E3G

War passes: the climate is for ever

By Tom Burke

Tom Burke’s latest commentary was published in The Independent on January 4th, 2009.

War passes: the climate is for ever

We humans are better at dealing with crises than long-term problems. The future could judge us harshly”

This is arguably the first week of the most important year in human history. The grandiose invites suspicion so the previous sentence was written reluctantly. Ideas do not seek permission before they enter your mind nor are they always the most welcome of guests.

The idea that this might be the most important year in human history was prompted by the headlines that greeted the New Year. War and recession, tragically familiar sources of human misery, dominated. Yet it was what was missing from them that provoked my unwelcome thought.

In December, a meeting on an issue far more important than war or recession to the future prosperity and security of literally everyone on earth will take place in Copenhagen. Yet, nowhere did its prospects make the front pages. Terrible though they are, we know that consequences of war and recession pass. Climate change is for ever.

The punctuation of history is marked by the names of the places where order was restored after chaos had prevailed – Westphalia, Versailles, San Francisco. It is not an exaggeration to say that what happens – or does not – in Copenhagen in December will shape human destiny more deeply, and for longer, than any of them.

The reason for this is the unique nature of the climate problem. We know that dangerous climate change is a threat to the fragile film of order we humans have built around the chaos of events and call ‘civilisation’. We know, because Europe’s political leaders told us, that a rise in global average temperature of more than two degrees Celsius is dangerous. We know from our scientists that greenhouse gas emissions must be moving downwards globally by 2015 if we are to have any chance at all of staying within that limit.

We have one chance, and only one chance, to reach a political agreement to reduce global carbon emissions in time to stay safe. This is the year in which we take that chance.”

Once a given concentration of carbon is in the atmosphere the climate it drives is inexorable even if it takes decades or more to fully express itself. In the most literal sense, the sins of the fathers will indeed be visited on their sons and daughters and well beyond the third and fourth generation.
Climate change does not suit us. We have little experience with the irrevocable and dislike exacting time limits. The nature of the climate is such that the future cannot redeem today’s mistakes. We have one chance, and only one chance, to reach a political agreement to reduce global carbon emissions in time to stay safe. This is the year in which we take that chance.

Compared to the diplomatic effort needed to achieve success in Copenhagen that required for a final settlement in the Middle East is small. But there is no sign that an effort on the required scale is yet being made. Compare the amount of media coverage, and intensity of political effort, given to the Middle East to that accorded to climate change.

This is not to diminish in any way the magnitude of that tragedy nor to argue that less should be done to address it. It is rather to point out the classic human error of allowing the more immediate to obscure the more urgent. History does not have an agenda on which items can be prioritised. Either you deal with the events it throws at you or they deal with you.