POLITICS APRIL 21, 2011
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What the hell went wrong? For months now, environmentalists have been asking themselves that question, and it’s easy to see why. After Barack Obama vaulted into the White House in 2008, it really did look like the United States was, at long last, going to do something about global warming. Scientists were united on the causes and perils of climate change. Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth had stoked public concern. Green groups in D.C. had rallied around a consensus solution—a cap-and-trade program for carbon emissions—and had garnered support from a few major companies like BP and Duke Energy. Both Obama and his opponent, John McCain, were on board. And, so, environmental advocates prepared a frontal assault on Congress. May as well order the victory confetti, right?
Instead, the climate push was … a total flop. By late 2010, the main cap-and-trade bill had fizzled out in the Senate; not a single Republican would agree to vote for it. Greens ended up winning zilch from Congress, not even minor legislation to boost renewable electricity or energy efficiency. Worse, after the 2010 midterms, the House GOP became overrun with climate deniers, while voters turned apathetic about global warming. All those flashy eco-ads and all that tireless eco-lobbying only got us even further from solving climate change than we were in 2008.
So now greens are in the post-mortem stage, and, not shockingly, it’s a sensitive subject. On Tuesday, Matthew Nisbet, a communications professor at American University, released a hefty 84-page report trying to figure out why climate activism flopped so miserably in the past few years. Nisbet’s report is already causing controversy: Among other things, he argues that, contrary to popular belief, greens weren’t badly outspent by industry groups and that media coverage of climate science wasn’t really a problem. And he raises questions about whether greens have been backing the wrong policy measures all along. Is he right? Have environmentalists been fundamentally misguided all this while? Or were they just unlucky?
Just about everyone in the green movement has a theory for why the climate fight sputtered out. Some activists blame their all-too-powerful foes. The oil and coal industries, as well as groups like the National Association of Manufacturers, all vehemently opposed cap-and-trade and shelled out millions lobbying Congress. The cranks who deny that global warming is manmade were way too effective at spreading their disinformation. And gullible reporters were too willing to give these skeptics airtime. Call this the “we were outgunned” theory. Bill McKibben, for one, has argued that enviros need to spend more time targeting the “the guys with the money who pull the strings,” like the Chamber of Commerce and the Koch brothers. Some climate scientists, meanwhile, have argued that they need to get better at swatting down gibberish from the skeptics. Shortly after the midterms, some 40 climatologists around the world banded together to form a “rapid response unit” on key climate-science questions. (It’s still too early to judge the end result.)
Then there are the lefty greens—groups like MoveOn.org and Friends of the Earth—who have long argued that the inside-the-Beltway strategy of 2009 and 2010 was inherently self-defeating. The mainstream green groups, these lefties argue, spent way too much time compromising with fossil-fuel interests in order to craft a byzantine cap-and-trade proposal that could placate enough swing voters in Congress. The end result was too loophole-ridden and too complicated to excite the base. Call this the “no one likes a sellout” theory—it’s the idea that a simpler, stronger policy (say, a flat carbon tax), combined with fervent grassroots pressure, might have stood a better chance.
Plenty of other observers, meanwhile, have suggested that greens miscast the problem from the start. Mike Hulme, a climate scientist at the University of East Anglia, has argued that greens mistakenly treated global warming as a run-of-the-mill environmental problem similar to, say, acid rain. But, with acid rain, feasible solutions were already available—namely, scrubbers and low-sulfur coal—that made it relatively straightforward to cap sulfur-dioxide emissions. Climate change, Hulme argues, is a much trickier, more complicated problem that will require a flurry of different policy responses and society-wide changes, not just one big bill. Alternatively, Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger of the Breakthrough Institute have argued—in TNR and elsewhere—that a policy like cap-and-trade, which works by making dirty energy expensive, will never gain broad political support. Instead, environmental groups should have focused on pain-free policies to boost innovation and make clean energy cheaper—by, say, funding R&D on a Manhattan Project-esque scale.
Nisbet, for his part, seems to favor the third camp, those in support of the “we need bold new ideas” theory. He certainly doesn’t believe greens were woefully outmatched by powerful fossil-fuel interests. In his report, Nisbet estimates that green groups and their allies spent $394 million on climate-change activities in 2009—ads, organizing, lobbying—compared with just $259 million from conservative and industry groups. Nor does he think media-assisted denialism was a decisive factor. His research found that the biggest news outlets—The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, CNN, and Politico—tended to reflect mainstream climate science in their coverage. The implication, then, is that environmentalists have no one to blame but themselves for failing to sell their climate policies.
What's more, Nisbet argues that the climate cause was hurt by getting too wrapped up in partisan politics. Back in 2007, it wasn’t a problem that Al Gore was the single figure most associated with raising awareness about global warming—after all, his erstwhile foe George W. Bush was wildly unpopular and Democrats were on the rise. But, Nisbet argues, the fact that tackling climate change became identified as a Democratic cause, in an era when Republicans have steadfastly opposed any and every Democratic position, ended up hurting the environmental movement.
These parts of Nisbet’s report have attracted plenty of criticism. His media analysis, for one, ignores both cable television and the Internet, where all sorts of denialist nonsense can percolate. And Joseph Romm of the Center for American Progress has argued that Nisbet’s analysis of interest-group spending is badly skewed—for instance, the report counts BP’s entire lobbying budget on the green side of the ledger, even though BP lobbies on all sorts of issues and barely lifted a finger when it came to cap-and-trade. That said, Nisbet does seem to have a point here: Green groups do have vast resources at their disposal that they don’t seem to be using effectively. As Grist’s David Roberts recently argued, environmentalists might see better results by bankrolling a few successful primary challenges against teetering politicians than by running another round of stirring wind-turbine ads.
As for the bit about Al Gore, I’d frame the situation slightly differently. After Barack Obama got elected, every major policy issue became subject to trench warfare. The Affordable Care Act squeaked through the Senate without a single GOP vote. Financial regulation, which was overwhelmingly popular with the public, only barely wiggled through Congress. In this same vein, cap-and-trade passed the House but fell just short in the Senate (it might have garnered 51 votes, but it couldn’t get the 60 required to overcome a filibuster). It seems misguided to suggest that climate change became a uniquely toxic policy issue, when the difference between it and health care or financial regulation amounted to a few measly votes. Under the circumstances, it’s hard to see how any other approach—say, one centered around spending billions of dollars on energy innovation, or a big grassroots approach—would have been any more successful.
Nisbet’s report is a fascinating dissection of the shortcomings of climate activism over the past few years, and he raises a lot of probing questions. But, reading through it, I started to wonder if there was another option worth considering. Maybe none of the theories about what went wrong are correct. It’s quite possible that climate activists basically did a competent job
—after all, they did get a big, complicated bill to the 20-yard-line in a legislative body that rarely passes big, complicated bills—and they just got unlucky. After all, if John McCain hadn’t thrown a tantrum and changed his mind about the merits of tackling global warming, cap-and-trade very well could have passed and those inside-the-Beltway greens would now look like geniuses. Maybe there’s such a thing as too much clever second-guessing. Sure, environmentalists will have to adapt to changing circumstances
—right now, the focus is on protecting the EPA's Clean Air Act authority—but does climate activism really need to be completely renovated? Or does it just need to wait for the right moment to come along? (Granted, greens better hope that moment arrives before the planet heats up too much.)
Last month, I asked David Hawkins of the Natural Resources Defense Council whether the green movement needed to rethink its broader strategy. We were chatting about Tim DeChristopher, a college student who was convicted after sabotaging an oil-lease auction, and I asked Hawkins whether more environmentalists might start engaging in non-violent civil disobedience in order to force people to pay attention to the issue. Hawkins, who has worked on air-pollution issues for four decades now, preferred to take the long view. “I’m a political optimist,” he said. “Over the last forty years, we really have seen significant environmental progress. There are always setbacks—we’ve weathered unfriendly political climates during the Reagan and Bush years, and we’ve protected the EPA’s authority. But, eventually, we'd win. The air would get cleaner, lives would be saved, and things continue to get better.” It's not the sort of conclusion that's going to grab headlines. But that doesn't mean he's wrong.
Bradford Plumer is the associate editor of The New Republic.
46 comments
What's wrong with Greens? Here are two answers: "Green and single-minded..." http://normblog.typepad.com/normblog/2011/04/green-and-single-minded-2-by-martin-morgan.html and here: “Labor councillors and two Greens who had supported the initial push to support the global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign against Israel, voted with two independent councillors against it.” http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/marrickville-councils-move-to-boycott-israel-sinks-in-stormy-sea-of-debate-20110419-1dnkk.html#ixzz1K85pPvXs
- arnon
April 21, 2011 at 12:43am
Try this link: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/marrickville-councils-move-to-boycott-israel-sinks-in-stormy-sea-of-debate-20110419-1dnkk.html
- arnon
April 21, 2011 at 12:44am
Arnon, it's pretty clear in context that Green is referring to the environmentalists in the United States, and not the Green Party, in Australia, Europe, or elsewhere. So, you know, read the article--not everything is about Israel.
- Crock1701
April 21, 2011 at 1:54am
I am stunned that this piece does not mention the obvious factor in the failure of cap and trade: recession. The public is hardly going to rally behind an environmental cause when gripped by economic anxiety.
- Dparke
April 21, 2011 at 2:51am
Could the lack of enthusiasm among the electorate and the Congress have anything to do with the wide suspicion that global warming reached a plateau in 1998 and that the worst of it is behind us? Only two (maybe three) years since have equalled the 1998 peak, and 2011 appears to be cooler again. When eleven out of the last thirteen years are cooler than 1998, it is difficult to maintain hysteria. And without hysteria, the draconian changes that greens favor have no chance of becoming law and shouldn't become law.
- kcrichmond
April 21, 2011 at 3:01am
http://www.motherearthnews.com/uploadedImages/articles/online_articles/2011-01-01/i8_GlobalTemp.png Please review, kcrichmond. I think lobbyists have created a "wide suspicion"; that and a bad economy explains the lack of enthusiasm in the general public.
- mozier
April 21, 2011 at 3:48am
It's pretty simple actually: However true the threat of global warming may be, it's REALLY inconvenient. If greens (not Greens, arnon) have failed, it's in the failure to acknowledge the magnitude of the required changes to our way of life in order to make a real difference. Another big factor is the Tragedy of the Commons. Whether we're talking about individuals or nation states, even if one acknowledges the reality of the threat, it may still be rational to do nothing about global warming so long as other members of the community fail to act. Activists need to recognize the difficulties posed by TotC and developing strategies to deal with it. I mean, Obama's a smart guy. He has acknowledged the reality and the danger of anthopogenic climate change. I doubt his opinion has changed since 2008. But what's he gonna do? Unilaterally hamstring the US economy, or at least appear to do so, with a fat carbon tax while China and India party on? Forget it. Come back with another proposal, because that one is doomed a priori.
- AaronW
April 21, 2011 at 6:44am
develop strategies, that is. Autocorrect on the iPad is a mixed blessing.
- AaronW
April 21, 2011 at 6:46am
As we all know, America is better in responding to crisis than in planning to avert crisis. Two particular crises loom: the water crisis in the (south)west and the water crisis in the east, which is to say the absence of sufficient water on the one hand and the overabundance of water on the other. Don't give up on Michigan and the rest of the midwest just yet.
- rayward
April 21, 2011 at 7:35am
I'm with Dparke on this one; the problem is simply that too much happened too quickly for our slow-moving, inertia-ridden government to process and respond to in only three years. Between the financial crisis, the battle over the ACA, the recession, the rise of the Tea Party, war in Libya, the Gulf oil spill and a handful of other second-tier crises, something had to give -- and that something was climate change. Aside from the fact that environmentalists were never really as close to a deal as they seem to believe, to conduct the post-mortem in a vacuum is pretty myopic. I doubt the supporters of marijuana legalization are fretting that they took the wrong approach because their position continues to grow in popularity but failed to produce the holy grail of legislation during one of the most tumultuous 3-year-periods in half a century.
- austinexpat
April 21, 2011 at 8:06am
I'd bet that if instead of calling the legislation "cap and trade" the sponsors had called it "the antipollution bill of 2010", it might have garnered more support. What does "cap and trade" mean anyway as a message other than a lot of complicated, tax code style complication and bureaucracy.
- PeteBeck
April 21, 2011 at 8:22am
Crock1701 "Arnon, it's pretty clear in context that Green is referring to the environmentalists in the United States, and not the Green Party, in Australia, Europe, or elsewhere." I know to what bhe was referring. "So, you know, read the article--not everything is about Israel." Tell that to Ralph Nader and his ilk. Ralph did run for president on the Green ticket, didn't he?
- arnon
April 21, 2011 at 9:12am
Yes.
- mtmcgrath84
April 21, 2011 at 9:46am
Arnon - that last post is just plain embarrassing, man. Let's stick to the issue shall we? Let's leave Israel and Raph Nader (interesting topics when relevant OK?) where they belong in this thread: not here. Green parties? Well, OK then. But really - the rest of it please bring up when relevant. Brad - I just want to thank you for conceptualizing this thread in the first place. It is about time. The entire green/sustainable living dialouge has become so lame, so stale and so circular, the earth will surely go up in smoke before we get anywhere. We need to lick our wounds, find new ways to fight and move ON. That can't be done until we acknowledge what has gone wrong. Tough economic climate? Please! The rest of the Western world is so far ahead of the US on this, we're being left in the *dust* economically on just this issue. We're leaving billions on the table every day! American firms simply sell their products overseas because they can't get anyone to pay attention or even try to understand here. I see the biggest problem as generational. It is hard to fnd a bigger divide between generations than the climate change - anyone under 21 considers these issues in a fundamentally more mature, concrete manner than any adult presently in power. Too bad the earth can't wait for the destructive crackpot baby-boomers running this country to die off. The kids think we're all idiots, I can hardly blame them.
- WandreyCer
April 21, 2011 at 10:01am
Perhaps those in the green movement would be more effective if they didn’t resort to characterizing the other side of the issue (to quote from your article) as “climate deniers”, “denialist nonsense”, “cranks who deny that global warming is manmade” or “gibberish from the skeptics”. Such name calling only makes those of us who believe there is no scientific evidence that 100% of global warming is due to human activity less inclined to engage in rational discussions of legitimate solutions.
- ggharmon11
April 21, 2011 at 11:48am
WandreyCer “Arnon - that last post is just plain embarrassing, man. Let's stick to the issue shall we? “ You are embarrassing yourself and showing your ignorance. “green” is and ideologically motivated movement which had its origin in 19c Europe. It used to be a strictly right wing ideology even if they today present themselves as being “on the left.” In Europe and Australia vestiges of right wing ideas still survive not least in their antisemitism which takes the form of demonizing the Jewish State. From Scotland to Australia to Germany and Canada antisemitism isn’t just a side issue and Ralph Nader’s views are not unique. This is from a blog titled the Methodist Preacher: Green Party "institutionally anti-Semitic" “A few years ago I was approached by a man in Strasbourg who wanted to talk to me about the Green Party. He was a Jew and his family had survived the Holocaust. He was convinced that the Green movement then fashionable across Europe could easily become anti-Semitic. His argument was that when Green's embraced "New Age" theology they were heading in the same direction to the self same "Gods" as Hitler and the Nazis. I could see the logic of the argument but I pointed out that on many issues the Greens in the European Parliament were not that much different from other sections of the left and had a good record of anti-racist activity. On this blog I have, from time to time, pointed to the authoritarian tendencies of those that support the Green agenda, especially on man made climate change theories about which we must have no doubts, even in our beloved Methodist connexion. Some Methodists have made clear their support for the Green Party So it was with interest I read an article by the appropriately named Toby Green, a Green Party member of some ten years' standing. He has decided not to renew his membership and here's why : ‘It has become clear that the Green Party is institutionally anti-Semitic. Its institutions have not dealt with clear evidence of antisemitism. They show no evidence of wanting to, and indeed now seem to have decided to target perceived "problem" members of the party who have raised this issue.’” http://methodistpreacher.blogspot.com/2011/02/green-party-institutionally-anti.html This is not to say that global warming and other man caused climate changes are not important. However, we would be able to deal with these issues more forthrightly if the greens haven’t tried to monopolize the issue and inject their own right wing (which they present as leftist) into the debate. This isn't a "generational issue" it's an ideologicla issue.
- arnon
April 21, 2011 at 11:58am
For God's sake, "arnon," just go away!
- bunthorne
April 21, 2011 at 12:01pm
From the Australian "green left" "Israel boycott not anti-Semitic" http://www.greenleft.org.au/node/47363 If you are "green" this is part of what you support, bunthorne.
- arnon
April 21, 2011 at 12:15pm
From the American Green Party website: "The Green Party condemns Israel's murderous attack on the Gaza-bound Freedom Flotilla, urges immediate aid cutoff and end to impunity for Israel" http://www.gp.org/press/pr-national.php?ID=321
- arnon
April 21, 2011 at 12:20pm
I am not now, nor have I ever been a member or supporter of the Green Party, which is not even a viable party in America. I am simply a liberal who is deeply, deathly concerned about the future of our environmental health. Like you, I am baffled as to why a poltical party which is ostensibly founded with the environment as its chief concern would even bother with the Israel/Palestine distraction. But really, I don't care. The fact of the matter is that this article has exactly zero to do with that mess. It is rather symptomatic of the larger problem that someone like you would bring up his or her hobby horse when the conversation began with the environment. Environmental issues always takes a back seat to all the other problems of the world. Presumably, there will come a day when we will no longer have that luxury. Perhaps then you may fondly recall the days when the biggest issue we faced was someone saying mean things about Israel.
- bunthorne
April 21, 2011 at 12:38pm
I said, buntrhone that man made environmental degradation is an important issue that needs to be dealt with. I wouldn't call concern that a movement (the green) that tried to hijack these legtitimate environmental concerns for their own antisemitic ends a minor issue.
- arnon
April 21, 2011 at 12:47pm
arnon, what bunthorne said. Stop hijacking a really important thread. You don't even know what green, not Green, means - this is part of the problem Brad addresses. Green is a generic term that infers thinking about the environment and climate change policy, it does not refer to political parties in this thread. Use sustainable (almost as meaningless at this point) if green makes you too upset at European lefty press releases from a year ago to think straight. The entire planet is at great risk right now and American policy has mostly failed to convey and address this fact effectively. American business has tried and continues to - there is money to be made, after all. But there are few policy changes to point to that have had much impact. It's disgraceful.
- WandreyCer
April 21, 2011 at 1:00pm
arnon - European political parties have zero relevance in this thread and have no say in American policy. So in fact, you make zero sense even bringing it up.
- WandreyCer
April 21, 2011 at 1:07pm
The thread is about the green movement. "Has the green movement been a miserable flop?" Answer yes, for more than one reason. And this was posted on an American Green website, not a European one: "The Green Party condemns Israel's murderous attack on the Gaza-bound Freedom Flotilla, urges immediate aid cutoff and end to impunity for Israel" Deal with it.
- arnon
April 21, 2011 at 1:11pm
Ok, I'll deal with it. What exactly am I to do? The failure of greens (not Greens) to accomplish anything is horribly despressing, but not at all surprising. It's a never-ending slow-motion trainwreck that demands decisive and forceful leadership from people who have shown time and again to be utterly devoid of any leaderly qualities. It's like watching the debacle over the debt, except worse, since at least everyone recognizes that a problem exists there. Particularly bad is that leadership on this issue must come from Americans, whose primary qualities are greed, individualism and anti-intellectualism. It does not inspire much hope.
- bunthorne
April 21, 2011 at 2:27pm
One of the mistakes made by the enviros was to politicize the environment. After all, the EPA was begun under Richard Nixon, and Republicans have been since TR in favor of conservation, etc. But in the 70s and 80s, the enviro movement became part and parcel of the Democratic Party, and the movement is now a single issue organization, much like the NRA or Planned Parenthood. It is filled with vicious partisans, who are loath to compromise. A failure? Yup. Pity.
- butchie b
April 21, 2011 at 2:38pm
butchie b, I think you oversimplify the state of the environmental movement since that time. Enviromentalists went with the Democrats because Reagan era Republicans, then and later, left the environmentalists behind. Reagan put Watt in charge of the interior, and his small government beliefs ran counter to the effective national solutions (EPA, etc.) that are required to protect the environment. He cozied up to anti-environment Westerners who wanted to open up Federal lands to various private interests, and in general was pretty bad on the environment. Environmentalists left the GOP because the GOP left its Nixon/TR Environmental past. To blame that on the environmentalists is the same sort of criticism I see directed at African Americans, blaming them for not joining the Republican Party and therefore marginalizing themselves. Constituent groups join parties because they fit them ideologically, and because they are welcomed. The reason the African American community has been solidy Democratic is because they agree with the Democratic platform, and they remember Goldwater opposing Civil Rights, the Southern Strategy, Reagan at Philadelphia, MS, and "States Rights." The reason environmentalists are in the Democratic Party is because they agree with the Democratic Party, and because they remember Reagan's record, W Bush's record, Kyoto, the "Clear Skies Initiative," "Cap and Tax," "Ozone Man," and widespread climate denialism. Environmentalists will be in the Republican Party when the Republican Party embraces and acknowledges environmentalists. To pretend that the onus on competing for Environmentalist votes should be on the Environmentalists is ludicrous.
- Crock1701
April 21, 2011 at 3:13pm
Well I think three things. a) as pointed out above the Green Party has gotten mixed up with antisemitism, which is unforgivable and this has damaged environmentalism, which is also unforgivable. Who wants to be associated with bigots, regardless of the cause? That puts people like me, pro-environment and also Jewish, in a real bind. I can't vote for the Green Party under these circumstances, period. b) people in general resist change. It doesn't matter how compelling the evidence of environmental damage, getting people to change this ways is truly difficult and this is especially true, here, with regard to cars. Part of this is simply because there are no good alternatives. How are people supposed to get around in a city like Denver without a car? Even in cities with rapid transit, it's often very difficult and most cities don't have good rapid transit or even good bus systems. Meanwhile, Detroit kept churning out monsters that get bad mileage and people buy them - they like the comfort and convenience and don't want to feel guilty and/or responsible for harming the world so they tune it out. Therefore at some point business leaders have to be more responsible (as if.) c) rather than focusing on "climate change," which people can dispute, pointing to past Ice Ages etc or claiming it's The Will of God, so forth - it was a mistake to frame the argument in these terms. Rather, just say, "environmental damage." That's more than sufficient. The species die off alone should be breaking peoples' hearts. But, even when that's the case, we are still up against the scoundrels in Congress who do not consult the people when they pass measures - often as part of budgets etc - for example what did the recent budget deal have to do with wolves? Nothing - yet - they were taken off the Endangered Species list at the behest of a couple of Western senators without the knowledge or consent of the people - and now, it is too late. They did this before, to the mustangs - slipping an anti-mustang provision into a must-pass appropriations bill - it's wrong and anti-democratic. Special interests will doom us and unless people have the right to vote on such issues, via national referendums, which is certainly possible in the computer age, nothing will change until it is too late period.
- Sophia
April 21, 2011 at 4:13pm
How about this theory: The public has a very short time horizon. Anything perceived as trading short term pain for long term gain doesn't stand much of a chance. Further, 2008 wasn't a revolution. 46% of voters thought McCain/Palin were just dandy.
- sampaine1
April 22, 2011 at 8:26am
How about this theory? People are realizing that the costs of "solving" global warming are astronomical, and that the dangers of not solving have been massively exaggerating by Al Gore et al? We can throw in an additional "meta" factor: significantly affecting global warming will require India and China to accept a significantly reduced rate of economic growth. They will never agree to this. Therefore, there will be no significant change in the rate of increase of global warming, no matter what the U.S. does. Wasting billions, or tens of billions, or hundreds of billions of dollars on feel-good projects so that upper-middle-class can, well, feel good about themselves (and protect the property values of their summer homes and ski chalets) is not a good idea.
- AlanVann
April 22, 2011 at 8:40am
I think AlanVann, AaronW and rayward are on to something. They offer the most pragmatic interpretation I've read. To WandreyCann -- there's room for arnon's interpretations and comments, even if tangential to the core issue. Perhaps this is the problem with the environmentalists: They expect everyone to be "see the light" and be as enlightened as they are and then fall in line. Part of the failed strategy is that they aren't doing their due diligence. They don't do a good enough job of anticipating the criticism (or the strength of the criticism) and preparing to address it. They have to soldier on and live to fight another day.
- kaybee
April 22, 2011 at 9:31am
Perhaps, crock, but their unwillingness to compromise and their immediate resort to the courts to solve any enviro problem simply has not helped their cause. The enviro position on energy is that fossil fuels are bad. Ok, fine. But when the state of CA wants to construct a huge solar energy field in the Mojave, who is against it - in court? Enviros. Explain that to me, crock. Has the green movement failed? In dubitably, but the wounds are self-inflicted.
- butchie b
April 22, 2011 at 11:04am
The tone of the comments here are depressingly typical of the problem that environmentalists face. People do not widely accept either the reality of global climate change, nor the actions necessary to mitigate the problem? Well, it's the fault of evironmentalists for being unwilling to compromise or for not "anticipating the strength of the criticism." Well, you know what, you're probably right. No one ever went broke underestimating the selfishness of the American public. Guess what, though, nature doesn't really do compromise, either. I know it makes you feel real good to point out the hypocrites, lunatics and bigots who have attached themselves, however tangentially, to the "Green" movement. And I know it makes you feel really bad that these mean people have the audacity to suggest that they might know more than you about a subject they have devoted their lives to studying. But this is not your typical American political issue where points are won and lost as determined by the punditry, and whoever has the most money will win in the end anyway. Chatter all you like, the clock is ticking.
- bunthorne
April 22, 2011 at 11:40am
Excuse me bunthorne, but if you read the comments carefully I think you'll see that (most) of us accept the reality of global warming and other environmental depridations. That doesn't mean we vote for Cynthia McKinney. We simply cannot do that. Period. Now. The Green Party has made a huge mistake - similar to the GOP's in a sense - by not distancing itself from fringe religious elements (and yes antisemitism is so irrational it is similar to a belief in the tooth fairy and akin to the far right religious elements that believe it's cool to strip women of our rights). Secondly, many of the same people who are antisemitic are also 9/11 troofers. This, we don't need. So, I call upon the Green Party to think very seriously about their errata because the stakes are extremely high. Third: nature's willingness to compromise or not compromise, notwithstanding - we have practical issues to address. Namely, people are struggling economically and broke and the absolute last thing they need is gas prices at $5.00/gallon. Therefore, it's very important to secure support for programs that will improve the environment AND create jobs (things like building better trains etc and therefore reducing dependency upon cars.) Of course we are dealing with, alas, the House GOP which wants to destroy the government. Finally, environmentalists in general take a lot of heat, as reflected in some comments above, for sending a mixed message (example, solar in the Mojave.) However the facts are complicated and sustainable energy that damages the environment isn't a good idea either. So, we need to clean our political house - find leadership that isn't morally compromised and/or outright nuts; find the unity to help support environmental initiatives that also support the economy; frame the message in such a way that the complexities of the situation are more easily understood. We may already be running out of time though - we have violent storms, cold in the North, flooding and snow in the Midwest and fires in Texas not to mention incredible damage to the oceans. I repeat, I think it would be better to focus on big-picture environmental impact than on global warming. People can see pollution and they can relate to dead animals and devastated habitat.
- Sophia
April 22, 2011 at 5:22pm
I'm sorry, that last post was written in a bad mood. I absolutely agree with you. I guess my point was that the Green party as it exists in America is such a fringe movement that it doesn't even seem worthwhile to worry about them. Let them play with the anti-semites - to me anyone who would be involved in that trash is going to discredit ANY movement they get behind. I personally don't think of the Green party as much of an environmental movement at all, but obviously other people think that they represent environmentalists as a whole, or at least a major potion of them. Guess we just don't see that eye to eye. I am very sympathetic to the fact that implementing serious energy reform may and probably will be hard on an already fragile and barely recovering economy, and like every economic hardship, it will likely fall disproportionally on those who can least afford it. Honestly, I don't have a good answer for that, other than it can't be as bad as the alternative. My point is that these problems are real, and they are not going to go away no matter how well people can blame enviromental scientists for not being politicians or play the gotcha game. Yes, I absolutely agree that environmentalists can do a better job getting their message across, and trucking with hateful people is NOT going to help their cause, though I doubt most scientists have anything at all to do with those movements. But it doesn't matter how many people can be "won" over. Environmentalists might not sell the message perfectly, but at some point, citizens must bear some responsibility in understanding the threats they face, right? Right? I don't even know any more. And Sophia, I agree with your last statment 100%. To me, ecosystem destruction and loss of habit, which are closely tied with climate change, but not always the same thing, are the much graver threats.
- bunthorne
April 22, 2011 at 6:34pm
I should add that I will never cease to blame the Green party for the Nader/Florida debacle, which directly led to one of the greatest catastropes our nation has ever faced, environmental or otherwise.
- bunthorne
April 22, 2011 at 6:39pm
bunthorne "The tone of the comments here are depressingly typical of the problem that environmentalists face. People do not widely accept either the reality of global climate change, nor the actions necessary to mitigate the problem?" I am sorry thorne, but you are misreading me. Yes, there are environmental problems. I also showed that many greens are part of the problem. We need pragmatic solutions to these problems and not more dogma. We certainly don't need an environmental big brother movement telling us how to live.
- arnon
April 22, 2011 at 6:56pm
It is difficult to determine how much of global climate change is caused by human activity. So I think that the Greens erred in making that the centerpiece of their message to the public. Such "sky is falling" fear-mongering doesn't motivate people to take concrete action to protect the environment. The pitch must be more concrete and explainable. As a mainstream Zionist, Jew, and active environmentalist, I see nothing inherently anti-semitic about environmentalism. Unfortunately, some Greens are anti-semitic, mainly as a function of prevailing Left thought concerning Jews and Israel. This is, thankfully, not a significant problem in the United States. Neo-cons and other conservatives are scare-mongering about Green anti-semitism because they want to frighten Jews away from environmentalism and other worthy social causes for their own political advantage. American environmentalism remains a big tent. In my organization, our members include both Democrats and Republicans, Christians, Jews, and people of other religious or humanist affiliations. But, like Bunthorne, "I will never cease to blame the Green party for the Nader/Florida debacle" in 2000.
- amidut
April 22, 2011 at 7:26pm
Amidut we are discussing at cross purposes. Concrete solutions to environmental problems, yes. Environmentalism as an ideology, no. The Green movemenst both here and in Europe have taken anti Israel postitions. This is not because they are left wing, on the contrary this is because many people with right wing cultural views who in the ealry 20th c would have embraced a romantic view of nature have joined the movement. They view Jews as anti environment meaning "anti-nature." Pre Israel they associated Jews with capitalism, with Communists who stressed industry over nature and associate Israel with technological development. These views are part of the movement though for the most part it's in the background.
- arnon
April 22, 2011 at 7:57pm
Here is how one writer viewed the history of antisemitism in the environmental movement: "You're right that they don't back comprehensive boycotts of other countries, so their Israel fixation looks initially like that of the rest of the unthinking left. The difference, if there is one, may lie in the Green interest in authenticity. From Edward Goldsmith onwards there has been a strong anti-modernist tendency in the Green movement - a concern for the protection of indigenous ways of life, distrust of global organisations and globalisation, and an emphasis on the degrading effects of industrial society on agrarian, artisan traditions. The villains here are colonialism, international banking, big corporations, industrial farming and the 'soulless' factory line. The far-right share these concerns, in particular the 'integralist' lineages from the Action Française and Gregor Strasser. Action Française's Charles Maurras was for ever railing in defence of the 'pays réel', the authentic small-town, rural France, and Alain de Benoist and the French New Right (Nouvelle Droite) have picked up on this in their critique of American capitalism. De Benoist also echoes ecological concerns, and calls for the separation of communities and opposes egalitariansim in order to preserve certain human cultures. There is also a sentimental belief in the nobility of a simpler, pastoral life. Pull all of this together in the general atmosphere of suspicion of Israel on the know-nothing left, and you can see how Israel looks especially wicked: 1. It is an artificial, 'European' colonialist implant in an authentic, appealingly noble, rural-artisan Arab culture. See also the recent (and also very old) pseudo-scientific attacks on the Middle Eastern origins of the Jews and even the Semitic nature of Modern Hebrew (Shlomo Sand on the 'invention' of the Jews, Paul Wexler on 'Slavic' Hebrew, Koestler on the Khazar myth - all the better for 'anti-Zionists' if some of the authors are Jews). 2. It is a model of capitalist development in contrast to the rural-artisan etc etc (ignoring its socialist/communitarian origins in the kibbutz/trade-union movements, of course). See a recent Guardian article on battery farming in Israel. 3. It can only survive by 'destroying' Arabs/Palestinians through 'genocide', theft of water, poisoning the air etc. So Israel's existence threatens the very survival of another, more authentic way of life. 4. The references you find in the left/right/Green 'anti-Zionist' movement to the 'authenticity' of anti-Zionist Jews like the Neturei Karta and even idylls about the somehow more Jewish nature of Diaspora life and Yiddish are part of this. 5. Israel promotes Western and in particular American values in one of the few parts of the urbanised world perceived to be resistant to US/multinational corporate penetration. 6. And of course there are the now mainstream background assumptions about international Jewish influence in finance, US policy-making etc that trade as the 'Israel Lobby', and the disproportionate amount of news coverage Israel gets compared to other 'issue' countries around the world. All of these factors, I would say, help to 'green' the anti-Israel camp. (Martin Morgan)." http://normblog.typepad.com/normblog/2011/04/green-and-single-minded-2-by-martin-morgan.html
- arnon
April 22, 2011 at 8:00pm
There is more to environmental history than its antisemitism, but we need to be aware of that history in order to get beyond it. The way forward it seems to me is to tackle the many causes of environment degradation concretely and discretely. We can't afford to invest in a single ideological movement that would offer a total solution to many individual problems. For example, there was a story in the NY Times that people because of the recession are not buying “environment” friendly products because they are more expensive. Rather than blame consumers we need to also see economic recessions as prolonging environmental degradation.
- arnon
April 22, 2011 at 8:10pm
Here is a link to that NY Times article : http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/22/business/energy-environment/22green.html
- arnon
April 22, 2011 at 8:12pm
Arnon, I will let the Ruritanian reactionaries and their Green successors think what they will about the Jews. If the Jews were all rustics, they would have made an anti-semitic philosophy out of that, too. The Jews just can't win with those people. As a matter of fact, Jews in Europe and the Middle East lived in rural areas as well as cities. And were often artisans practicing traditional crafts! Many of the early Zionists were romantic about nature. The return to Zion was a return to the natural land of Israel, too. Israel today has a strong environmental movement (See teva.org.il and adamteva.org.il for examples), stronger than comparable movements in the neighboring Arab world. The population density of Israel and the need for a strong national defense require that the Israelis develop a strong economy, commercialized agriculture, and technology sector. But even if most Israelis live in cities, they still need open spaces, clean environment, public transit, etc., needs which must be balanced against commercial development, as elsewhere.
- amidut
April 22, 2011 at 9:32pm
"Many of the early Zionists were romantic about nature. The return to Zion was a return to the natural land of Israel, too. Israel today has a strong environmental movement (See teva.org.il and adamteva.org.il for examples), stronger than comparable movements in the neighboring Arab world. The population density of Israel and the need for a strong national defense require that the Israelis develop a strong economy, commercialized agriculture, and technology sector. But even if most Israelis live in cities, they still need open spaces, clean environment, public transit, etc., needs which must be balanced against commercial development, as elsewhere." Yes.
- arnon
April 22, 2011 at 9:41pm
I remember reading something some years ago about a project whereby an Israeli group was helping introduce Barn Owls to Palestian farms as an organic means to pest control. Sure, it was one of those feel-good "can't-we-all-get-along" stories, but it made me happy all the same.
- bunthorne
April 22, 2011 at 10:40pm
Humans are too clever for our own good. Those very characteristics that helped us survive competition with the jackals and hyenas, the vipers and the adders, the sharks and the piranhas, our viciousness that makes grizzlies and white sharks look tame, our intelligence which is more often malevolent cunning than wisdom, our fecundity which makes us fornicate like crazed weasels, are going to help us ruin our environment and destroy our species. For that matter, we are self-deceiving narcissists. What does “Save the Earth” mean? As cleverly destructive as we are, we cannot yet destroy the entire globe. Long after we are gone, the rats and the starlings, the slugs and the termites, they coyotes and the ferrets will still be doing fine. Frankly, I don't know how we can stand ourselves. Nevertheless, I recycle, I grow some of my own food organically, eat healthful eggs from our free range chickens, and limited myself to one child who limited herself to one child (her partner's daughter, actually). Our non-genetic granddaughter is very bright and goes to a private school for high-IQ children, and is learning to preserve the environment; though as she is only seven years old, it is premature for me to tell her: “Kid, we have f*d up the world and the environment; it is your job to save the human race; get going.”
- skahn
April 26, 2011 at 1:46pm