The Guardian says today [Friday] that the (G20) summit’s biggest loser may have been the fight against climate change. “Hundreds of billions were found for the IMF and World Bank, but for making the transition to a green economy there is no money on the table”.
The Guardian quotes diplomatic sources to the effect that “China led the opposition to green language in the final communique”. I don’t buy this for a second – that China is to blame. On the contrary: the G20 was always going to be about a rescue of the ecocidal economic model that has led us to this situation. If they thought about it all, I’m sure most of the political leaders in London told each other they would “deal with climate change later, in Copenhagen”.
It’s tempting, on days like this, to rage and scream at these ignorant bastards. But do you know what? They won’t hear – because they can’t hear. There’s nothing in the lived experience of a senior politician (think of that grim conference centre yesterday) to help him or her understand the world differently. Most of them are lawyers and economists: their known world is, by training and socialization, abstract and disconnected from the biosphere.
Besides, is it a good use of one’s life energy to scream at the captain of the Titanic? The economic model the G20-ers hope to have ‘rescued’ is dying anyway.
That’s why I don’t agree that yesterday was a “lost opportunity”. The G20 was never going to be where a “green economy” would be made – or even thought about. The green economy is being made elsewhere.
And that reminds me: I have a meeting to go to about rainwater capture in our town.