Do we need to go "beyond capitalism" in solving the crisis of global climate change?

Question

The question is posed in the final paragraph of this fine piece by Bill McKibbon. I encourage you to read the entire article before you offer a response.

http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2008/05/the-greenback-effect.html

Answer 1

Hey folks, i picked this out of the stream of answers:

"Americans were much more interested in attaining wealth yet more willing to share and ensure that their neighbor could also prosper."

- Right, the Americans 'shared' so well with the Natives.

-this is very relevant as it leads to the notion of land ownership and land/nature as a commodity.  

watch the uses of the royal "we"

hehe.

Answer 2

Capitalism is not the problem.  There is an anti capitalism in the global warming comunity.  Tax coorperations, that is just passed along to the consumer.  Coorperations have done more for energy conservation and improved efficiency than amy government in the world.  The article just makes me laugh.  

What created the flourescent lighting.- Evil Coorperations, and Capitism.  Why? It was finincially feasible for consumers.

What increased gas mileage by 50% in towns (hybred)? Evil Coorperations and Capitalism. Why? It was financially feasible.  (Alot of this technology has been around for a while, but did not have a market until gas prices went up.)

Government programs by and large do very little to actually help and more mask things.

Answer 3

Capitalism is the problem.  Bottom line for corporations is profit and it does not matter how much damage is done to the environment in pursuit of the bottom line.  It is up to Government to put the curbs on capitalism necessary to preserve the environment for generations to come.

Answer 4

tuba, i found a last bit to that saying;

'markets make a good servant but a bad master and a worse religion'

the most important thing i think is 'joined up thinking'. we see a series of bodges for particular problems by one sector, which then cause a problem elsewhere, which then has to be patched (by a different group of people) etc. ad nauseum.

this applies to government and intergovernment action as much as for microsoft bloatware.

edit; good grief! who modded tuba's answer? so much for free speech!

Answer 5

How many times do communism and socialism have to fail before you figure out that it doesn't work?

Answer 6

What you call a fine piece, I call a piece of %$&^$#.  It is so full of misconceptions and falsehoods.  Mt Zion summed up my thoughts pretty well.  Socialism has failed every time it is tried.  Why do some keep on trying to repackage it.  Isn't that a definition of insanity, to keep trying the same thing and expecting a different result?  I would love for the socialists to go spend a few weeks in Cuba, North Korea, Myanmar, or in Former East Germany (where I spent a week), or any other socialist paradise.  They would quickly learn their mistake unless they truly are insane.

I could not think of a more simplistic or idiotic summary or markets or conservative skepticism than:

"Markets solve all problems;

Markets are not solving global warming;

QED, global warming is not a problem. "

It demonstrates first an ignorance of the problem and second a profound ignorance of economics and the way the world actually works. Jeesh.

Answer 7

Global worming is a hoax

Answer 8

I read the article, I did not get the sense that he felt socialism or government could solve the issue.  Though I have not bought into the affects of global warming this kind of article is good for the debate.  Will capitalism work only if the profit is there, my problem with the capitalism we have today is that we have lost the goodness has a nation.  Americans were much more interested in attaining wealth yet more willing to share and ensure that their neighbor could also prosper.  The greater good for humanity was more important then the bottom line.  Today we are driven more by money and profits then ever. Don't get me wrong business needs to profit to be successful however how much profit is enough?  When we get back to our roots and use capitalism for a greater cause, we will become the great nation we once were.

Answer 9

Given that rotting corpses produce a lot of greenhouse gases, anyone who believes the hype about man-made global warming would have to conclude that non-capitalist countries are making it worse.  Consider what's been going on in countries that have moved "beyond" capitalism:

Russia- At least 50 million murdered between 1917 and 1990, instigated several wars, worlds worst nuclear disaster.

China- 20 million murdered by government during the 1960s, more than 1,000 executions per year.

Germany-  12 million murdered between 1933 and 1945, instigated worst war of the 20th century.

Camobdia- Two million murdered over three-year period.

Answer 10

Cornucopian growth economics got us here.  How can the same thinking possibly get us out?

The environment is not a market that can be chopped up to be bought and sold.

Ecosystems need large protected areas on the same scale as continents and oceans.  

How will we ever get to this kind of world when the earth is for sale to the highest bidder?  What if the highest bidder was a government?  Oh drat, Socialism.

Hardly anyone alive today can even conceive of such a world and in any case most appear to want nothing to do with it.  

Except that without it, we're doomed.

edit:

Cuba, North Korea, Myanmar, and the former East Germany are rabid totalitarian dictatorships under the guise of Communism.  Socialism is not Communism; will you guys ever stop beating this dead horse?  Oh, but it works and people believe you.  Check.  

Last I checked the Euro was whupin' the dollars *** and western European countries top the scores of every measure of well being from student achievement to social freedoms

except for perhaps executive - to - worker salary ratio

where the good ol' USA is right up top along with gun murders and per capita incarcerated.  

Sheesh.

edit:

When people say “the same type of thinking can't solve this” it means that we will always be behind the curve.  There will never be enough altruistic capitalists to make up for the shortcomings of the system.

I read with amusement stories of Carnegie and his altruism.  At the turn of the century thousands died in virtual economic slavery and untold environmental damage was done setting the stage for 20th century obscenities, but in the end some of the Robber Barons got religion and gave a little back.  So what.

Indefinite growth is impossible, therefore free market cornucopian capitalism is fundamentally flawed and by definition can never be a long term sustainable solution.  

The longer we entertain the fantasy that we can "grow" or "innovate" or "manage" our way out of this is that much longer we delay the inevitable.

Democratic Socialism is the answer.  Everyone gets a say.  Everyone is allowed to maximize their freedom.  Limits are put in place so that everyone is protected, so that no one (set of stakeholders) can usurp the right to a clean and sustainable world from the rest of us.

edit

Deep ecology Tuba.  

All this squabbling is academic.  The vast majority of the western world walks a knife edge - just hours from panic, anarchy and collapse.  It may come quickly from a rogue warhead or slowly through environmental degradation and ecosystem collapse.  If one doesn't have food to last to the end of the next growing season, some bit of land and a good well with a way to power it, one is a mere hours or days away from refugee status.  Think it won't happen?  It has already happened / is happening.

I guess just like the deniers and the fundamentalists I got my crazy convictions too.  Mine are based on reality at least.

Answer 11

yes, we do.

that's why the EPA was created -- to attempt to mitigate some of the problems caused by industry, in their headlong rush for profits.

consider McDonalds.  they deal out food, and you get to pay to clean up the wrappers.  they pollute, the rest of us pay to enhance their profits.

it's the same with energy.  the EPA has forced electricity generators to clean up the mercury, SO2, and other pollutants in their exhaust.  it's only recently that the CO2 problem has come to widespread attention.  they will not be voluntarily paying to mitigate the effects.

to that, you need to add that climate change is a problem for every government, and every economy, not just ours.  it will not due to have some address the problem, and others not.  it will not due for first world countries to blame 3rd world countries for contributing to the problem.

from your article:  <<Perhaps we should work for some totally different economic system—I hear pretty regularly from a different breed of skeptic who insists we'll never solve our problems until we go "beyond capitalism.">>

last i looked, capitalism was still, by far, the most productive system.  self sufficient societies, like the Amish, can be more satisfying, but they're not about to compete in the same arena as free market capitalism.  but unbridled capitalism will dump all of the expenses it can get away with, on the rest of society.  that's why we're where we are, and why government does need some control over industry, and corporations.

Answer 12

Winston Churchill's quote came to mind as soon as I saw this. "it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time". Capitalism is a brutal and often unfair system. But it's better than anything else we've found. Compare our prosperity to any other period of human history and you'll see the benefits, but there are also costs, inequities, painful adjustments and so on.

A free market solution is the only one that will work in this case, and that's exactly the problem with the IPCC proposals. Everything is micro-managed by some UN agency or local political entity, telling companies and individuals what to do and what to refrain from doing. That's a recipe for failure and leaves the door open for a strong individual to take advantage of all that power laying around and make himself into a world-wide despot.

Rather than taxes and limits on carbon use, create incentives for going solar, for instance, like Germany has done. If we build enough solar cells the price will drop, the technology will mature and we'll be much better off. The same is true with fuel cells, hydrogen and electric cars. In a free market, the carrot often works while the stick does not.

The Mother Jones article treats nuclear power with disdain, which isn't surprising since it is Mother Jones, but why not research that option, find ways to reprocess waste and use more of the energy before discarding the fuel? If you have much less waste then that problem diminishes and can be solved.

They paint a picture of little self-sufficient villages but that's not how the modern world works. You can't got down to Al's Garage and have him make you a DVD player can you? One day we will, if nano-technology comes into wide use, but today you can only do that with a limited range of goods, mostly agricultural. Pointing out that our government is beholden to corporate interests is hardly revealing, the cost of political campaigns is ridiculously high and without that help nobody could get elected.

What exactly is beyond capitalism? There are only a handful of government and economy types, you can mix and match but basically all we have is what we had from the time of the Roman Republic. No innovation except for communism, which is really nothing but feudalism with better public relations, and the same with fascism. Dictatorships are nothing new. Certainly a powerful dictator could act on global warming and do everything you want him to do. The problem is that dictators tend to do whatever they want to do, without your individual input or consent. I suspect the "beyond capitalism" he envisions would resemble something one of the Marx brothers wrote about, the eldest named Karl.

**edit   K, is there a statute of limitations for societal guilt? How has anyone now living in the US oppressed the Natives? Should we continue to feel guilty over slavery, which no one living ever practiced or could have condoned? Why not blame the Romans for enslaving my ancestors? Who do I sue for reparations for that? Native Americans were nomads, that's a lifestyle not something to admire or denigrate, just the way they lived. If they'd faced less ruthless or well-armed foes they'd have won. They didn't, and history is full of stories like that so try to get over it.

Answer 13

Absolutely not.  Capitalism is the most efficient method to bring green products to the market place at prices that are competitive.

Gvmt mandates, like Ethanol have subsidized major corporations like ADM in building 101 ethanol plants in the USA with another 100 to come on line soon.

This has pushed the price of food up to levels outside the reach of the poor.  Corn is the major source for ethanol only because the farm belt grows corn, and politicians are just buying votes.  Other sources like sugar cane are far more efficient, however there are fewer voters for sugar products in the US.

Answer 14

Go live in a commune if you want to - the rest of us won't mind, but there's no point trying to convert people so socalism - it's not going to work.

Answer 15

I agree with Dr Blob:

"Indefinite growth is impossible, therefore free market cornucopian capitalism is fundamentally flawed and by definition can never be a long term sustainable solution."

It doesn't matter what economic system is in place, they are all overshadowed by consumerism and the belief that more is better: more square footage, more channels, more profit, more travel, more children, more obesity.  Until hairless apes get it through their thick skulls that they do not have dominion over nature but are a small part of it then there is little hope for true sustainability of the species.

And arguing economic theories won't help one iota. Understanding simple math might:  

"During each doubling time more is consumed than in all previous history combined!" (see 6:11 mark of video)

It isn't the big, bad companies that are destroying the Earth; it is the big, bad consumers!  Stop trying to pass the buck!

Answer 16

Given some of the responses, I have to wonder how many people actually took the time to read the article. The article brings up some good points. He seems to be advocating letting the market do what it does best (which is respond quickly), but using government to give it some direction.  Thankfully, we didn't let the free market build our Interstate highway system without any direction from government.

The "problem" with capitalism isn't the drive for profit and growth (that's all good), but the drive for continuous short-term profit and growth.  Many modern corporate boards and CEO's are simply too short-sited for their own (and the rest of the worlds) good.  Their economic horizon only extends to their own retirement. That's not the way great industries of the past were established and that's not the way new great renewable energy industries will be built.

Fortunately, some great capitalists like oilman T. Boone Pickens (who's building the worlds largest wind-power farm) and the Rockefeller family (who recently chastised Exxon for their lack of action toward renewable energy) are speaking up and starting to act.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080418/us_n...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24387781/

Answer 17

Capitalism is the state religion. The future of society will be something other tan capitalism, but for now, greed and the desire to outdo your neighbors and impress your friends and family while pretending to be an altruistic "blessed" Christian, is the driving force of the nation. It works better than anything else we've come up with though, despite being totally pathological.