controlling our borders". We don't need a wall, except in Ireland, but the basic thought process is identical to Trump's solution.

Unquestionably the EU has a massive democratic deficit but it has to date played a positive role in nurturing fledgling democracies across the continent. I happen to think that is a platform to build on and not to disparage and destroy.

I'm also of the view that the UK as a mature parliamentary democracy, despite or maybe even because of its colonial history, should be playing a key role in addressing the obvious challenges created by the Brussels plutocracy.

We desperately need to start moving towards a new order that recognises that it's in the best interests of everyone to abandon the economics of exponential growth and to work towards the more equitable distribution of wealth that is needed to inhibit both conflict and migration.

This maybe pie in the sky and a collapse of society may be inevitable but I fail to see why I should do anything other than to try to realise that dream.

With that in mind it terrifies me that the victorious Brexiters have no clue as to what they intend to do next but one thing is for sure - "managing the decline" is not on their agenda.

A good post. 

If I thought that either side in this political dustup had any chance of meaningfully executing plans to deal with climate change I would be full on in support of them...but sadly I have watched them and thought about what they are doing and are capable of doing and come to the conclusion that none of them are serious about our long term survival.  To me it is just two BAU camps at war over whose hands will be on the levers of the technology which is being used to prop up our totally unsustainable civilization.  The data does not lie - the climate change and carrying capacity problems cannot be solved with anything like our current population levels or even an average 3rd world standard of living. 

Any proposed answer to the existential problems we face which does not include population reductions as its core platform is dead on arrival.  So neither path out of this vote leads to any long term positive change.

pikaia

CONCRETE??

The gap between your view and mine may be too large to bridge. I believe I am trying to come to terms with the physical reality of climate change and still envisage a quality of life that most people would like. That may now be impossible but to give it a try we must cut consumption and therefore cut production so I warm to silkman saying

Climate change I’m afraid won’t get a look in though the resultant recession may seem to solve the problem for a while.

But this won't cut consumption nearly enough. The consumption we must cut includes

• Building with concrete and steel
• Driving cars
• Flying in planes
• Eating beef and lamb
• &etc

So no new concrete cities. In my mind (&elsewhere) I plan idyllic green settlements where I don't have to live next to motorists. They have wooden houses, most food locally produced, clean air, lots of bicycles &etc.

If real climate disaster is to be avoided consumption must be cut quickly as our remaining carbon budgets are tiny and production cannot be decarbonised quickly enough.

After BRexit I feel ashamed to be British but the EU's plans for cutting emissions have been pathetic. Any Brexit recession in Europe will be tiny compared to what is required by the physics of climate change.

Physics trumps politics and economics.

Yes. Physics wins, humanity looses.

Geoff's comment, to me, is where this discussion's real value is.  The point is not the tactical reasons for exit or not.  Nor is it the tactical decisions regarding what the EU and the UK should do going forward as it relates to the partial dissolution of the EU.  The point is that this is partial collapse in action right before our eyes.

It is a process well underway in many other places around the globe.  If I had been asked where I thought the first few meaningful locations where collapse would manifest itself 5 years ago I almost certainly would not have picked the EU.  But here it is.  So what does this mean?  Does it mean, contrary to what seemed logical, that the most technologically advanced and wealthy locations are actually the most fragile and thus subject to collapse first?  Or not?  It is a good question.  Does the rise of Sanders and Trump here in the US, the Exiter's in the UK, and the populist parties around the developed world indicate that we are much weaker than we thought?

The world is full of failed and failing states (and the US seems bound to accelerate this phenomenom - Hillary's past actions only promise even more of it) which are undergoing some form of collapse.  Perhaps the global recession currently underway will be accelerated by this decision and it will quickly spread across the developed world like it has the developing world.  A distinct possibility I think.   Following on the footsteps of 2009, from which we saw no meaningful recovery, another deep global recession would likely take us down another full step along the path to deep collapse.  This is how collapse is likely to progress.  The system sets after a decline at a point where it can hold on for a time, the stresses of climate change and carrying capacity continue to build, at the next inflection point the system breaks again and falls to the next point of temporary stability.  And the process repeats.  Until we reach the point where population and resource needs are balanced with their effects on the climate and global carrying capacity there is no other thing which can happen.  BAU solutions will not solve this problem.

We can learn from this situation if we step back from the tactical level and look at our long term prospects.  Using the most optimistic possible viewpoint (one I clearly do not hold) we still have some chance to change the outcome if we radically overhaul our current civilizational structure, dramatically reduce population, and so on.  Collapse takes decades but it does not stop until one reaches sustainability.  Meaningful actions now will have positive long term benefits.  Tactical decisions will have no effect.

Anyway I am rambling.  It is 7 am and I need some coffee. 

[JimD]

Jim,

"Politics is the art of the possible.", so said Otto Von Bismarck.

I said above in my reply to you that I am the only person I know who doesn't own a car because of AGW, everyone at work drives to work and flies on holiday. When you and people like you are able to persuade say 50% of people to stop driving and flying we might be at a point where we can seriously talk about reducing CO2 and a paradigm shift. Until that point, I am sorry, but I view claims that we should shift the paradigm from the existing one of exponential growth as idle day dreams. So I will continue to reason under the prevalent paradigm.

Well in all my years of arguing about this stuff I am not aware of ever changing anyone's mind and really have no expectations of doing so (though I did once).  So 50% is beyond my means unfortunately. 

I fully agree that changing the paradigm of our approach to civilization is likely far beyond our capabilities as we as a species do not actually reason our way to anything.  I just cannot let the argument go I guess. 

In any case, cheers!.  I like to read all your stuff and find it valuable.  I mean no personal disrespect.

[JimD]

Here is a great blog post.  It address's many of my viewpoints about whether the EU or the US are democratic institutions.

http://www.declineoftheempire.com/2016/06/undemocratic-liberalism.html#comments

[SATire]

SATire in trying to define the EU as any real democratic system one has to dance around what democratic means pretty fast.  There is next to zero accountability in Brussels and the various countries are played off each other and only select ones have much say in matters and not in a particularly democratic way at that.  Guess we will just not agree on this issue.

JimD, I did not try to define something. I tried to explain it. To make "my dance" easier to understand also for people in USA: The EU is not a state. Thus it does not matter if the EU itself is democratic. All accountability is in the governments of the states, which are the 28 democratic legitimated members and which all agreed to the treaties.

I am really tired of reading that the EU is to be blamed for this or that. Blame the governments, which made the treaties. Blame the people who elected thoose government. Blame todays government that they are not able to allow any progress. Blame todays people that they did not start the "grass root canal therapy" of the EU yet (cited words stolen from 2 Swiss authors here: http://www.zeit.de/politik/2016-06/eu-nationalismus-europaeische-integration-buergernaehe ).

[ChrisReynolds]

Jim,

The respect is mutual. You might have noticed, I rarely say how pessimistic I am about the prospects for dragging things to a more intelligent direction. At the moment we really are no better than yeast or bacteria...

Anyway, the reason I don't tend to express that pessimism is I don't want to reduce the chances for a change and for someone to get a solution I haven't thought of. So I'll shut up now. 

[OldLeatherneck]

Here is a great blog post.  It address's many of my viewpoints about whether the EU or the US are democratic institutions.

http://www.declineoftheempire.com/2016/06/undemocratic-liberalism.html#comments

JimD

Thanks for sharing that link.  There's a lot of food for thought in that, and much of it is not easy to digest.

Other than that, I've been thinking about how Brexit will impact any efforts to curb AGW/CC.  In the short term, the governments of Europe are going to be forced to focus on managing Britain's exit from the EU rather than focus on Climate Change.  In the long term, a weakened EU with growing social unrest and the rise of right wing nationalist movements will not be cohesive enough to take the necessary and painful steps to address the looming threat of Climate Change.

[AbruptSLR]

The World Economic Forum's New Champions ("summer Davos") is taking place this week (June) in Tianjin, China, and TPTB project a negative view of Brexit and a positive view of the coming technological singularity (or Fourth Industrial Revolution).  I believe that TPTB are also very sensitive to the lack of sustainability of our current situation and that they have two solutions in mind: (a) If populism/nationalism leads to excessive rates of decline, they will use military law to impose restrictions comparable to what the feudal lords used to address the "Tyranny of the Commons" problem; or (b) If societal collapse can be held off long enough then they view themselves as "New Champions" of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.  Both of these topics are discussed in articles posted at the weforum.org website linked below:

https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/06/brexit-is-hot-topic-at-summer-davos

Extract: "Ian Bremmer, President and Founder, Eurasia Group
"You are talking about the diminishment of the most important alliance in the post-war order, the transatlantic relationship, which was already before Brexit at its weakest since World War Two. You're talking about not only the removal of the UK from the EU, but you're also talking, I think reasonably likely, about the eventual disintegration in further part of the UK itself. And you're also talking at the very least about the severe diminishment of what the EU actually means, its footprint globally, its common values and its ability to continue to integrate.""


https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/06/highlights-of-day-one-at-the-annual-meeting-of-the-new-champions-2016

Extract: "Britain's recent decision to leave the European Union and its economic implications for the rest of the world dominated the conversations, with several experts taking a gloomy view.
"It could be – I’m not saying it is going to be – the beginning of the disintegration of the European Union or the Eurozone," said Nouriel Roubini, the economist who predicted the 2008 housing crash in the United States."
But it wasn't all about Brexit. Not entirely. There were other dazzling moments in a day of illuminations and bright ideas. New technologies, for instance."
With regards to new technologies, the theme of the January 2016 Davos World Economic Forum was: “Mastering the Fourth Industrial Revolution”.

https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2015/11/what-is-the-theme-of-davos-2016

Extract: "Earlier Industrial Revolutions advanced human progress through new forms of power generation, mass production and information processing. Building on a ubiquitous and mobile internet, smaller, cheaper and more powerful sensors, as well as artificial intelligence and machine learning, the Fourth Industrial Revolution is distinct in the speed, scale and force at which it transforms entire systems of production, distribution, consumption – and possibly the very essence of human nature.

“There are many challenges in the world today, and I feel that one of the most intense and impactful will be shaping the ‘Fourth Industrial Revolution’ – driven by the speed, the breadth and the complete ‘systems innovation’ of technological change underway. The challenges are as daunting as the opportunities are compelling. We must have a comprehensive and globally shared understanding of how technology is changing our lives and that of future generations, transforming the economic, social, ecological and cultural contexts in which we live. This is critical, in order to shape our collective future to reflect our common objectives and values,” said Klaus Schwab, Founder and Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum."

In short, TPTB are placing a big bet on AI (as the critical factor in a Fourth Industrial Revolution) as discussed further in the "Adapting to the Anthropocene" thread:

http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,1308.0.html

Edit: In other words the first option of military law (say by the US GOP-led Congress declaring an endless war on ISIS [which triggers NATO obligations of support from Europe including from a Brexit UK], leading two WWII type rationing and Japanese-style internment camps for "others") would result in "democracy without rights"; while for the second option an AI dominated singularity would result in "rights without democracy" (think how Millennials are quick to give-up privacy in order to easily get what they want from a smart internet dominated by Google's AI et al) .

[oren]

In the long term, a weakened EU with growing social unrest and the rise of right wing nationalist movements will not be cohesive enough to take the necessary and painful steps to address the looming threat of Climate Change.

Very interesting thread.
To generalize on OLN's comment - the coming collapse will reduce global ability to deal with global issues such as emissions and climate change, refugees, carrying capacity and overpopulation etc. and therefore will serve as a positive feedback to enhancing the problems at hand, and keeping solutions away, thus bringing additional collapse faster.

[GeoffBeacon]

Chris

Thanks for the link to The UK imports 40% of total foodstuffs from foodsecurity.ac.uk. I don't remember coming across them before.  As yu point out they say

But although the UK has a thriving farming sector – it exported £12Bn of food and drink in 2007 (ref 2) – Britain is not self-sufficient in food production; it imports 40% of the total food consumed and the proportion is rising (ref 1). Therefore, as a food-trading nation, Britain relies on both imports and thriving export markets to feed itself and drive economic growth.

This uses the language of the UK Department of Business Information and Skills (BIS) who are now the sponsoring department of the Met Office. It's agribusiness language.

Food security has concerned me for a while e.g.  Food: Scientists vs amateurs.
(2011) which starts

• In Ireland before the famine, potatoes, with some milk and pigs could support a population density approaching 10 people per hectare.
• The world now has about 0.5 people per hectare.
• That’s about 5% of the population density of pre-famine Ireland.

So the problem is not food (calories, protein & etc.) per. se.

The problem is that the rich (i.e. us) turn lots of food growing capacity into not much food at all. Foods like beef and lamb require many more times the land area (and other resources) than fruit, vegetables and pulses.

We may also be betting too much on “scientific” agriculture. By “scientific” I mean agriculture that attracts research funding. I got caught between advocates of gardening, permaculture, horticulture recently and three “scientific” professors from Rothamstead Research and the UK Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council.

I characterise the gardeners as “the amateurs” and the professors as “the scientists”. Starting with claims the “gardening can’t feed the world” from one the professors I found none of the professors knew anything much about the topic.

I think it is still the case that “the scientists” know too little about food production that isn't agribusiness, partly because it's quite difficult to say what terms like  “support a population density” mean but also because there is little or no research funding of the type that agribusiness and lobbied governments can dish out.

“The amateurs” aren't too much help, it's difficult to find anything with numbers in their claims that can be checked.  The best I have done is find an old article that I was allowed to republish, Food and permaculture. by David Blume. He starts

I wrote this in response to post to the bioregional listserve from a woman at ATTRA who said something like “Of course you couldn’t feed the world with such a hippy-dippy, hunter-gatherer, landscape system like permaculture.” Well that got me a little steamed so this is what I wrote.

Here are his points

• Two acres produced enough food for 300 people
• A permaculture ecosystem
• This can be on a commercial scale
• Reasons for the better productivity of polyculture
• We are not really short of food
• Monocultures – use less labor but have poor yields – favored by corporations
• Agricultural land is in the hands of multi-nationals.
• Insecurity in old age drives population growth
• &etc

I'm not sure how to interpret this. I does seem to be a factual account and, at the moment,  I trust David Blume more than foodsecurity.ac.uk who say

Should crop yields be significantly affected by the decline in insect pollinators, or even a small proportion of the British sheep population succumb to bluetongue, exports would be curtailed, jobs would be lost, and food wasted. Furthermore, culling sheep or cattle would have a knock-on effect on other meat prices, sending them spiralling.

So "culling sheep or cattle would have a knock-on effect on other meat prices" but the bonus would be a substantial cut in our carbon emissions. In my view climate trumps a highly carnivorous diet.

unlimited numbers of immigrants from all over the world

That's another question altogether.

[JimD]

As the link is self explanatory I won't even say anything more than think how much worse it is going to get.

http://www.theplaceswelive.com/

[SATire]

[...]   I've been thinking about how Brexit will impact any efforts to curb AGW/CC.  In the short term, the governments of Europe are going to be forced to focus on managing Britain's exit from the EU rather than focus on Climate Change.  In the long term, a weakened EU with growing social unrest and the rise of right wing nationalist movements will not be cohesive enough to take the necessary and painful steps to address the looming threat of Climate Change.

In the short term you are surely right - everybody here is now busy with internal matters of EU. But on the long run there is a nice chance:
Now for everyone it is pretty clear, that the BS the aggressive reactionists are talking about could become a reality. And what then? What are the plans of Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage now? Today it seems as if they started thinking about that right now. E.g. using a time-machine and disappear into the past?

Starting with last Friday every populist in EU will have to give complex answers on the complex questions: What are your plans if you win the BS you suggest? They are in serious trouble.

[TerryM]

The Pound and the Euro are both down, as is oil.
Britain's economy will take a hit, and so will Europe's. While CC may take a back seat, there may be even less enthusiasm for increasing military outlays. It's even possible that sanctions against Russia might be lifted to increase trade.
The sudden drop in crude prices is due to an expectation of less fuel being burned in both Britain and Europe & this is a positive for climate concerns. If this disruption should also result in more normalised relations with Russia it could end as a huge positive for everyone.
I'd assume that European governments will be doing everything they can to prevent any further defections. This might include halting immigration which most people seem to be opposed to, increasing trade to increase job opportunities, and possibly investing in climate change mitigation projects, again to increase jobs.
Terry

[magnamentis]

a bit of an exageration, typical news "headline making" the euro is quite stable within the range it has been for months, have seen 1.09 as well as 1.14 while 1.11, 1.10 1.09 was where it has spent most of the time.

[AbruptSLR]

SkS calls Brexit: "Inter-generational theft"

https://www.skepticalscience.com/inter-generational-theft-brexit-climate-change.html

Extract: "The problem is of course that younger generations will have to live with the consequences of the decisions we make today for much longer than older generations. Older generations in developed countries prospered as a result of the burning of fossil fuels for seemingly cheap energy."

Furthermore, I read that the Paris Pact will need to be modified due to Brexit.

[TerryM]

ASLR
In defence of fellow Boomers.


It seems as though those that were born in the EU voted to remain, while those born in pre-EU Britain prefered to return. Fear of the unknown as well as euphoric recall may explain part of the split.


My politics is of the far left & a good part of the reason is that I'm old enough to remember the world as it was before Reagan & Thatcher. I was teargassed in Berkeley while attending protests that eventually ended Vietnam. I remember friend's reactions to the Kennedy assassinations. When Watts exploded, when MLK was killed, and when Rodney King's assailants were freed, I was close to the turmoil.
I was young when the Cuban Missile Crisis almost killed everyone, and many years later I shook the hand of Khrushchev's son, and thanked his family for the fact that my family was alive.


We did negotiate great retirement packages, and gave up pay raises in the bargaining. We drove "muscle cars", built suburban sprawls, and kicked consumerism to levels never before imagined. We also cheered on Che Guevara, lived in communes, and preached love & tolerance.


Our parents had lived through the depression and WWII. Their heros herded neighbors into "detainment camps", wore military uniforms at formal outings and killed indians from horseback every friday night. I never understood the experiences that formed their mindset, and don't expect those under 50 to understand mine.


Remember that for every Chaney or Bundy there was a Lennon, a Hansen, or a Chaves.


Terry

[be cause]

Ironic that Cameron went to great lengths to make it difficult for the young to register to vote before the last general election ; when in the referendum he needed them like never before !

[AbruptSLR]

ASLR
In defence of fellow Boomers.


It seems as though those that were born in the EU voted to remain, while those born in pre-EU Britain prefered to return. Fear of the unknown as well as euphoric recall may explain part of the split.


My politics is of the far left & a good part of the reason is that I'm old enough to remember the world as it was before Reagan & Thatcher. I was teargassed in Berkeley while attending protests that eventually ended Vietnam. I remember friend's reactions to the Kennedy assassinations. When Watts exploded, when MLK was killed, and when Rodney King's assailants were freed, I was close to the turmoil.
I was young when the Cuban Missile Crisis almost killed everyone, and many years later I shook the hand of Khrushchev's son, and thanked his family for the fact that my family was alive.


We did negotiate great retirement packages, and gave up pay raises in the bargaining. We drove "muscle cars", built suburban sprawls, and kicked consumerism to levels never before imagined. We also cheered on Che Guevara, lived in communes, and preached love & tolerance.


Our parents had lived through the depression and WWII. Their heros herded neighbors into "detainment camps", wore military uniforms at formal outings and killed indians from horseback every friday night. I never understood the experiences that formed their mindset, and don't expect those under 50 to understand mine.


Remember that for every Chaney or Bundy there was a Lennon, a Hansen, or a Chaves.


Terry

Terry,

I appreciate all of your points, as I am also a boomer, who went to school at UC Berkeley, and my great grandfather road horses and shot-up the Old West, and I have lived the California dream my entire life (including being a vegetarian and being married to a woman whose family was interred in the Japanese-camps in WWII).  Nevertheless, the Brexit vote was not a vote about the past but about the future, and in my opinion is an example of the "Tyranny of the Contemporary" who are squeezing the young and future generations by myopically thinking about themselves in a self-serving/egotistical manner.

All the best,
ASLR


Edit: As a side note, I also believe that the communists had very large carbon footprints, so when I am talking about the "Tyranny of the Contemporary" I am not just talking about neo-classical/neo-liberal economic types like Ronald Reagan, but more about material values within a socio-economic system.

[johnm33]

A brief article by Steve Keen, who was in favour of 'brexit' but was surprised it happened, it links through to Forbes

    "The central planners in Brussels and at the ECB in Frankfurt are not unaware that under their command, a historically unprecedented economic dislocation has taken place in the EU during the past ten years, including massive asset and property bubbles, banking crises and large-scale unemployment in all the periphery countries – with over 50% youth unemployment in Greece, Spain and Portugal, as well as the lack of any serious controls of the EU external borders to prevent an influx of unparalleled numbers of illegal immigrants and economic migrants.

    However, the EU central planners are in denial about the fact that these problems have been caused entirely by their own misguided and disastrous policies. As a result, they argue that the solution to such problems can only be further concentration of powers into their hands … This United States of Europe, an undemocratic leviathan that the European peoples never wanted, is the culmination of the much repeated mantra of “ever closer union”.
  http://www.debtdeflation.com/blogs/2016/06/27/what-next-after-brexit/
He makes no mention of the Italian banks being on the brink, or the underwater French bank, which has led to a restriction in the size of cash transactions, Spanish and Portuguese banks too are seriously at risk, if there was any way to save the bondholders it would have already been done, all that's left is extend and pretend. All of these countries need either a 'handout' from either Germany or the ECB or a devaluation, the first is not culturally possible for the Germans, the second impossible whilst they remain in the Euro.
[edit- spelling]

[magnamentis]

another one of those "a pleasure to read"

i enjoy a few of those almost every day and find it interesting albeit not surprising to find such
sophisticated content in exactly this forum, while one at times has to read all week long to find
such a concentration of quality content form various angles elsewhere. seems to be a good mix
in this place and the only thing that would make it even better for me woud be if it were in my
mother tongue :-) not to read but to write, that's where the the difficulty to write in a foreign
language at times is a bit frustrating. at least i hope that i was able to convey my compliments.

[AbruptSLR]

The linked Scribbler article is entitled: "Britain Succumbs to Fear — Europe Shattered by Deteriorating Physical and Political Climate".

https://robertscribbler.com/2016/06/27/britain-succumbs-to-fear-europe-shattered-by-deteriorating-physical-and-political-climate/

Extract: "In Central India, during 2016, millions of farmers who have lost their livelihoods due to a persistent drought made worse by climate change are migrating to the cities. The climate change induced monsoonal delays and ever-worsening drought conditions forced this most recent wave of climate change refugees to make a stark choice — move or watch their families starve.
It’s a repeat of a scene that happened in Syria during 2006 through 2010, but on a much larger scale. A scene that will repeat again and again. In Bangladesh and the other low lying coastal and delta regions of the world, hundreds of millions will be uprooted by sea level rise. In the US Southwest, India, Africa, South America, the Middle East and Southern Europe hundreds of millions more will be uprooted by drought. All because we, as a global civilization, failed to work together to halt fossil fuel burning soon enough and prevent a temperature increase great enough to wreck cities, states, and regions and to start to destabilize human civilization."

[Xulonn]

Scribblers' writing style makes him sound like a fear-mongering rabble-rouser.

But what if he is correct? 

[AbruptSLR]

Scribblers' writing style makes him sound like a fear-mongering rabble-rouser.

But what if he is correct?

If ECS is closer to 4C than the current consensus value of 3C, you (we all) may soon be wondering why Scribbler erred so much on the side of least drama.

For example, the linked reference analyzes the CMIP3&5 results to conclude the ECS is likely 3.9C +/- 0.45C:

Chengxing Zhai, Jonathan H. Jiang & Hui Su (2015), "Long-term cloud change imprinted in seasonal cloud variation: More evidence of high climate sensitivity", Geophysical Research Letters, DOI: 10.1002/2015GL065911

[johnm33]

I rarely disagree with RS's take on things but he accepted the demonisation of the out voters, which was intended to shame them into voting 'in' as a fair description. Here's another economists view on the situation http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=33894 it starts, "The class struggle is back! Who would have thought. After years of being told by the likes of John Major and then Tony Blair that “the class war is over” (Blair) and the we now all live in “the classless society” (Major) the working class has fought back, albeit under the motivation of the looney, populist Right rather than a progressive left, who remain a voice for capital. Remember when we were told that the Left-Right continuum was irrelevant now in this global world where nation states had given way to grand communities (like the EU) and that, in this new post-modern world, we could all be entrepreneurs (meaning we sell our labour to a capitalist!). And now we know that class never went away. It might have been hi-jacked by the Right but it is there – and it is powerful. Planet Earth to British Labour – do something about it or wither away and make way for a progressive new organised working class movement." Bill Mitchell is rarely brief and always full of links, sources and quotes, but I feel he nails it with this peice.
[added] Ok last link to someone economically literate, here's Peter Schiffer outlining what one of my fears is, that lots of stuff that needs to happen will happen now and it will be hung on the 'Brexit' vote.
"First of all, this is not about Brexit. Brexit is all the media. Brexit is the catalyst. It is like the match that lights the tinderbox. The markets are artificially propped up by central banks, by cheap money, by QE, and it’s all hype and hope. The markets never should have been where they were. And what Brexit is doing is challenging the belief that the markets have the confidence in central bankers to keep all these bubbles in the air…There’re a lot of dominoes that are going to come down. Yes, the Fed is going to use this maybe as an excuse to cut rates and do QE 4. It was looking for an excuse for a long time. But we have some real serious problems that go beyond what is happening in Britain.”

[AbruptSLR]

Carbon Brief provides the linked article entitled: "Brexit: 94 unanswered questions for climate and energy policy", that discusses areas where Brexit makes the fight against climate change harder and less certain to be effective:

http://www.carbonbrief.org/brexit-94-unanswered-questions-for-climate-and-energy-policy

Extract: "… Rudd conceded that the referendum result had made the path to climate action harder, raising a host of questions. Adding to the air of uncertainty, there is now the prospect of a new Conservative prime minister being in place by September, as well as the possibility of a snap general election."

[TerryM]

ASLR


Small,small world. Power to the People. Roll with The Barb. Electric Kool Aid & Purple Owsley.


Regrew my beard at 65 since life as an over the hill hippy has it's attractions. Berkley was Sex, Drugs & Rock & Roll - in that order. Never felt the urge to actually enroll.


Terry

[Sigmetnow]

Another view.

Imagining the U.K. and the EU Three Years After Brexit

It's the summer of 2019, three years after British voters stunned the world by voting to leave the European Union. The U.K. has regained its economic and financial footing, as well as its national confidence. A smaller and more unified European Union now functions in a more coherent fashion.

But the road has been bumpy and, as a result, the global economy came close to recession, financial instability and more isolationist policies. Meanwhile, the global standing and influence of both the EU and the U.K. are much reduced....

http://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-06-28/imagining-the-u-k-and-the-eu-three-years-after-brexit

[VeliAlbertKallio]

A few years ago a Turkish friend of mine suggested that the North Pole (escaping sea ice cap) will join the European Union rather than Turkey (whose EU membership negotiations had been progressing at glacial space). It rather seems - now - that the breaking polar vortex and changing jet streams are blowing the Britain towards North Pole instead. What does NSIDC models say about this outcome? 

[SATire]

A few years ago a Turkish friend of mine suggested that the North Pole (escaping sea ice cap) will join the European Union rather than Turkey (whose EU membership negotiations had been progressing at glacial space). It rather seems - now - that the breaking polar vortex and changing jet streams are blowing the Britain towards North Pole instead. What does NSIDC models say about this outcome? 

Your Turkish friend seems to be a master in understatement. Since Erdogan startet to orient towards Arabia and to islamic state the EU negotiations "progressed" like the calving front of Jakobshavn isbrae. In recent times that negotiations have been collapsing like the ice in that famous movie. "To be solved issues" increase every day (freedom of press, Turkey is now part of the international civil war in the near and middle east).

Regarding "blowing Britain towards the North Pole" I do not know what NSIDC computes. The Euro (ECMWF) model shows rapidly alternating rain/hail/sun but no storm all over Europe in the near future. Long term predictions remain unstable: Mixed sun (for working people) and rain (for banks and big business) perhaps. But no storm and Britain will stay where it is since good neighborhood is, what everybody here wants.
So let us calm down, wait and we'll see. Maybe ignoring the economics wasn't a bad decision by most of the Brexetiers. The non-wealthy people did not benefit too much from the union anyway and getting a passport is not that much of a problem.

[AbruptSLR]

The linked Op-Ed piece is based largely on German's experience in trying to transform into a "Green Economy", and it indicates that this process will be harder than most people (Paris Pact negotiators) think:

https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/limits-to-green-growth-by-lili-fuhr-et-al-2016-07
Extract: "Will reconciling environmental and economic imperatives be harder than we think?
In a word, yes. The mainstream perception is that the green economy will enable us to break free from our dependence on fossil fuels, without sacrificing growth. Many argue that the shift to a green economy can even spur new growth. But, as appealing as this idea is, it is not realistic, as we show in our new book Inside the Green Economy.
To be sure, it is possible for a genuinely “green” economy to be prosperous. But the model that prevails today focuses on quick and easy solutions. Moreover, it reasserts the primacy of economics, thereby failing to recognize the depth of the transformation that is required.
Instead of rethinking our economies with a view to adapting their functioning to environmental limits and imperatives, today’s green economy seeks to redefine nature, in order to adapt it to existing economic systems. We now attach a monetary value to nature and add it to our balance sheets, with the protection of “natural capital,” such as ecosystem services, offsetting environmental degradation, gauged by the global abstract currency of carbon metrics. New market-based mechanisms, such as the trading of biodiversity credits, exemplify this approach. None of this prevents the destruction of nature; it simply reorganizes that destruction along market lines.
As a result of this narrow approach, current conceptions of the green economy have so many blind spots that the entire enterprise should be regarded as largely a matter of faith. The most powerful talisman is technological innovation, which justifies simply waiting for a cure-all invention to come along. But, though new ideas and innovations are obviously vital to address complex challenges, environmental or otherwise, they are neither automatic nor inevitable.
…
If we are to decouple economic growth from energy consumption and achieve real resource efficiency in a world of nine billion, much less ensure justice for all, we cannot let the economy lead the way.
Instead, we must view the green transformation as a political task. Only a political approach can manage, through genuinely representative institutions, differences of opinion and interest, guided by the kind of open debate, engaging civil society, that is vital to a pluralistic democracy.
…
The real problem is the lack of political will to implement and scale up those innovations opposed by vested economic interests. The challenge is thus to overcome these minority interests and ensure the protection of the broader public good – a task that is often left to civil society.
Some might argue that calling for radical transformation, rather than incremental change, is inappropriate. At a time when the world faces so many pressing challenges, from economic stagnation to political upheaval to massive refugee flows, any progress toward sustainability should be viewed as a victory. Pragmatic, politically feasible solutions to the environmental crisis should be celebrated, not criticized.
…
The task that the world’s democracies face today is to continue the project of modernity, embracing the latest knowledge about planetary boundaries, while advancing broad democratic participation and reducing poverty and social injustice. This is no small undertaking, and requires passion and tenacity. But it is not beyond our capacity. The first step is to recognize the constraints that the “green economy” places on thought and action."

[JimD]

ASLR

The author is really torn between an urge to face facts and the fear of facing them.  The inability to see the elephant in the room syndrome?   An adherent to the Progress religion?  Just another coward?

....
Extract: "Will reconciling environmental and economic imperatives be harder than we think?
In a word, yes. The mainstream perception is that the green economy will enable us to break free from our dependence on fossil fuels, without sacrificing growth. Many argue that the shift to a green economy can even spur new growth. But, as appealing as this idea is, it is not realistic, as we show in our new book Inside the Green Economy. ..

Thus a nice phrase about the Green BAU perception.  We can have it all if we go green..growth, affluence, yada, yada.  Bull crap.  Unrealistic is putting it mildly.  Impossible is more accurate.  If folks don't keep overpopulation and climate change in front of them at all times and deal with them as part of the solution they will fail spectacularly.

To be sure, it is possible for a genuinely “green” economy to be prosperous.

Not if we are not solving the problems of overpopulation and climate change first.  This is the fantasy (the religious faith that Progress will save us) that the Greeen BAU crowd falls into every day.  Electric cars for example do not solve overpopulation (carrying capacity issues) nor climate change.  They just slow the inevitable crash you get if you ignore them.    Even a genuinely green economy only works temporarily and goes then collapses when enough of the various trigger points are passed since it does not address the core problems.  I have been arguing about this forever. 

 

But the model that prevails today focuses on quick and easy solutions. Moreover, it reasserts the primacy of economics, thereby failing to recognize the depth of the transformation that is required.
Instead of rethinking our economies with a view to adapting their functioning to environmental limits and imperatives, today’s green economy seeks to redefine nature, in order to adapt it to existing economic systems. 

Exactly.  If our society does not have the courage to look the problem in the eye this is what happens.  Emotional solutions which sound good but don't address core issues.  This kind of approach to problem solving reminds me strongly of those who fall for Trumps verbiage. he triggers off of peoples emotional stress just like the green bau folks with their verbal nonsense.

We now attach a monetary value to nature and add it to our balance sheets, with the protection of “natural capital,” such as ecosystem services, offsetting environmental degradation, gauged by the global abstract currency of carbon metrics. New market-based mechanisms, such as the trading of biodiversity credits, exemplify this approach. None of this prevents the destruction of nature; it simply reorganizes that destruction along market lines.
As a result of this narrow approach, current conceptions of the green economy have so many blind spots that the entire enterprise should be regarded as largely a matter of faith.

I don't know how many times I have written this very sentence.  The modern belief in Progress is irrational and amounts to a religious faith. It is merely wishing for a miracle.

The most powerful talisman is technological innovation, which justifies simply waiting for a cure-all invention to come along. But, though new ideas and innovations are obviously vital to address complex challenges, environmental or otherwise, they are neither automatic nor inevitable.

Nor do they come without adverse consequences.  Most technologies have just as many downsides as they do ups.  We are far past the point where there is any balance in the world on these issues.

…
If we are to decouple economic growth from energy consumption and achieve real resource efficiency in a world of nine billion, much less ensure justice for all, we cannot let the economy lead the way.

It is much worse than that.  There is no solution with nine billion people.  There is not one with 7 billion either.  Justice for all means affluence for all...not poverty for all.  The world cannot handle anything like the current population living any where near a developing world standard of living.  Let alone something resembling how we live in the US and EU.  Let us not forget that even if we somehow achieve the maximum of "resource efficiency" we will still be well over the global carrying capacity and we will still have a large net carbon emission.  There are no carbon neutral or fully sustainable energy technologies, civilized lifestyles, global scale farming systems, militaries, cities, etc.  We don't need or want economic growth...we need degrowth.  We need to slow down the engine of civilization as it is speeding towards a cliff.  The more we slow the less we make things worse and the more time it gives us.  Doing what we are doing now is just the opposite.

Instead, we must view the green transformation as a political task. Only a political approach can manage, through genuinely representative institutions, differences of opinion and interest, guided by the kind of open debate, engaging civil society, that is vital to a pluralistic democracy.

Ummm...nope!  That system is how we got here.  If all interests are taken into account and given their due we end up where we are at...the problem is that some interests have a lot more sway than others.  Where does this utopian benevolent government come from?  Where exactly in the human condition are you going to find that perfect setup where everyone sacrifices for the greater good?  Open debate..seriously?  Pluralistic democracy is what the supporters of Trump want...they want to live in within the bounds of their personal prejudices and beliefs...as does everyone.  But most of those prejudices and beliefs are incompatible with survival and totally irrational.  This is not going to work.

…
The real problem is the lack of political will to implement and scale up those innovations opposed by vested economic interests. The challenge is thus to overcome these minority interests and ensure the protection of the broader public good – a task that is often left to civil society.
Some might argue that calling for radical transformation, rather than incremental change, is inappropriate. At a time when the world faces so many pressing challenges, from economic stagnation to political upheaval to massive refugee flows, any progress toward sustainability should be viewed as a victory. Pragmatic, politically feasible solutions to the environmental crisis should be celebrated, not criticized.

No that is not even close to the real problem.  That statement is assuming that the green bau solutions (the faith in Progress) will work.  They won't.  This is just one religion fighting with another.  It is useless.  The global inability to face overpopulation and to stop doing the actions which are accelerating climate change are the real problem.  This article does not argue for radical transformation but for another version of progressive bau.  It is dead in the water from the time it was written.  There is certainly a pragmatic solution but to date it is not politically feasible..dramtic reductions in population in concert with a dramatic reduction in affluence, lifestyles, and standards of living...with a goal of reaching some point where carbon emissions are a small fraction of what they are now and the use of global resources has shrunken to the point where natural systems can recover and regenerate.  Then and only then will the remaining green technological techniques be helping us survive and not perpetrating our destruction.

…
The task that the world’s democracies face today is to continue the project of modernity, embracing the latest knowledge about planetary boundaries, while advancing broad democratic participation and reducing poverty and social injustice.

No it is not.  The task is to survive and nothing else matters. You can be as sweet and cuddly as my dog but if there is no food to eat, no place to live, no air to breathe you die.  Democracy cannot solve a problem whose solution requires everyone do behave in specific ways...depopulation, reducing affluence, ending global competition, killing off capitalism.  Democracy is not in our future if we are going to have one I am pretty certain.

This is no small undertaking, and requires passion and tenacity. But it is not beyond our capacity. The first step is to recognize the constraints that the “green economy” places on thought and action."

Well maybe it is not beyond our capacity but all the evidence to date indicates it actually is.  As this article demonstrates. 

[AbruptSLR]

ASLR

The author is really torn between an urge to face facts and the fear of facing them.  The inability to see the elephant in the room syndrome?   An adherent to the Progress religion?  Just another coward?
 

Jim,

You make many points that I agree with; however, facing facts I suspect that the only way that the global population (now over 7.4 billion) is going to decrease before 2100 is by partial socio-economic collapse (see attached UN projections).  That said, I do believe that after such a partial collapse (possibly in the 2040 to 2070 timeframe) that there will remain several billion people who might be better motivated/equipped to enjoy more of a "small is beautiful" (while probably still including some high tech component) life-type.

Best,
ASLR

[JimD]

ASLR

Yes I agree that a deliberate strategy to quickly reduce population is very unlikely to happen.  The sad thing is that it is also likely the only action we could execute which would really improve our prospects going forward.

By the time your scenario happens (which it will) the additional damage we will have all caused will way overwhelm us and wipe out all the minor gains being made on secondary items...which would have been really useful to have made if we had also attacked the core problems.  The bottom will be much further down than it needed to be.

I remain pessimistic but hopeful.

No matter how cynical you are it is not enough?

[AbruptSLR]

ASLR

Yes I agree that a deliberate strategy to quickly reduce population is very unlikely to happen.  The sad thing is that it is also likely the only action we could execute which would really improve our prospects going forward.

By the time your scenario happens (which it will) the additional damage we will have all caused will way overwhelm us and wipe out all the minor gains being made on secondary items...which would have been really useful to have made if we had also attacked the core problems.  The bottom will be much further down than it needed to be.

I remain pessimistic but hopeful.

No matter how cynical you are it is not enough?

Jim,

There is a reason why all natural systems include both births and deaths, and that in "natural selection" one species is replaced by another; as learning the art of living entails understanding the art of dying.  Clinging to the past is a waste of time & effort, and it is best to accept the unfolding of future generations, even if the coming of those beautiful future generation entail painful births (which doesn't mean that we [the current generation] shouldn't work to reduce the painfulness of those births).

Best,
ASLR

[AbruptSLR]

"Othering" results from fossil fueled capitalism, and it will contribute to significant population loss when society reaches a tipping point (note that "othered" Arabs & Muslims are right next door to Europe):

https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/opinion/topic/2016/06/25/naomi-klein-the-racism-that-underlies-climate-change-inaction

Extract: "There is also an avalanche of evidence that there is no peaceful way to run an economy powered by coal, oil and gas. The trouble is structural. Fossil fuels, unlike renewable forms of energy such as wind and solar, are not widely distributed but highly concentrated in very specific locations, and those locations have a bad habit of being in other people’s countries. Particularly that most potent and precious of fossil fuels: oil. This is why the project of orientalism, of othering Arab and Muslim people, has been the silent partner of our oil dependence from the start – and inextricable, therefore, from the blowback that is climate change. If nations and peoples are regarded as other – exotic, primitive, bloodthirsty, as Said documented in the 1970s – it is far easier to wage wars and stage coups when they get the crazy idea that they should control their own oil in their own interests. The reverberations from such interventions continue to jolt our world, as do the reverberations from the successful burning of all that oil. The Middle East is now squeezed in the pincer of violence caused by fossil fuels, on the one hand, and the impact of burning those fossil fuels on the other.
…
The most important lesson to take from all this is that there is no way to confront the climate crisis as a technocratic problem, in isolation. It must be seen in the context of austerity and privatisation, of colonialism and militarism, and of the various systems of othering needed to sustain them all. The connections and intersections between them are glaring, and yet so often resistance to them is highly compartmentalised. The anti-austerity people rarely talk about climate change, the climate change people rarely talk about war or occupation.
Overcoming these disconnections – strengthening the threads tying together our various issues and movements – is the most pressing task of anyone concerned with social and economic justice. It is the only way to build a counterpower sufficiently robust to win against the forces protecting the highly profitable but increasingly untenable status quo."



See also:
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v38/n11/naomi-klein/let-them-drown

Extract: "Let Them Drown

The Violence of Othering in a Warming World"

&

https://www.rt.com/uk/341981-climate-change-naomi-klein/

Extract (Remember that Africa is also right next to Europe): "Addressing the audience, Klein said the rise of poverty, discrimination and conflict as climate change intensifies is aggravated by greed and individualism.

“It is not about things getting hotter and wetter but things getting meaner and uglier,” she said.

...

Klein branded climate change an emergency that threatens global security, and said current proposals to tackle the crisis, as laid out under the Paris agreement, are “reckless.”

“In 2009, African nations said this was a death sentence,” she said."

&

http://moderndiplomacy.eu/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=1561:this-changes-everything-capitalism-and-climate-change&Itemid=670

[JimD]

...The most important lesson to take from all this is that there is no way to confront the climate crisis as a technocratic problem, in isolation. It must be seen in the context of austerity and privatisation, of colonialism and militarism, and of the various systems of othering needed to sustain them all. The connections and intersections between them are glaring, and yet so often resistance to them is highly compartmentalised. The anti-austerity people rarely talk about climate change, the climate change people rarely talk about war or occupation.....

Sounds like Naomi has been reading my stuff.

[AbruptSLR]

You can't fix stupid from the outside, you can only encourage stupid to want to fix itself.

[magnamentis]

that works for ignorance, lack of education and lack of experience but not for stupidity. remember what
our good ol' friend albert E. said, the only thin we can be (he was) sure about to be infinite is human
stupidity while he was not 100% sure about the universe.

[JimD]

Quite long but well worth it.  Raises some interesting historical points as well as current issues.

http://www.firstthings.com/article/2016/08/all-the-east-is-moving

[SATire]

Quite long but well worth it.  Raises some interesting historical points as well as current issues.

http://www.firstthings.com/article/2016/08/all-the-east-is-moving

Nice read. But why is such story in "America's most influential journal of religion and public life"? The 1. empire history is not explained precisely and its mixture with lord of rings and with more modern history is very odd. One could even get the impression that the battle at Lech field could have some similarity to todays difficulities between Pegida (partiotic europeans against the islamization of the Occident) and the refugees, but not much things could be more wrong... 

Only common thing I could see: More than 1000 years ago some clever people used religion to motivate people to do cruel things together (and to make Otto the emperor of the previoulsy not-so-united German nations) and similar things are happening until today. In those times people usually had only the choice between baptism with water or blood (cutting the head off). If you look what christians did to each other 1618-48 (about 1/3 of people killed in this land - larger percentage than in any WW) todays islamists of various type could be considered moderate and liberal.

[JimD]

It is common for people to think of human history as a path through time along which we travel that, while it passes through rough terrain, entails strife and suffering, none-the-less is still a constant progression towards a better future.  Enlightened progress we could say.  However this is not a good description of history in most ways.  Civilizations cycle.  They rise towards some version of enlightenment and tolerance while they are in the growth of wealth stage.  And then they fall when the resource base can no longer support the complexity of their creation.  And then they usually return to the more base behaviors of the past which taught them that such was the road to survival. This pattern has repeated itself throughout history.

I think what we see here in this article is a drawing in the sand of a line which is stating that the time is coming when sides will have to be taken and those 'immigrants' will have to either bow their heads to one form of baptism or another - as you stated.  To the extremists on both sides of the religious divide which overlays many of today's problems the religious layer is the most important as it is one of the defining historical answers to the repeating problem of collapse through our history.  The authors are laying the Christian groundwork for this conflict just as the fundamentalists in Islam have been doing for a long time now.  Where this goes over the next couple of decades is hard to say but the arc of time leans towards more conflict it seems.

Yes one can say that today's issues and conflicts are not to any where near the scale of those of Otto's time and one might hope that this time it is different.  But that is a hope and not a certainty after all.  Lines are being drawn and walls are being built.  Words are moving towards actions.  Just because only a few are today separating heads in baptisms of blood does not at all guarantee that such behavior will not spread as we decline and the stresses build.  These authors are taking sides and laying down where they think evil lies. 

[SATire]

Yes, history was never a linear sequence of events. Not everything in the past was worse than today and "good old times" rarely were better than todays life.
However, there is always a good possibility to learn from past times and to learn from errors other people made. Unfortunately some are even not able to learn from their own recent mistakes even in case friends tell them about it (e.g. like this ).

Looking at history it seems easy to blame religion for most cruel events. But that is to short minded: It was never the religion doing something, things were done allways by the people and sometimes they used religion to motivate something. Today also other things may be used in a similar way, e.g. "its the economy, stupid", e.g. using xenophobia to motivate a Brexit, e.g. talking against globalisation to motivate french people to vote against a European constitution.

One should not blame the people to lead people into wrong directions, since they just take their chance and they can justify anything by the "good goal". Blame the people following so willingly and thoughtlessly. That is were the evil lies.

People thinking globally have a really tough time today. We were just thinking about the implications of the Brexit and how we could live together in peace and friendship. We had a very short time for that until we had to turn our head to Nice and then rapidly to Turkey, where we see another aggressive reactionist following his old plan to transform a nation into an islamic republic to become a sultan (is he really religious or does he just follow the easy way?). The internet makes the things so fast and plentyful so it is hard to stay on track - seducing people to search for simple categories (this religion, that extreme left/right wing, those rich, these refugees...) which are wrong by nature and result always in hurting other people and provoking similar harsh reactions.

It is too fast, too simple, too brutal. So let us try some de-growth of categories. Evil is who evil does.

[JimD]

Well we could digress into a very interesting discussion about the promoters/creators of evil and those who carry out the actions.  Who instigates, who is manipulated and who goes willingly. And which of the various types of people are the most evil.

But all I was doing was trying to answer your question about why such a article was found in a prominent religious journal.  It is not about blaming religion and those who are acting are always responsible for their actions.  In times of decline and social stress humans are going to have a much greater tendency to behave according to their subconscious hardwired behavior modes which we evolved into over time.  These behaviors are most easily manipulated through religious or religious like manipulations.  Though there are certainly many other methods also as are often seen in populist political leaders.  There are many adherents to Christianity, Judaism and Islam who are eager to explain what is going on in the world in their terms and to follow along the paths which lead from those convictions.  Thus my comment that the authors of the article are just some of the Christian versions of the radical Islamists we have grown so familiar with. 

We are heading into deep conflict imho and much of that conflict will be defined via religious terms which support xenophobia, tribalism, racism and just the general hatred of those not like oneself or who are just basically strangers.  Not that all of those behaviors will not arise from other sources as well which are not religiously based.  These behaviors are always present in human conflict.  And while it is possible to learn from past errors there is a limit and scale to such learning.  Humans throughout history have never demonstrated the ability to learn not to do what we are talking about here and to find a way to cooperate with each other at a deep level.  It may happen but I for one find the idea somewhat fantastical.

[JimD]

An article very pertinent to some of the earlier discussions in this topic.  Specifically my contention that the EU is not a democratic union but rather an autocracy.

..Of course, the alacrity with which other European leaders have said that the Leave vote in the UK must be respected is somewhat surprising. It is worth noting that the European Union so far has not been particularly responsive to the voice of popular will, typically forcing people to bend rather than the other way around, even when there have been significant democratic pressures within member countries against its mandates. Consider just a few examples. In Denmark, 51.7 per cent of voters wanted to reject the Maastricht Treaty in 1992, but the country was made to vote again until the treaty was passed by an even smaller majority. In 2002, the EU Constitution was rejected by 54.9 per cent of French voters and 61.5 per cent of Dutch voters, but these results were simply ignored and the Lisbon Treaty was put in place. In 2008, Ireland voted against the Lisbon Treaty by 53.8 per cent, but were made to vote again until a more satisfactory result was obtained. In 2015, 61.3 per cent of Greek voters – an overwhelming majority – voted against the austerity programme of the EU, but this too was rejected. At that time, the president of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker even said, “There can be no democratic choice against the European treaties.”.......

...The European Union as it exists today is unstable and probably unsustainable. But it will be tragic indeed if it collapses under the weight of its own contradictions only to yield to the petty and xenophobic forms of national neoliberalism that are currently the most forceful alternative to neoliberal economic integration. What Europe and the world require are more internationalist alternatives based on popular sovereignty, solidarity, the improvement of workers’ conditions and the rights of citizens. Sadly, at this time there are only very few voices making such demands.

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2016/07/what-next-for-the-eu.html

[SATire]

An article very pertinent to some of the earlier discussions in this topic.  Specifically my contention that the EU is not a democratic union but rather an autocracy.

... In 2002, the EU Constitution was rejected by 54.9 per cent of French voters and 61.5 per cent of Dutch voters, but these results were simply ignored and the Lisbon Treaty was put in place. [...].[/b]......

[...] What Europe and the world require are more internationalist alternatives based on popular sovereignty, solidarity, the improvement of workers’ conditions and the rights of citizens. Sadly, at this time there are only very few voices making such demands.

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2016/07/what-next-for-the-eu.html

What an opinion-driven bullshit can be found again on this nakedcapitalism blog?!?

Just two examples picked: The constitution was rejected and thus there is no constitution in EU. There are treatys between countries like Lisboa Treaty.
Jim, how can such set of treaties be a democracy or autocraty? Could NATO be a democracy? Or TTIP? And if EU would be an autocracy who would be the autocrat? Junkers?? He can not do anything against the governments of the countries (the council) - even less than a president in USA, since the latter can e.g. press an important button (but can not close a jail or increase a tax...).

And then we find this conclusion: "What Europe and the world require are more internationalist alternatives based on popular sovereignty, solidarity, the improvement of workers’ conditions and the rights of citizens." What the hell is ment by this??? Like Pegida or other international aggressive reactionists? Alternatives like from the Putin-Le-Pen-axis, Erdogan concepts or more like the things Trump suggests? Or similar suggestions we hear from Italian 5 stars and also sometimes from the newly united far left-right-wing-international in Europe?

I think the blog-poster confuses democracy with plebiszites. In Swiss that may be ok to put those things together - including very precise information long before the plebiszite and open discussions in the public. But elsewhere a plebiszite is often the opposite of democracy: It is frequently used as a tool for individual policians to enforce somethings against the own or other parties - and most often it is some populistic idea which turns the plebiszite into something completely different: Just ask the French people if they think that they once voted against an European constitution. Most of the public discussions were about somethings else...

To conclude: I think I will start to ignore blog posts from nakedcaptialism from now on, since those crazy arguments and distorted propaganda drive my blood pressure and could make me write for hours, risking to do something similar to the reader of my words. I am sorry - this polarization is so wrong and keeps me&you from doing the real things.