To move onto an environmentally safer path

I want to talk about what goes under the name “anthropogenic global warming” (AGW). I hope I have impressed you enough with that opening, using big words like “anthropogenic”. The word simply means that the warming of the earth, as science witnesses and discerns with increasing confidence, is human induced.

No reader, I am not talking down to you. Read further to understand why I had to start at that level, with a measure of condescension I do not feel comfortable showing. What more, I am not any more informed on climate change matters than the next person. Yet, there is a reason for the tone of this post thus far.

The article in The Hindu of October 19, 2012 entitled Clear the smog around climate change information by Samir Nazareth [1] impelled me to take that tone. I found myself nodding my head at a few things in that piece. There are also many places I could not help but shake my head vigorously. Let me share with you my nods and shakes, many more of the latter.

Nazareth says that the Indian government is not taking efforts to spread the news about climate change and global warming among the citizens. The strapline: “A survey reveals that people think governments at spreading the word about global warming are inadequate.”

About the survey, no details other than the size of the sample, and no breakups – “4,031 adults from rural and urban India” – are forthcoming. We are in the dark about who undertook the survey, who commissioned it, government agencies or private parties, what is the confidence level of the numbers.

There could be some truth to the claim in the strap line. I nod my head, even if only lightly perceptible. But, I am shaking my head when I read, “Only seven percent of those sampled knew a lot about global warming,” and subsequently this: “Does leaving the people in the dark have a feudal basis? Not divulging information is one way of retaining power and maintaining status quo.” On the assertion, given later, no contest. But, it carries no specifics as regards the issue at hand.  On the earlier sentence, however, it is merely from the population’s lack of knowledge about AGW the writer has jumped right into blaming the political and business interests for such ignorance. And, as far as I can say, from the write-up there is not a shred of evidence for this leap.

“In a follow-up question, when the respondents were given a brief explanation of what global warming was, 72 per cent of the total believed it was happening.” Recall how I criticized the lack of details on the survey. If a mere briefing on global warming, even in the absence of actions of an active government, could sway at least 41% (who had earlier admitted to no knowledge or said “I don’t know”) of people to jump over the fence on global warming, the globe must have stopped warming already! We needed to be aware of at least minimalist details on the brief on global warming given to the respondents for us to make sense of this remarkable shift in belief.

This is the problem with the article – the reader has no clue as to the motivations behind the survey. And, we all know how surveys are always subjective – frame the questions to get the answers one desires! I believe I have justified my head-shaking.

In the newspaper article we read that “Fifty-six (sic) per cent of the respondents [to the survey] pointed the finger at human activities when asked about the cause of global warming.” That must have been one strong briefing! I know. I have had to bring in all my powers of persuasion to make a dent in the minds of the climate skeptical audience in conversations on AGW. Here, a mere briefing did the job, many times better! I need to read a transcript of that briefing.

Going beyond, I have to ask, whence this 56%? Did all of the 41% have the Road to Damascus experience? Say yes. Then, add in the original seven per cent. I still have an eight per cent deficit that could be filled in only by conversions from the committed skeptics. Wow, my faith in the briefing went stratospheric! But my head has not stopped shaking since the first and only nod so far.

70% of the respondents also said that there should be a national effort to inform the citizens on global warming. Again, it is to the government that the respondents, at least 41% of them, appear to be appealing. Why can we not read up on AGW on our own? Why should we be spoon fed? Yes, global warming is not an easy matter. Everything we know cannot be distilled any finer than at the level of probabilities. There are no certainties in AGW. But that cannot be the defense for not learning. It can be no one’s position that she does not understand AGW and hence it does not exist. This is a head shake for me.

It can be inferred that 38% of “Indians want the government to play a more proactive and positive role in the climate negotiations.” These negotiations, you may note, need not necessarily be limited to inter-governmental; these can be between the citizen and the government also. Then, is this not ironical, on the one hand we are pillorying the government for its corrupt ways and on the other, we are asking it to stand behind something that at least 93% of the citizenry is not committed to? We want the corrupt government, or its corrupt successor whoever it may be, to lead us into the promised land of environmental bliss. Am I missing something? Do I understand things correctly? My head is shaking still.

Nazareth wants more prominent “Green” information on consumer products, under the mandate of the government, it can be inferred. My question: why can he not have addressed this question to the producers directly and explicitly? What is in it for the companies to lose? Perhaps less space for useless pictures of fetching females? That is how cynical I got while reading. 

To get my head to stand still, I will shift from the article to the real thing, anthropogenic global warming. This is a global commons issue, but one that has not been treated so by the industrialized nations up until a few years ago. Carbon space in the environment was and had stayed “enclosed” by the European countries and the US from the onset of industrialization for their growth, no matter the perils posed to the other nations.

The US is still decidedly and deliberately ignorant of the global effects of the CO₂ it is spewing into the atmosphere. The rest of the globe cannot compensate for its profligate ways. It must be a global “ownership” because the problem is global, recognizing no boundaries, between nations, between land and water, between humans and non-human living things. But, it is only humans who can take “ownership”.

There is no one in particular who should take “ownership”. It is everyone’s responsibility, which, of course, implies that it is no one’s. But that is facile. It is the responsibility of each and every one of us. Let us not be taken in by the siren song of the nation reducing its carbon emissions by whatever percentage. This commitment, as we are witnessing worldwide, will be breached more often than not.

Remember, the nation is impotent. It is its citizens, you and me, who must take “ownership” of the nation’s responsibility for the global commons. We cannot leave it to our political masters, working through and around a political system that in itself may not be robust enough for the task ahead. We cannot just be looking to the government from outside and point to that overused word, “reforms”. It is us, each one of us, who should reform, in our habits, in our thinking.

No national survey is going to give us the comfort that we seek in being celebrated for the national performance on “Green” development and economic growth, even if there is anything to be celebrated.

An article such as the one I have shaken my head at for the most part is no pointer to the direction in which we should move. I tend to believe that even if I get my hand on the survey itself, I will not be too satisfied. It is only We have to move inside ourselves, inside our minds. We have to reduce our consumption but without sacrificing economic growth. Globalization of trade and the global environment demand this high wire act.

The article wants us to enjoy watching the government precariously balanced on the wire whereas I am asking each of us to climb on to it. What will it be?

Raghuram Ekambaram

References

http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/clear-the-smog-around-climate-change-information/article4010137.ece