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THE CLIMATE REVOLUTION PODCAST EPISODE 8:
The path to a green economy
Transforming the economic system to protect both nature and ourselves.
This 8th episode in The Climate Revolution podcast series explores the urgent need for community mobilisation and system change in the face of the climate and other emergencies. This requires an understanding of how the economy functions in our society, and an examination of the failures of the current economic system, especially the flaws of neoclassical economics, and the inadequacies of GDP as a measure of well-being.
The speakers emphasise the need for systemic change, drawing on examples from Denmark and advocating for a new economy that prioritises social justice and environmental sustainability.
Brief bios
Dr Mark Diesendorf is Honorary Associate Professor in Environment and Society at UNSW Sydney. Previously he was Professor of Environmental Science and Founding Director of the Institute for Sustainable Futures at University of Technology Sydney. His latest book, co-authored by Rod Taylor, is The Path to a Sustainable Civilisation: Technological, socioeconomic and political change (Palgrave Macmillan, 2023).
Dr Geoff Davies is a scientist, author and commentator. He is a retired Senior Fellow in Geophysics at the Australian National University. In critiquing conventional economics, he is the author of Economia (2004), Economy, Society, Nature: An introduction to the new systems-based, life-friendly economics (2019) and A New Australia: Discarding delusions and organising for the wellbeing of all (2023).
Dr Marilyn Waring CNZM is a New Zealand feminist, former politician, author, academic, and activist for female human rights and environmental issues. Since 2006, she has been Professor of Public Policy at AUT in Auckland, New Zealand, focusing on governance and public policy, political economy, gender analysis, and human rights. Her books include If Women Counted: A new feminist economics (1988) (also published as Counting for Nothing: What men value and what women are worth), and Still Counting: Wellbeing, women’s work and policy making (2018).
Dr Steven Hail is a modern monetary theory economist at Modern Money Lab and an Associate Professor at Torrens University, Australia. He is the author of Economics for Sustainable Prosperity (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018). He also has extensive experience of training banking and financial service professionals in the United Kingdom, including staff from the Bank of England.
INDEX – Content of this podcast episode
00:00 Imagining a sustainable future
02:46 The climate crisis and its impacts
06:09 The economic system and climate change
09:04 Challenging neoclassical economics
11:54 Geoff Davies: Exploring solutions for a sustainable economy
15:01 Rethinking wealth and corporations
17:58 Marilyn Waring: The flaws of GDP as a measure
20:51 Alternative measures of well-being
24:07 The role of time use in well-being
26:56 International organisations and well-being
29:53 Designing a new economy
32:49 Financing the green transition
36:14 Community action and political change
39:05 The Danish model of social democracy
41:57 Steven Hail: The role of government in economic change
45:04 The importance of resource management
47:56 Building community power
50:54 The path to a sustainable civilisation
54:11 Envisioning a better society
57:13 The call for systemic change
for systemic economic change to secure a sustainable and just future.
Photo: Scientists Rebellion in Glasgow, UK.
Imagining a new path
Dr Mark Diesendorf has a plan for how we solve the climate crisis and other major threats to civilisation and the planet. Changing the economic system is an important part of it.
Imagine a world where human-induced climate change has ceased, the environment supports life with renewed vitality, and society thrives in fairness, peace, and justice. These are essential goals in our fight against the climate crisis and other major environmental threats, and for a better society.
“We are rapidly reaching the point of no return for the planet,” warns UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. This stark reality frames our discussion about the economic system’s role in driving the destruction of our life support system, the environment. The failures of the current economic paradigm, rooted in neoclassical economics, extend beyond environmental harm to exacerbate social inequality, loss of human rights and democratic decision-making, and the frequency and impacts of wars.
Dr Mark Diesendorf, Honorary Associate Professor in Environment and Society at UNSW Sydney in Australia, critiques this flawed system, noting, “The economic system provides a false rationale for powerful individuals and corporations to exploit the environment and increase social inequality.”
Challenging GDP and neoclassical economics
Key among the harmful ideologies is the belief in endless growth on a finite planet – a fallacy driving environmental destruction and resource depletion.
GDP, often lauded as a measure of societal progress, falls woefully short as a tool for public policymaking. Dr Marilyn Waring, a feminist academic, public policy expert and former minister in New Zealand, explains: “GDP treats the environment as if it exists only to be exploited. It doesn’t account for unpaid work, often the backbone of communities, nor does it distinguish between positive and destructive economic activities.”
Dr Geoff Davies, a retired research scientist turned economic thinker, echoes this critique: “Mainstream economics misidentifies the nature of an economy. It’s not a system that naturally equilibrates; rather, it’s fraught with instabilities.”
Both experts call for a shift towards indicators that reflect genuine wellbeing and environmental health.
The Danish example
Denmark offers an inspiring example of a nation prioritising social justice and environmental sustainability. Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen encapsulates this ethos: “It’s not due to luck that Denmark is one of the richest, most equal, and secure societies. It’s the result of political choices and a strong social contract. We’ve tried to extract the best aspects of capitalism, such as enterprise and profits, while curbing the greediest and the most harmful sides. The gains have been shared more fairly and reinvested in a strong community.”
Podcast host Mik Aidt highlights Denmark’s approach to the green transition, where renewable energy, strong worker protections, and universal social services are integral to the national framework. These measures demonstrate that systemic change is not only achievable but also beneficial.
Financing the green transition
The question of financing such a transformation often raises concerns. Dr Steven Hail, a modern monetary theory economist, clarifies: “Federal governments are currency issuers. They create money with every dollar spent.” While this capacity removes funding constraints, it demands careful management to avoid inflation and ensure resources are allocated effectively.
Hail advocates for an audit of Australia’s real resources – labour, technology, and institutional capacity – to strategically direct investments. This approach not only facilitates the green transition but also builds the infrastructure for a post-growth economy.
Building a movement for change
The path to systemic change lies in community mobilisation. Dr Diesendorf emphasises the need for alliances between diverse groups – environmentalists, human rights advocates, social justice and peace organisations – to challenge vested interests.
“The strategy is two-pronged: combat the power of vested interests and campaign for positive socio-economic changes,” he asserts.
Echoing this sentiment, George Monbiot argues, “We have to overthrow the system eating the planet with perpetual growth. Rewilding and ecological restoration can draw down significant carbon dioxide while reversing ecological collapse.”
Envisioning a better society
What could a successful transition look like? Dr Diesendorf paints a picture of a sustainable civilisation: “It would protect the environment, be socially just, and foster peace. It’s not utopia but a better, more equitable society.”
To achieve this vision, he outlines key steps that, taken together, could create radical socioeconomic change:
- Implement wellbeing indicators beyond GDP
- Establish a national audit and planning commission with community input
- Expand universal public services and introduce a job guarantee
- Strengthen worker rights and regulate corporate influence
- Redirect subsidies from polluting industries to sustainable ventures
- Promote a circular economy
These measures, inspired by successful models like Denmark’s, demonstrate that systemic change is within reach.
Collective action
The climate revolution requires a unified movement advocating for transformative change. “Find your role and contribute with your strengths,” urges Aidt. From rethinking economic metrics to mobilising community power, the journey towards a sustainable future begins with collective action.
As Sir David Attenborough wisely states, “Self-interest is for the past. Common interest is for the future.” Let us heed this call and build a safer and more peaceful world where all living beings on this planet thrive in harmony.
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Music in this episode
00:00-00:28 Wayne Jones: ‘A Quiet Thought’
00:51-01:12 Alex Aidt: ‘Icecream’ (also 59:21-59:52)
01:12-01:44 Twin Musicom: ‘A Dream Within a Dream’ (also 03:18-03:34)
01:47-02:48 Serge Pavkin: ‘Dawn’
02:51-03:19 Unicorn Heads: ‘Wolf Moon’
03:58-04:22 Wayne Jones: ‘Connection’ (also 49:20-49:56, 56:24-57:36)
04:20-05:19 DSTechnician: ‘Robotic Dreams’ (also 11:04-12:20, 19:46-20:28, 32:14-33:12, 41:51-42:38)
54:57-56:15 Joel Cummins: ‘Everything Has a Beginning’
A big thank you to the musicians for allowing us to use this music in the podcast.
Listening tip
If you think an hour-long podcast is too long for you, we recommend you think about it diffently. The overall idea with us doing these long podcasts (we’ve done 570 of them by now, and they are all one hour long) is that our listeners listen to them for instance when they are in transport – sitting in a car or a train – and press the pause button in the podcast player when they reach their destination. Then next time they are back in transport, they press play and continue listening from where they left.
In other words, cut it up in smaller bits which are suitable to your life. You, or your transport situation, decide where to break the hour up in those smaller bits.
. . .
→ Subscribe to The Climate Revolution series via The Sustainable Hour’s podcast account in Apple Podcast
A Strategy for Resisting the Vested Interests Driving the Collapse of the Biosphere and Civilisation
By Mark Diesendorf *
School of Humanities & Languages, UNSW Sydney, Sydney 2052, Australia
* Corresponding author. E-mail: m.diesendorf@unsw.edu.au (M.D.)
Received: 14 January 2025; Accepted: 10 March 2025; Available online: 17 March 2025
ABSTRACT: The biosphere and civilisation are facing existential and other major threats: climate change, biodiversity loss, nuclear war, social inequality/injustice, loss of human rights, and autocracy. These threats are driven by politically powerful vested interests supported by an economic system based on the exploitation of the environment and most people for the benefit of a wealthy minority. This article proposes a strategy to resist and weaken state capture, i.e., the influence of the vested interests driving the principal threats, while simultaneously facilitating the transition to a sustainable society. Despite the achievements of diverse community-based non-government organisations (CNGOs) campaigning on specific issues, scientists are now warning of the potential collapse of civilisation. As the threats are linked together in several ways, I propose a strategy to address them together to yield multiple benefits, supplementing campaigns on individual issues. A broad social movement—comprising an alliance between CNGOs devoted to the environment, social justice, human rights, and peace—could exert sufficient political power to expose and defeat the methods of state capture. Simultaneously, the movement could gain widespread community support by campaigning for a well-being economy, including universal basic services and a job guarantee, thus facilitating the transition to an ecologically sustainable, more socially just, and more peaceful civilisation.
INSPIRATIONAL
Other publications, posts and videos relating to this topic
Reducing greenhouse gas pollution, ecosystem degradation, and biodiversity loss and restoring land could have an estimated $140 trillion of benefit annually – a third more than the entire 2023 global GDP.
BOOKS
Mark Diesendorf & Rod Taylor:
‘The Path to a Sustainable Civilisation
– Technological, Socioeconomical and Political Change’
www.sustainablecivilisation.com
“The way out of our black hole is to build social movements to pressure government and big business, to weaken the power of vested interests and strengthen democratic decision-making. This must be done with actions on climate, energy, natural resources and social justice. Our goal is an ecologically sustainable, socially just civilisation.”
~ Authors Mark Diesendorf and Rod Taylor
Dieter Helm:
‘Legacy – How to build the sustainable economy’
Cambridge University Press, October 2023
www.cambridge.org – PDF
“What is not sustainable will not be sustained. We are either going to have to change the fundamentals of our economies and sort out the pollution we cause and the erosion of the fundamental natural capital, or we will face the disaster of much more warming and the consequences of losing a lot more of earth’s rich biodiversity. There is simply no escape. Utopia or dystopia: we can choose which path we want to be on.”
~ Author Dieter Helm, Oxford University
Economists ‘externalise’ the environment
“The economics toolbox is still remarkably reliant on the theories developed almost 100 years ago, in the years of high theory of the 1920s and 1930s, an intellectual world view created by names still familiar today and who continue to dominate our economic debates, like John Maynard Keynes and Friedrich von Hayek and others perhaps less familiar like John Hicks. Today’s economists and the textbooks that set out their ideas are heirs to this older tradition. Their great theories have dominated economic policy debates ever since: in privatisation, liberalisation and competition; in the debate between monetarists and Keynesians; and most recently in the responses to the great financial crash and the shock of Covid. It is the ghosts of Keynes, Hayek and Hicks that lurk behind today’s economists’ prescriptions. None had a primary concern with the environment.”
~ Dieter Helm, in his book ‘Legacy’
UNIVERSAL BASIC INCOME
Finland’s two-year test of universal basic income concluded that it doesn’t seem to disincentivise working, and benefits recipients’ mental and financial wellbeing.
The world’s most robust study of universal basic income has concluded that it boosts recipients’ mental and financial well-being, as well as modestly improving employment.
Finland ran a two-year universal basic income study in 2017 and 2018, during which the government gave 2000 unemployed people aged between 25 and 58 monthly payments with no strings attached.
→ New Scientist – 6 May 2020:
Universal basic income seems to improve employment and well-being
THE PROBLEM WITH GDP
“Instead of GDP and the cash-based national accounts which tell us very little about the underlying state of the primary assets, the sustainable economy needs very different accounts. Accounts should answer the question as to whether the economy is on a sustainable path, and whether current consumption is consistent with leaving the next generation with a set of assets at least as good as those we inherited.
GDP won’t tell you this. Conventional economists look at the flows of goods and services, the flows of expenditures and the flows of incomes. The sustainable economy starts with the balance sheet of the assets and asks how well the stocks of these assets are being stewarded. In the example above, it is about the stocks of fish, not just how many we are catching. The former can be declining while the catches are going up, increasing GDP.
These accounts are anything but boring. Accounts shine a torch on what is going on. There should be a continuous updating on the state of the primary building blocks of the economy, an exercise that is more like William the Conqueror’s Domesday Book than estimating GDP. Accounts should tell us every year how well we are doing in sustaining the primary assets. The balance sheet should be net of maintaining the assets, of any spending necessary to fix damage to the climate, to biodiversity, to the energy systems and to other core utility system networks in perpetuity. These costs of maintenance should be a charge to the nation’s current account, analogous to a business’s profit and loss account.
What might look like an arcane accounting detail has really radical implications in the sustainable economy. What is left for us to spend now is net of having first made good any damage we have done. If you own a house and have neglected to fix a hole in the roof, you will not pretend that you are better off and can spend more because the money has not been spent on fixing the roof. On the contrary, your house would be worth less; you would in effect be eating up your capital, mortgaging the future for the benefit of your spending today. Try constructing your own household balance sheet and see how many assets you have to fall back on.”
~ Dieter Helm, in his book ‘Legacy’
The choice we have: growth – or a habitable planet
“A week ago the UK Chancellor said the quiet bit out loud – and I can’t believe it took me until today to realise it. She said the pursuit of growth trumps the government’s net zero commitments.
That growth is UK government’s number one mission.
Asked what she would do if faced with a choice between economic growth and the UK’s 2050 net zero target, Reeves said: “If it’s the number one mission, it’s obviously the most important thing.”
What’s interesting is that none of us seemed to notice how huge this is, immediately.
It was said in the context of expanding Heathrow, and we were all so shocked that she would support something that is so blatantly harmful, that we didn’t see the bigger picture.
Normally we’re sold the nonsense that growth is compatible with net zero – that it is compatible with minimising climate change and all the other environmental collapses happening around us.
Economists and governments usually ask us to suspend our understanding of some pretty basic laws of maths, ecology and common sense, in order to believe that infinite growth is possible on a planet with finite resources.
But Reeves’ comments imply something different.
Reeves appears to be acknowledging reality. That there is a choice to make: growth or climate.
Net zero was never achievable alongside infinite growth.
But that’s remained the elephant in the room. The quiet bit that politicians and business ‘leaders’ don’t say out loud.
But the cat is out of the bag. It looks like the Chancellor is finally saying it.
Reeves has shown the choice we have: growth – or a habitable planet.
Reeves has made it clear that she will prioritise growth. But that’s not a bad thing. Because it opens up a conversation that has been consistently shut down at governmental level. Pandora’s Box has been opened.
Thank you, Chancellor.”
~ Jane Shaw
Ethical marketer, trainer & journalist
→ ABC News – 4 December 2024:
Australia’s economy growing at slowest pace in decades, propped up by government spending
“Australia’s economy recorded its weakest annual growth rate in decades in the September quarter, outside of the pandemic. Private demand was negative, with overall economic activity being propped up by government spending.”
→ National Bureau of Economic Research – May 2024:
The Macroeconomic Impact of Climate Change: Global vs. Local Temperature
“The National Bureau of Economic Research found that every 1 degree C of warming reduces world GDP by 12 per cent.”
→ The Conversation – 31 March 2025:
Climate change isn’t fair but Tony Juniper’s new book explains how a green transition could be ‘just’
“Inequality – between the rich and poor or between the powerful and the weak – is the main factor stalling action on environmental problems including biodiversity loss, pollution and climate change, according to British environmentalist Tony Juniper.”
GETUP! NEWSLETTER ON 20 JANUARY 2025:
Today’s report from Oxfam reveals a sobering truth: 60% of billionaire wealth is built on systems hardwired in their favour, with 18% driven by corporate monopolies.1 These systems don’t create wealth – they extract it, rewarding corporations while leaving ordinary people behind.
Here in Australia, corporations have squeezed $98 billion in excess profits from everyday people during recent crises. We know families are skipping meals, struggling to pay rent and mortgages, while wages remain stagnant. Yet our major parties are stuck on short-term fixes instead of committing to long-term, systemic reform.2
But this election is a chance to demand real change. When politicians start looking ahead to the polls, they listen more closely to the people they represent.
Now is our chance to tell them what really matters and to demand billionaires and corporations pay their fair share. This coming election, we need to demand a government that can reshape the economy to prioritise people over profit – investing in housing, healthcare, and education to create a future where everyone can thrive.
Monopoly power fuels billionaire wealth: Monopolies allow a few large corporations to dominate entire industries, with devastating consequences for fairness, competition, and everyday people:
Here’s the problem:
- Market domination: When a few companies control an industry, they can dictate prices, wages, and the availability of goods and services.
- Price-gouging: Without competition, monopolies charge higher prices because consumers have few alternatives. Basic goods and services become unaffordable for many. 3
- Exploitative practices: Workers, especially in global supply chains, are underpaid, while monopolies extract massive profits. Suppliers are forced into unfair contracts, and consumers are left with fewer choices.4
- Tax havens and loopholes siphon wealth from governments worldwide, with over 70% of corporate tax abuse happening in OECD countries or their dependencies.5
These systems aren’t accidents – they’re deliberate, built to maintain power and protect profits while everyday people pay the price.
Imagine an Australia where corporations and billionaires finally pay their fair share and where everyone can access a good standard of living including food on the table, and a home to enjoy with friends and family, without being exploited by big corporations.
This election is our chance to call for a fairer future. Will you join us – demanding the incoming government commits to a fair and balanced tax system, and we’ll deliver it to key candidates in the upcoming election.
Jane and Raisa, for the GetUp team
P.S. Fighting for a fair and balanced tax system is a key part of our People Over Profit campaign. Together, we’re sending a clear message to our leaders: it’s time to put people over profits. Will you chip in to help power this critical work?
References:
[1] Billionaire wealth rises $3 trillion in 2024, at a rate three times faster than year before, Oxfam finds, ABC News, 20 January 2025.
[2] Liberals dangle tax breaks for business lunches as leaders target marginal seats, The Guardian, 19 January 2025.
[3]Inquiry into price goughing and unfair pricing practices, Australian Council of Trade Unions, February 2024
[4]Takers, Not Makers, Oxfam International, January 2025
[5]Nearly $500 billion lost yearly to global tax abuse due mostly to corporations, new analysis says, International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, November 19, 2021
Degrowth in the news
“Recent articles in major newspapers – including The New York Times, The Guardian, and The Wall Street Journal – explore the possibility that deliberately shrinking our economy could forestall environmental catastrophe while still delivering the necessities of life to a populace currently hooked on perpetual industrial expansion. Why is degrowth increasingly in the news?
At the heart of the degrowth argument is a simple observation: continual growth in the use of materials and energy would lead fairly quickly to absurdly high numbers that could never be sustained in the real world. For example, in the last couple of centuries, humanity’s usage of energy grew at about 3 percent per year. If that rate of growth were to continue, regardless what energy sources we used, the planet’s surface would reach boiling temperature in about 400 years – not due to the greenhouse effect, but to the simple thermodynamic impacts of so much energy being transferred.”
~ Richard Heinberg, Resilience
→ Resilience – 31 October 2024:
To Grow or Not to Grow: That Isn’t the Question
“In this article, we will review the growth-versus-degrowth debate and explore why and where the degrowth alternative is taking root. We’ll explore the wide range of degrowth objectives and strategies. And finally, we’ll see why it’s only a matter of time before involuntary degrowth commences, and why advocating for voluntary degrowth makes sense now, even if nature-imposed contraction will come first.”
“A chicken can only lay a finite number of eggs; an avocado tree can only produce so much fruit. Our economic models are built on the assumption of endless growth. There is something fundamentally flawed about this equation.”
~ Harris Sockel
Calling univ profs & lecturers! If you want to bring concepts from Doughnut Economics into your teaching, we've just launched a webpage bursting with resources for you: 7 slide decks, reading lists, videos & activities – all open access. Dive in & pls reshare! doughnuteconomics.org/university-c…
— Kate Raworth (@kateraworth.bsky.social) November 25, 2024 at 11:17 PM
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Regarding climate justice, most people underestimate the carbon impacts of the richest www.nature.com/articles/s41…
— BONUS (@thedisproof.bsky.social) December 4, 2024 at 5:55 PM
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YES! The #G20 Summit in Rio just reaffirmed the commitment to tax the ultra-wealthy more to fund urgent climate and social initiatives. This progressive taxation is seen as a key tool to reduce inequality & support the #SDGs. www.edie.net/g20-nations-… #WealthTax #TaxTheRich #PovertyEradication
— Millionaires for Humanity (@mills4humanity.bsky.social) November 20, 2024 at 11:50 PM
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"There is an element here of redistribution of wealth that… has been demanded by our citizens. So we have to somehow respond," says Spain's economy minister. We know there's strong global support for a #WealthTax – it's time to #TaxTheSuperRich. www.theguardian.com/…
— Earth4All (@earth4all.bsky.social) November 19, 2024 at 9:15 PM
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More than ⅔ of people surveyed in G20 countries agree: the rich should pay a higher tax on their wealth. With world leaders meeting at #G20Brasil this week, we're calling on them to #TaxTheSuperRich. Learn more ⏩ sayitwithmenow.org
— Earth4All (@earth4all.bsky.social) November 19, 2024 at 6:45 PM
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Full transcript
Dr Mark Diesendorf:
Imagine a world where we have stopped human-induced climate change, where we have an environment that is much, much cleaner and can support continuing life on Earth. Imagine a world which is more socially just, which has stronger human rights, and is more peaceful. That’s what we’re looking for.
Antonio Guterres, UN Secretary-General:
We are rapidly reaching the point of no return for the planet.
Marvel Movie clip – Kaorg speaks with Thor, who asks: ‘How did you end up in here?’ ‘Oh, well, I tried to start a revolution but didn’t print enough pamphlets. So hardly anyone turned up, except for my mum and her boyfriend who I hate. But I’m actually organising another revolution – don’t know if you’d be interested in something like that? Do you reckon you’d be interested?
Female voice:
The climate revolution
Mik Aidt:
Welcome to this special edition of The Sustainable Hour.
9News reporter:
Emergency crews are right now searching for any survivors after devastating floods swamped towns and streets in Spain.
ABC News reporter:
Frustration and desperation is growing.
Female voice – Spanish flood victim:
We are not thieves but we have to eat. What can I give to the child?
Male voice – Spanish flood victim:
No one in this area can contact each other because we have no internet.
9News reporter:
Authorities are also warning that there are likely people’s bodies in the cars that have been washed up on top of one another. The deaths, they’re going to touch everyone in these communities in the Valencia region of Spain. In one town alone, 40 people have lost their lives in this flooding…
Mik:
They’re not coming to save us, are they, our leaders? They’re not fixing the problems as we thought they eventually would. Because that’s their job, isn’t it? That’s why we have voted them in, in parliament, to protect us, the people, against climate breakdown, rising inequalities, cost of living trouble. Now a dying Great Barrier Reef, species going extinct, plastic coming into our bloodstream, all this, the list is long.
ABC News:
A state of emergency has been declared in New Zealand after Cyclone Gabriel brought heavy rain…
Sir David Attenborough:
We will face the collapse of everything that gives us our security.
Antonio Guterres, Secretary-General:
The longer we wait, the harder it will become. This report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is a file of shame, cataloguing the empty pledges that put us firmly on track towards an unlivable world.
…towards an unlivable world.
Marvel movie clip:
‘How bad is it?’ ‘That’s the problem, sir. We don’t know.’
Mik:
What if all these are connected? For instance, what if we actually can’t have any hope of fixing the climate problem without attending some of the other problems that are built into our system?
What we CAN see now is that the climate activation that I personally have been part of for more than a decade now so far hasn’t even made the tiniest dent in the rising CO2 parts per million curve. It just keeps going up, doesn’t it? And up and up. Every day, every month, every year. No matter how much we protest, no matter how much we’re banging on the doors of our leaders. And our leaders are, so far, allowing all this to happen.
Monty Python movie clip:
‘You seek the Holy Grail?’ ‘That is our quest. Our quest is to find the Holy Grail.’ ‘Yes, it is.’ ‘Yeah.’ ‘ And so we’re looking for it.’ ‘Yes, we are.’ ‘We have been for some time.’ ‘Ages.’
Mik:
So, enter the climate revolution. And when we talk about revolution, it implies something deeper. So much more serious changes, not just in politics, but in culture – and maybe most importantly, in our economy.
And that’ll be the focus of this particular episode of The Climate Revolution: The economy. The economy and how it drives those decisions about climate and all the other things. All those terrible misguided, short-sighted decisions that shape our world.
ABC News reporter Melissa Clark:
The government is feeling triumphant. It’s manoeuvring in the Parliament, delivering policy wins. But it has a wary eye on economic conditions knowing slow growth, stubborn inflation and static interest rates could undo its political progress.
Mik:
Those who’ve been listening to this series, The Climate Revolution, will remember that we have been talking about economy and culture before. And that was when we had Dr. Mark Diesendorf in the studio. It’s about a year ago, I think, when he had just published a new book titled ‘The Path to a Sustainable Civilisation.’
Mark, let’s get straight to it. How was your book received and did that trigger something? And where’s your thinking today now that a year has gone by?
Mark:
Good day, Mik. Well, to follow up on the book publication, my co-author and I have been giving talks around the country. And for the people who came to those talks, it’s been very well received.
However, we also tried very hard to get some publicity, in the ABC and other mainstream media. And my university, the University of New South Wales, put out a press release that went everywhere. And would you believe the reaction was: zero, from the mainstream media. So for the people who are concerned, the reaction has been very good. But for the mainstream media, we’ve got a long way to go.
Mik:
And so, Mark, a year has gone by and has your thinking changed in that year?
Mark:
My thinking has evolved quite a bit, and I’ve actually been working very hard in the past year. What’s happened is: First on the academic side, I brought together a team of five sustainability scientists and one ecological economist. And with great difficulty, we have published a major paper in a leading international peer-reviewed journal, which is critiquing the current economic system.
In particular, it’s critiquing neoclassical economics, which is supposed to be the theory underlying neoliberalism, which is the ideology that governs the Australian government, and most governments around the world.
So that’s only been published fairly recently, and it wasn’t easy to find a journal, a leading journal, that would publish it.
So we’re now waiting for reactions, because the reactions of conventional leading economists… usually, first they ignore you, then they attack you. And as the saying goes, hopefully in the long run, then we win.
Mik:
Yeah, I think we will win, Mark. It’s only a question how long time is it going to take before we win. So, Mark, what you’re saying is: this economic system we have at the moment is rooted in this neoclassical economics. And that’s the driving force behind all that destruction that we are witnessing, the climate breakdown, the flooding, the bushfires, the rising waters because of ice melting and all that – as well as cost of living crisis and increasing inequality in society, with a very rich elite and lot of people struggling at the bottom.
Mark:
The economic system provides the false rationale for very powerful individuals and powerful corporations to continue to exploit the environment and to increase social inequality. And they do this by a number of myths or ideologies that they have spread, which have been unfortunately widely adopted by governments, oppositions, public service and the media. One obvious example is the notion that endless growth on a finite planet is feasible and even desirable. And of course, this is a major source of environmental destruction. Endless growth in the use of energy, even if it’s renewables, and the use of materials. But it gets worse.
There are other ideologies. One is that we should shrink government and the public service and leave all our major decisions to the market. But the problem with that is, of course, that the market is controlled by the 1 per cent or even more specifically by the 0.1 per cent of rich individuals and corporations. The market is not free and that results in both environmental damage and social inequality.
I could go on, there are other ideologies, the notion that the market gives the value of everything. But of course, as we know, the market doesn’t deal with unpaid work, it doesn’t deal with some of the essential plants and animals in the environment that without them, we couldn’t survive. Another myth is that wealth and income just trickle down from the rich to the poor and that has been refuted by major empirical studies for example a recent one done for all the OECD countries, that is the rich the relatively rich countries of the world, over a 50 year period and that study finds that there is no gain if you give tax deductions to the rich there is no gain in employment.
And there’s no gain in GDP if you believe that GDP is important for the economy. So it’s one more of these ridiculous myths that dominates the system and in fact give licence to those who control the market, to the rich and powerful individuals and corporations. They have licence from these myths, from these ideologies, to continue with their destructive activities, whether it’s environmental destruction, social inequality, or war, for example. And we mustn’t forget the weapons industry that is helping to drive, is a major driver, often of wars around the world.
Mik: (at 11:27)
Now, let’s talk about solutions because, yes, we understand now that we’ve got a problem with the way that we talk about economy here in Australia, in particular in the lead up to election where once again we’ll hear the major parties talking about growth and how good everything is when we have a growth of 2 per cent, 3 per cent and so on every year. But what are the solutions? I would be curious to hear from… Mark, those that you wrote the paper that you mentioned together with, one of them is Dr Geoff Davis, who is a research scientist, and he’s been looking into how do we construct an economy that is consistent with, that we have limits to growth.
. . .
Geoff Davies: (at 12:12)
Hello, I’m Geoff Davies. I have been a scientist studying the Earth for many years. I’ve been retired now for a decade or so. Over the last 20 years or so, I’ve also dug deeply into the subject of economics, which claims to understand an economy and found that the mainstream economics is really highly misguided and so I’ve put a lot of effort into trying to understand and explain that.
So the ‘2024 Report on the State of the Climate’ began with statements saying that we are in dire peril, basically. This warning was pretty much ignored, as have been all the warnings for the last many decades. So my question is why?
And I think the answer is partly the nature of the economic system that we’ve created. And within that, we’ve got these corporations whose purpose in the world is merely to make money for shareholders. And then on top of that, something pointed out by Jason Hickel: We have artificial scarcity, as he calls it, in which some essential things are deliberately kept not sufficient for us. This goes all the way back to the enclosures in Europe of the common lands, but there are many versions of it. And the effect today is there are not enough jobs, supposedly. There’s plenty to do. And there’s not enough finance, so the corporations scramble for finance. So all this creates a driver for these corporations to do more and more and what they do is produce stuff. And so we have a system that’s set up to produce more and more stuff forever without limit. And of course we’re exceeding the limits of the planet.
The remedy for it is to recognise the nature of what we’re dealing with. And part of that is, as Jason Hickel says, restore the commons, give us access back to things that allow us to survive without having to depend on corporations. or lords of the manor, or whoever.
We also need to identify what kind of system we’re dealing with, this economic system, and that’s really the core of what I’ve been looking into for some time. Mainstream economics profoundly misidentified the nature of an economy. They say it’s a system that if you let the markets run, it will automatically bring itself to equilibrium. And that equilibrium will be an optimum, the best of all possible worlds. And they’re seduced by this idea, but economies are not like that at all. In fact, they’re radically different. They’re full of instabilities.
A financial crash is just one of the more obvious ones. There are many internal, strong internal feedbacks through money and social interactions, which are ignored in mainstream theory. All of this makes for a system that’s full of instabilities. There’s no reason we couldn’t have an economy that is compatible with the living world. And of course that’s good because however much we pretend we’re the Lords of Creation, we’re in fact intimately a part of the living biosphere
We are intimately connected into it through our food, the water we drink, the oxygen we breathe. It all depends on all the other living things. We need to learn again to live within the biosphere. And there are many aspects to that. We can learn from indigenous cultures. We can dismantle this monster corporate consumer system that’s currently devouring the world. We could live for a good life rather than for more and more stuff. There’s a movement called Degrowth to reverse the material growth.
I don’t much like the name, but I agree with the sentiment, but I’d clarify it by saying I think we can dramatically reduce the material aspects of their system at the same time as we improve the quality. We can reduce quantity and improve quality.
Mark:
Geoff, the economists tell us that the basis of our wealth is in fact corporations. They claim that corporations generate the wealth that trickles down to everyone. What have you got to say to that claim?
Geoff:
Corporations are very good at extracting wealth. Some of them do things that create wealth. They’re not alone. They depend on people. You know, Elon Musk thinks he’s the great cowboy, but he would not be wealthy, he could do nothing, unless there was a society and many institutions supporting what he does and all the well-trained and well-educated people who are able to do the things he likes. So rather than support Elon Musk, we could support a good quality of life for everybody.
Mark:
You mentioned earlier the so-called free market and that raises an interesting question as to who actually controls the markets.
Geoff:
Yeah, well that’s I guess what I was touching on is that the market is manipulated by rich people. Its nature is governed by laws that have been passed which generally tend to favour the rich. So we can change the rules basically so the wealthy, sorry, so that the tweaking of the market, favours the things we want and need rather than just the wants of some greedy person.
. . .
Mik: (at 19:53)
So how do we measure what we really want? Someone who has looked deeply into that and written books about it is Marilyn Waring. She understands GDP and the flaws of GDP. GDP being the system that governments are using to measure our wellbeing in society.
Mark:
And we should add that Marilyn Waring was previously a minister in the New Zealand government and she’s currently an academic in New Zealand.
Marilyn:
GDP is a very poor indicator as a basis for public policy making. It’s called a system of accounts, but in fact it doesn’t have a debit side. So everything that is exchanged in the market, everything that is paid for, apparently adds to growth. And it doesn’t even have to be legal to add to growth. So trafficking in people, drugs, armaments, endangered species. It’s all great for growth. Motor vehicle accidents are fabulous for growth. You need new motor cars. Earthquakes are fabulous. You have to build new buildings. So it’s a nightmare as a basis for public policy.
It also treats the whole of the environment as if the environment just sits there available to be exploited, mined, deforested, polluted, whatever, as long as you’re gaining market transactions. And of course, it leaves out the single largest sector of any nation’s economy, which is unpaid work. And that unpaid work is overwhelmingly done by women, but men do unpaid work and children do unpaid work. They pretty much don’t count subsistence work. In many countries, subsistence agriculture is the basis of food security, it’s not counted. And it means that most politicians, as well, don’t understand GDP. It doesn’t matter if they’ve done economics, people who do economics don’t understand GDP. So… And they think that the only thing that they need is by the time the next election comes around, that they have to be showing that the growth figures are better, no matter how they achieve that.
I learned all this as a very young politician put into chair the Public Accounts Budget and Expenditure Committee. And I thought it was just something mad and nightmarish that New Zealand did. And then I subsequently found out, no, this was imposed on the whole world. And so it’s an inexorable major problem.
Mik:
So what would be a better way of measuring our well-being and how well we’re doing as a society?
Marilyn:
Well, one of the real key things, I think, is to move away from trying to monetise everything and to exercise judgment across a whole range of variables. So, for example, when we’re looking at the environment, in the first place, if you were looking at something like the Tarkine Forest in Tasmania, with its, you know, I think it’s this Gondwanaland Forest there, it’s about the second largest rainforest in the world, but it has grasslands and bogs and extraordinary range of species. And there is no way in the world that you can put a market value on the environment of the Tarkine forest. But we can count some things, can’t we?
We can count how many trees are still there, or if there’s reforestation, we can count endangered species, and we can count despoilation of habitation, those kinds of things. You know, we DO know what bad air is about. Bad air is about suspended particles, and we can count that. There are some things we can’t count. So what I say is what we can count, we have good numbers for. We have open architecture, which means when we discover new things and there are new ways of counting, they can simply be added into the model. And it doesn’t matter about replicability over time. When we learn something new, we can put that in. And where we don’t have numbers, we write narrative. We don’t just leave it out because we don’t have numbers. And at that point, you start to have to exercise judgment across indicators.
And the other thing I really have an objection to is the idea that we’ll move from something universally imposed like the GDP, and now we’ll universally impose some wellbeing framework. And in Australia, with your 40,000 years of Aboriginal wellbeing and communities, and certainly in New Zealand with Tangata Whenua Māori, there isn’t one way of being well. There are other ways of being well that shouldn’t yet again be left out just because they’re not Western and capitalist. So the very best public policy is going to be made when countries stop thinking that comparing ourselves with somebody else is the end target, as opposed to making really good public policy in this region or inside this nation state or with these peoples or whatever it is and just not be afraid of that.
Mark:
Marilyn, there are some new international organisations being formed. The Wellbeing Economy Alliance is one and the Wellbeing Economy Governments is another. Would you like to comment on these organisations?
Marilyn:
Yeah, so the well-being economy governments have arisen out of the OECD well-being approach. There’s some issues though. Number one, it’s still monocultural, which for me is a really major issue. Number two, they do still take the issue like safety, know and say okay this is what safety means and say okay and this is what safety is going to mean in Iceland, Scotland, Japan and New Zealand. Well no, actually that’s not what the different peoples say that it means. It’s very different if you’re living under volcanoes and in something that’s iced under for you know six months of the year than it is living in other places. You’re going to have different characteristics.
So yes, they should share a philosophical approach, right, and they should help each other generate reputable and rigorous data by saying, no, but look, we’ve collected it this way. Wouldn’t that work for you? That kind of thing. But not a whole, ‘Oh this is the new framework and everybody shall do this.’
So take, for example, the issue I’m very concerned about, which is time use. And I love time use because we all have 24 hours a day and nobody can invent any more for themselves.
Time use shows you where… for me as a public policy analyst or practitioner, who is time poor? And why are they time poor? And what input does that demand? And time poor people are invariably carers of people with extensive ongoing needs, 24/7 carers. We think we’re inefficient if we’re not doing at least two things at once, and generally in respect of, so I’m answering the phone, I’m preparing dinner, I’m supervising homework, but I’m also the logistician for the whole household. And while I’m doing all of this, I’m planning tomorrow. Who is going to be where, who needs to be where, who has to be fed? How are we going to sort all that out tonight? What clothes are going to be needed? Et cetera.
So, simultaneity in time use is also extremely important because what economists do isn’t to say, ‘Oh yes, okay. So, that was so many hours as a kitchen hand, and we’ll pop that down. And that was so many hours as a chauffeur, and we’ll pop that down. And so many hours as a cleaner.’ But actually, no, that’s not how efficient households run.
Mik:
What’s your alternative? What could come in strong and really replace this and in a fast way? We don’t have 100 years to wait for it.
Marilyn:
When you break out of GDP, and you go to something like time use, or you go to something like natural environmental indicators, or you go to asking populations about their well-being, then you do have to exercise judgment. But it’s far more democratic. Because now most of the population can not only access but understand the data that is being used for public policy formation and decision making. While it remains this opaque GDP nonsense, you effectively exclude 99 per cent of the population from any participation, let alone understanding what on earth it’s about. So you can democratise public policy making by finding these alternatives.
Mik:
Marilyn, you’ve written books about this and do you feel that you’re being heard?
Marilyn:
Do I feel I’m being heard? Well, in the last 40 years there has been a great deal more feminist analysis of economics, that’s for sure, and definitely environmental scientists becoming very engaged, and now indigenous peoples becoming very engaged in this as well, and you get these incredible crossovers.
I think 80 per cent of the world’s remaining biodiversity is in lands occupied by indigenous peoples. And that’s not an accident, is it? It’s because they know how to care for it.
So there are just this profound range of alternative ways of thinking and of being. And it’s a real threat to economics to even admit to that, right? So it’s that old… You know, in social sciences we talk about epistemologies: ‘How do we know what we know? And if you’ve been trained in neoclassical economics, yours is a very small framework and frankly you don’t know much at all.
. . .
Mik: (at 32:21)
So, Mark, the really big question here is then, if we were to design a new economy from the ground up, in your opinion, with all the experience that you now have and all the thoughts in your head, how do we do that? And which sort of policies would you suggest we put in place to take us there?
Mark:
Well, we are looking for a big transformation, not a superficial one, but fortunately, we can go there step by step. And as each step builds, find eventually, if we follow those steps, we will get to system change. So for a start, as Marilyn Waring has indicated, we need a much broader set of wellbeing indicators. And these indicators must carry more weight than GDP, which is really very limited in the information it carries.
We also need to do something that is heresy in the neoliberal ideology, and that is to introduce a planning commission which has input from community groups, from focus groups. And this planning commission can help develop an industry strategy because in transforming the economy, some industries are going to have to decline like fossil fuels, like the financial services industry, is mostly based on gambling in the stock market, and many other destructive industries, while other industries are going to have to increase, such as renewable energy, the caring professions and so on. So we need an industry strategy. We actually need some planning and that planning needs input from the community if we are to change direction.
And then specifically, what we really need is to what can we offer the community that is going through this these changes and what we can offer them is what is called ‘universal basic services’ or ‘universal public services’, and by this we simply mean better public housing, public education, public health, public transport, better government support for caring for the elderly, for child care, better support for public parks and so on.
So universal basic services are what the community, everyone, receives and everyone will get the benefits except possibly the super rich who feel they are doing okay as it is. And alongside universal basic services, we need a job guarantee, a job guarantee for everyone who wants to work and yet isn’t able to find a work in the market system. And there are so many things that need to be done in our community that the market does not reward. A lot of caring for the environment, caring for people, is not rewarded by the market. And so a job guarantee funded by the federal government, the national government, is essential and those jobs can be provided by all levels of government, but specifically by local governments and I would argue by community groups that are registered to provide those services. We can go further to assist worker rights and human rights, but particularly worker rights, which have been so weakened over the recent decades.
So we need legislation, for example, to strengthen trade union rights, to strengthen the rights to protest. And right now in Australia, we’re going in the opposite direction, and to foster the creation of cooperatives, which are a much more democratic form of business. And then we have to recognise that the greatest environmental impacts, in particular the greatest greenhouse gas emissions, are produced by the rich. And that means increasing taxation for the rich, whether it’s a wealth tax or inheritance tax or a pollution tax to discourage private planes and so on. So that’s a very tough one to grab because the rich are already very powerful and they will scream.
And I guess, last but not least in my menu of steps, we have a situation where subsidies are going to polluters, to the fossil fuel industries, to the pharmaceutical industries and so on. What we need to do is to shift those subsidies initially to help establish the clean and green businesses and industries and we need to create a circular economy and right now the current economy is based on polluters not paying for the damage they are doing and what we have to do is to shift that subsidy to the community so we can have a circular economy or at least a nearly circular economy.
So I believe that all these actions, all these steps are actually achievable, but they need to be driven by community groups from across the board coming together and forming alliances to demand action that will get these positives established while at the same time campaigning against the methods used by vested interests to capture the nation state.
Mik:
You say, Mark, that you believe that this could happen. I can tell you that you don’t have to just believe it. I have evidence that it is already happening in this world, which is in Denmark, where I come from, where many of the things that you have just mentioned are not just some fantasy. It’s actually how the society runs. It’s how things work. Yes, we do have much stronger rights for workers, the laws actually respect unions there and everyone is a member of a union. If you have a job, you’re a member of a union. That’s how it works in Denmark.
And we don’t have a fancy word such as when you talk about the Universal Public Service concept, but we do have a social protection net. It’s called a social security system that helps anyone who loses their job or gets in trouble and it’s actually quite generous. And many other of the things that you mentioned actually are happening. It’s rolling out in Denmark, and they even have a name for this energy transition.
I’ve talked a lot about that since I was in Denmark in August, which is that they talk about ‘the green transition’ and they use that word. Everyone is on the same page with that. This is where we’re going. We’re heading towards The Green Transition. It’s an inevitable thing. It’s not up for discussion. It’s just something that is happening and everyone is taking it for granted.
But I think maybe what really shows where Denmark stands is a quote that I saw from the prime minister in Denmark, Mette Frederiksen, said something which I believe is true about the Danish mentality, where she said: ‘It’s not due to luck that Denmark is one of the richest, most equal and secure societies on Earth. It’s the result of political choices and a social contract. We’ve tried to extract the best aspects of capitalism, like enterprise and profits, while curbing the greediest and the most harmful sides. The gains have been shared more fairly and reinvested in a strong community,’ she said, in Denmark.
Mark:
Well, I think the Danish example really refutes the fear mongering from those who do not wish change because they’re part of the system. Denmark is one of the richest countries in the world per capita. It has a good society. The Danes are not living in caves and trees, as the fear mongers would like to suggest. And we can learn from Denmark and build on what’s happening in Denmark and go even further. We want particularly all the rich countries to end this notion of endless growth and rather look at the distribution of wealth and income within the community. And of course, we also need the rich countries to allow the poorer countries to develop, to undergo a green transition themselves and to fund that transition.
Mik:
Let’s talk a little bit about how we finance all that. Because financing the green transition and what you talked about – the universal public services and so on – can seem like a bit of a mystery: Where do we find the money for that? Considering that we are in a crisis in so many ways, and everyone’s talking about a cost of living crisis, so where’s the money going to come from?
Mark:
Well, we’re very fortunate that one of the other co-authors of our economic critique paper, Dr Steven Hail is able to discuss the question of financing the change as a real international expert.
. . .
Steven Hail: (at 42:40)
The first bit is the easy bit. How does the government fund anything? All federal government spending happens in precisely the same way. It involves the Reserve Bank of Australia crediting private bank accounts and crediting those private banks’ reserve balances with the amount the federal government is spending. Every dollar the federal government ever spends, and they spend at least a couple of billion dollars every day is a new dollar, is the birth of a dollar.
So it’s not a question of where you go and find the money from. They create money every time there’s any federal spending at all. And while people think of federal taxes as finding money for the government to spend, that’s not right. Federal taxes destroy money that the government has previously spent into the system. The government does have what you might regard as a bank account, basically a sale in an Excel spreadsheet at the Reserve Bank, which people call the official public account.
But it really doesn’t matter how much is in that particular record at the moment in terms of the government’s ability to spend. And just to demonstrate that to people, there was virtually nothing in the federal government’s bank account. There was about $20 billion in February 2020. And that didn’t prevent the government in March 2020, starting the biggest fiscal support measure outside wartime that there’s ever been in Australia, because our federal government is not like the rest of us. It doesn’t have a bank account where if it runs out of money in that bank account, it can’t spend anymore because it is the currency issuer.
The Reserve Bank will spend funds on behalf of the government and the government will never run out of our currency. The point is that if the federal government wants to spend more money and if it can pass bills through parliament then there is nothing stopping the federal government doing
Mark:
What about the risk of inflation?
Steven:
That is the key issue. The difficult part, of course, is if you spend more dollars into the system and you don’t tax them back out again, then there’ll be more dollars in the system and people over time will spend more. And if that pushes total spending within our economy beyond its productive capacity, if the government is competing for scarce resources, I mean real resources here, I mean what people and capital equipment are producing, what materials are being used to produce, what energy is being used to produce, then it will drive prices up.
What you need to do if you want to engage in the sort of investments which would be necessary to decarbonise Australia’s economy in a short period of time is you need to do an audit of the state of the Australian economy as far as those real resources are concerned. What labour, including skilled labour, do we have available that’s relevant? What technology, what capital equipment is available, what natural resources are available to us, what institutional capacity do we have, how could we manage the investments that we would need to make in order to create the infrastructure of a post-growth economy?
And if you don’t have some of those resources at the moment, or if they’re employed, and the construction industry is close to full capacity at the moment, then you would need to free up some of those resources, which you could do partly through changing the way you regulate the banks in terms of the amount of lending they’re allowed to do and what they’re allowed to create credit for.
You could use the planning system also to limit the forms of development which took place in our major cities to free up some resources there that could be used for other purposes. There are of course sectors of our economy which we should be, which we need to, phase out over the next few years. That will free up some resources as well. Not that this is a simple thing to do because those resources will not be perfectly occupationally mobile between the activities we’re phasing out and the activities that we need to engage in. On top of that, an essay by Keynes during the Second World War called ‘How to Pay for the War’, which was published in 1940, which said, and remember this was after the Great Depression of the 1930s when you would imagine Britain was basically bankrupt. It said: ‘There’s no problem finding the pounds to fight the Second World War.’
The problem is that, if we’re producing all these things in our factories, we won’t be able to produce the things which people would like to consume with the money that we’re spending. So we need to ask people to save more of that money. And we could do something like this in Australia.
Mark:
Could some of the government’s spending be allocated to actually increase the national economic capacity through infrastructure, through training and education processes?
Steven:
That’s vitally important. If some of those productive resources we need at the moment don’t exist, then we can create them. If we don’t have enough people with the skills to work in the construction industry, to take a simple example, then we need people to have an incentive to move into that occupation. We need to train them up.
There are some things, in other words, that would be great to do now, but we may not be able to do now. That’s why we need a thorough audit of our real resources as a country so that we know what we might not be able to do now, that we might be able to do in five years’ time, if we start planning for it now.
Our politicians have been obsessed with financial aggregates that on their own don’t actually matter and have ignored what really does matter, which is do we actually have the people, the equipment, the materials? Are we doing the right research as technology evolving in the right direction quickly enough to do what we need? Do we even know where we want to end up? These kinds of things need to be discussed much more widely and they should be right at the very centre of federal election campaigns.
. . .
Mik: (at 49:27)
So in short, it’s all very doable. However, here in Australia, we certainly need some strategies. We need to think about how can communities step in, you could say, and take over, you know, the state capture that has happened, the power of the vested interest is real. I think as communities, you know, as individuals, we sometimes feel very powerless, Mark, so what do we do?
Mark:
Well, there’s a story that a group of lobbyists once met with the American president Franklin D. Roosevelt and after he listened to their arguments he said: “Okay you’ve convinced me; now get out there and make me do it”. So I guess what he’s saying is reason, although it’s necessary, reason alone is not going to change a politician’s position.
That reason has to be backed up by very strong community pressure. And what I’m proposing is that community groups in a whole range of different areas – environment, social justice, human rights, peace, public health, public housing – form alliances. And the strategy that I think is needed is two-pronged, it has two components.
One component is to combat the power of the vested interests and the other component is to push to campaign for the positive steps that we’ve spoken about. So the power of the vested interests depends on a handful of methods that we’ve mentioned earlier: political donations, election expenditure (and I’m talking about nominally democratic countries), revolving door jobs, concentrated media ownership, and the list goes on. But the point is that each of these is vulnerable to a concerted campaign across the board by a wide range of community groups. The environment movement alone cannot win on this, as Mik has pointed out at the beginning. But there is hope, at least, that combined environment, public health, social justice, human rights, peace groups, working together can challenge these methods used of state capture by powerful vested interests.
So that’s the first point. And this is really the main theme of our book, ‘The Path to a Sustainable Civilisation’. The other half is the campaigning on a whole range of socio-economic changes that I listed before. And the emphasis really is on the economic side to create a much better economy. It’s the positive campaign. Wellbeing indicators, a planning commission, universal basic services, as already Denmark is a long way to achieving, a job guarantee, legislation, for trade union rights, worker rights, human rights, and a shift in the subsidies from the destructive industries and businesses to the constructive ones.
So I believe we can do it. And already there are groups in Australia and internationally that are trying to bring together the different interests in the community to campaign much more broadly.
So one example is the campaigns for democracy. And there is a major group formed in Europe to campaign for democracy because democracy is the opposite of state capture. Democracy means the community makes the decisions. It’s not just voting, we’re getting genuine community input to government decision making, genuine input.
In Australia, we have a relatively new group, the Australian Democracy Network, which has done fantastic work. Its first report was an excellent report on state capture. And the question is, is this group going to become a campaign group or is it a theoretical group? We don’t know at this stage. But what we do know is that we need both the theory and we need organisation and campaigning.
Mik: (at 54:11)
I think it also begins with changing the narrative and having the ambition that that’s possible. That we can start talking, for instance, about the green transition and the positive things that you’re mentioning instead of only protesting and only being blockading and being up against authorities and so on.
Mark:
Well, we certainly have to campaign, but we’re campaigning for positive changes as well as campaigning against the negative forces that we’re up against. So we need to do both. And as you say, we need to have a story that brings together the anti-destruction with the positive creation of a better economy and a better society and a better environment.
Mik: (at 55:03)
What would it look like if we actually succeeded in doing what you’re saying, let’s say over the next 10 to 20 years? What would it look like? How would it feel? Our new place would not be a utopia, but it would be a better society, a better civilisation. It would protect the environment. It would be more socially equal, more socially just, have stronger human rights and worker rights, and it would be more peaceful.
Mark:
I believe that humans have the capacity for great good and great constructive work and also great evil and great destructive work. And to get a positive society we need to organise to ensure that we create the institutions that foster the positive, that foster the good, but work against the negatives and the destructive side.
Mik: (at 56:17)
The sustainable civilisation. How we can transition to a new civilisation that is not just sustainable but socially just, healthy and less militarised. As we’ve heard Mark Diesendorf explain it, the solution is to build a social movement which is so big and so strong that it can apply overwhelming pressure on government and big business and weaken the power of the vested interests, the fossil fuel interests, the agricultural and pharmaceutical industries and so on, and strengthen the democratic decision-making.
The building of this social movement is, and that’s the good news that I can bring to you, it is already happening. I have seen the grail.
I’ll leave you with two short statements, arguments you could say, for what needs to happen now. First is the British author, George Monbiot, who was guest in a TV debate, and then one of humanity’s leading spokespersons for a sustainable civilisation, Sir David Attenborough.
George Monbiot:
Actually everything we have to do is change the system. We have to overthrow this system which is eating the planet with perpetual growth. I mean since when was GDP a sensible measure of human welfare and yet everything that governments want to do is to try to boost GDP. Now people like the OECD or the World Bank, they say: ‘Oh, we’re not asking for a lot of growth. Just 3 per cent a year.’ That means doubling in 24 years. Yeah! We’re bursting through all the environmental boundaries and screwing the planet already, and you want to double it?! Double all that? Double it again?! Keep doubling it? It’s madness!
We’ve got to find a better way of measuring human welfare than perpetual growth. We’ve got to start ramping down all fossil fuel production and leave fossil fuels in the ground.
And at the same time, and this is a nice bit of it, it turns out that, through massive rewilding, ecological restoration, you can draw down a load of the carbon dioxide we’ve already produced. Huge amounts. Allowing the forests to come back, the marshes to come back, the sea floor to recover from trawling and stuff. They draw down carbon dioxide and can take us a long way towards stopping climate breakdown at the same time as stopping ecological breakdown. There’s time, but we can’t do it by just pissing around at the margins of the problem. We’ve got to go straight to the heart of capitalism and overthrow it.
Sir David Attenborough, excerpt from BBC’s ‘Greta Thunberg: A Year to Change the World’:
There just could be a change in moral attitude from people worldwide, politicians worldwide, to see that self-interest is for the past, common interest is for the future.
Mik:
If you want to be part of the climate revolution, find your role. Contribute with what you think you’re good at. My name is Mik Aidt and you can reach me on the email address mikaidt@climatsafety.info
Female voice:
All revolutions seem impossible until they are inevitable.
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