The Impact Of Environmentalism On The Policies And Political Discourses
“The squeaky wheel gets the grease” is an American proverb that expresses the fact that only the most noticeable claims get attention. This is what environmentalism tries to do with the climate change. Trying to get the focus on the issue. One of the ways of getting it is by conquering the political discourse in order to get attention from all the political parties and ideologies. In this essay the different reactions to the irruption of the environmentalism will be described and interpreted. With the objective to show that in fact the fight against the climate change has already been established as a principle of the political speech.
To understand how the environmentalism has shaped the policies and political discourses it is necessary to acknowledge the roots of the movement. The political movement rises in the context of the Second Industrial Revolution, but it is possible to find ideas related to protecting the ecosystem even before such as in the Romanticism current of literature or in the ideas of some political theorists. One of example of this is Piotr Kropotkin, who was not only a very important anarchist and revolutionary, but also a naturalist and geographer. He had relevant works related to Siberia and Finland’s and Sweden’s glaciers.
Nevertheless, the inflection point in the growth of the environmentalism can be found in the 1970’s. As the economy and technology were developing, their impacts to the ecosystem were also growing. As an answer to this the first scientific publications began to appear, criticising, for example the uncontrolled use of pesticides and the effects in the biosphere and in humans. This is what Rachel Carson wrote in Silent Spring, an essential science book in the environmentalism. Furthermore, not only science was getting implicated but also social movements united in the counterculture phenomenon, such as the hippies.
Nowadays, since the beginning of the century, the environmentalism is a movement that has conquered the debates and it is growing daily, especially among the youngest generations who are going to face the gravest issues related to global warming and climatic change. However, how does this affect the political discourses and policies? To answer this question, it is mandatory to create a classification. The first step is knowing in which way the speaker confronts the concerns of the environmentalism, accepting them or denying them. The essay emphasises in the fact that the environmentalism has won the mediatic battle. Even the ones that deny the climate change, talk about it. Years before talking about it was strange and did not give any political benefit.
Before starting the analysis, it is necessary to clarify the fact that this essay assumes that the climate change is real, and it is caused mostly by the human activity. As said by the IPCC in the AR5: “Human influence has been detected in warming of the atmosphere and the ocean, in changes in the global water cycle, in reductions in snow and ice, in global mean sea level rise, and in changes in some climate extremes. It is extremely likely (95% – 100% probability) that human influence has been the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century. ” With this assumption, it is easily to comprehend why some political parties and politicians say that climate change is not real and refuse to accept the environmentalism as a guide to the future. It is not ignorance; it is protecting their interests. They do not have any kind of doubt or scientific backup, they have the support of big corporations or lobbies.
At least in Europe we can associate this speech to far right parties at least in Europe and to the most conservative part of the Republican Party in America. One of example of this is Donald Trump, the president of the USA. According to Mongue (2018) In his own Administration, there has been some reports about the reality of the climate change, such as the Fourth National Climate Assessment, an exhaustive text of more than 1600 pages that affirms the climate change is real and precisely analyses its effects on the American people. Trump said: “I don’t believe it”. This intervention of the president is not the first and probably would not be the last one. One of his most polemic speeches affirmed that the climate change was “an invention of China”. We surely know that is false, and I think he also does know it. Trump is trying to defend the interests of the USA economy and the big enterprises who fund his campaign. In the struggle to be the primary power against China, Trump does not want to be an environmentalist because he thinks that would mean losing a lot of his power. But analysing the implications of this discourse we can discover that paradoxically saying what it should be unpopular, benefits these politicians, not just Trump but also Bolsonaro and Salvini for example. It seems that nowadays in the post-truth politics it’s more beneficial to be recognised than to be popular or accurate.
Except the negationist parties, most parties have assimilated the environmentalism in a way. Even the right-wing ones. Although there are two positions on how to integrate environmentalism. The conservative parties tend to state that even though the climate change is real, it is wrong to be so frightened and we need more information. This discourse it’s part of what Fleming et al. (2014) defined as “logical discourse”. In their words: “A dominant construction of climate change presents the need for more information, or at least the need for a better understanding of available information. ” This thesis can lead to inaction for example the Popular Party in Spain, or quite the opposite as some European conservatives’ parties have demonstrated.
Among the liberals in the right-wing parties, plenty of them have assumed the environmentalism as an opportunity. They agree with the transition to renewable energies and they accept the climate change as a problem. But they have received many critics on the economic plan to fight against the climatic issue. This is the so-called “green capitalism” that focuses on small changes that want to reduce the impact in the Earth but keeping the productive system. In theory this would allow to keep the economic growth without harming nature. But from other sectors of the environmentalism this is considered as a failure, because it does not focus on the productive model as a problem. This is reflexed in their discourse. When talking about environmentalism the liberals try to commercialize the natural recourses and their measures sound more like a compendium than a real action plan.
Before talking about the left-parties, it is mandatory to mention the political ecology. That takes the scientific discipline to the politics sphere. This way of understanding the productive model it’s neither capitalist, but neither Marxist (at least in an orthodox way). This ideology puts the spotlight on the nature, not in the humanity. It is important to mention this current of thought because it has influenced both left and right discourses and furthermore the EGP, European Green Parties have gained a lot of power and influence in the European Parliament.
Related to the green parties, we can find the concept of “ecosocialism”. This ideology tries to mix the critics to the capitalism typical of the socialism with the new ideas from the ecologism. This idea is the base of the left-parties that have integrated the environmentalism in their way of thinking. These parties agree in the fact that the capitalism is the root of the climate change and they must implant a new productive system in order to solve the current crisis. The thing is that the differ in how to do it and in what new system implement. Their discourse might sound more radical, direct and sometimes catastrophic. One type of this new-eco-left focus more on individual changes of lifestyle, such as veganism, breaking with their Marxist past that would centre in the bigger structure. Many of them have connections with NGO and incorporate the idea of immediate and direct action via civil disobedience. Sometimes from the science they suffer critics, because of their belligerent position against the nuclear energies. They argue that the energetic model should change 100% to renewable energy, but many physicists reply that even though that is the final goal, it is now impossible.
To conclude, the environmentalism as a political ideology has established itself in every aspect of the political discourse. Every party and candidate must be prepared to suggest solutions to the problem of the climate change. Some of them go for to the easy solution of evading the problem (maybe with the intention of obtaining benefit in a way), and others try to focus on how to confront the current problematic. It has been reviewed every aspect of the different solutions that the different ideologies give to the problem, and how that shapes the way the act and communicate with their potential voters. I think even though the environmentalism must grow even more, it has already won by infiltrating in every aspect of the discourse. And that means that our species maybe has an opportunity to fight back against the climate change that we have created. It is our duty to comprehend the environmentalism or to disappear.
