On the Ides of March (Friday last week), the day by which ancient Romans were expected to settle their debts, young people in 60 countries around the world staged a school walkout to press world leaders for more urgent action on climate change.
It is a tragedy that younger generations are forced to speak out against the injustice they are to suffer as a result of choices made by others. Yet, at the same time, it is deeply reassuring to witness their power and passion as they try to change the course of history.
Concerns about the intergenerational injustice of the climate crisis are of a piece with concerns about inequality in the here and now.
Following in the footsteps of his papal namesake, Francis of Assisi — named Patron Saint of Ecology in 1979 — Pope Francis in his May 2015 encyclical said: “We are faced not with two separate crises, one environmental and the other social, but rather with one complex crisis which is both social and environmental.”
This means that making the necessary shift to an ecologically sustainable economy cannot ignore the challenges that many people are already facing today.
However, just as the problems of climate change and inequality go hand-in-hand, so do the solutions. Adopting renewable energy, for example, can also yield massive health benefits, create jobs and improve other indicators of social well-being.
The Lancet Commission said that “tackling climate change could be the greatest global health opportunity of the 21st century.”
As younger generations already recognize, our economic systems can no longer be based on the logic of trade-offs and must now follow the logic of social-environmental synergy. Fortunately, more policymakers are also coming to this realization.
Consider the proposals in the US for a Green New Deal, which is designed to address the “systemic injustice” driving today’s ecological crises, the brunt of which is borne by “frontline and vulnerable communities.”
The hardship and calamities that these populations — which include children, the elderly, the poor and many ethnic minorities — are already suffering will befall all of us if we continue to destroy our habitat blindly and with abandon.
Consider also a recent open letter cosigned by many of the world’s top economists calling for “carbon dividends” of the type economist James K. Boyce has proposed.
To be sure, such a policy would help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but it would succeed only if it included measures to ensure that the most vulnerable are not hurt by the introduction of a carbon price.
Presumably, the recent protests in France have provided ample warning to policymakers considering this route. Environmental policies must also be social policies.
One country that is making notable progress toward social-environmental synergy is China. Now that the government’s war on pollution has started to show results, people in many parts of the country are enjoying the benefits of better air quality.
According to the Energy Policy Institute’s Air Quality Life Index, sustained exposure to particulate matter in the air can result in lower life expectancy for affected communities.
Yet by reducing local pollution, particularly in urban areas, China is not just improving the well-being of its citizens; it is also reducing carbon dioxide pollution globally.
Policymakers in Europe are also advocating concrete proposals to advance the goals of sustainable equality. A report from the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament, for example, said that “inequality is an environmental issue just as environmental degradation is also a social issue.”
Accordingly, it offers a series of recommendations for reducing emissions in key sectors, such as heavy manufacturing and agriculture, while also supporting the communities that are likely to be most affected.
By definition, all of the policies being designed around social-environmental synergy would yield “cobenefits” with respect to inequality and climate change. However, equally important, they would also benefit humanity in the present and the future.
Our societies would be more just if they were more sustainable, and more sustainable if they were more just.
Societies that have been rendered socially and politically fragile by inequality are poorly prepared to face the environmental shocks from climate change, and as ecological conditions continue to deteriorate, one should expect to witness an explosion of injustices, new and old.
“Why should I care about future generations? What have they ever done for me?” Groucho Marx is said to have asked.
Last week, young people around the world reminded us that the question is moot. While our debt to posterity grows ever larger, young people are asking merely that we help them by helping ourselves.
Eloi Laurent is a senior research fellow at OFCE (Sciences Po Center for Economic Research, Paris), professor at the School of Management and Innovation at Sciences Po, and visiting professor at Stanford University.
Copyright: Project Syndicate
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