The Club of Rome

The Club of Rome – a new path for world development
by John Pratt

Forty years ago the Club of Rome predicted that the global economic system would fail because it was unsustainable.

On 26 March 2009, New York Times Columnist Tom Friedman was interviewed by Leigh Sales on Lateline:

LEIGH SALES: You wrote in a recent column that perhaps this crisis is telling the US that the growth model it's created over the last 50 years is unsustainable, economically and ecologically. And indeed in your new book 'Hot, Flat and Crowded' you write what's needed in the US is a revolution, a green revolution.
What did you mean by that? And is what we're seeing in the US now a precursor to it?
TOM FRIEDMAN: I think it is. I think it's a precursor to what my Australian friend and environmental teacher Paul Gielding calls "the great disruption". And what he means by that, and sort of what I mean by that is I think two things happened in 2008/2009, Leigh. I think both the market and Mother Nature hit a wall. And they both hit a wall. And what they basically - the wall they hit was that we cannot keep raising standards of living for us, for our kids, the way we've been doing for the last 50 years.
What was that system? Well, in short it worked like this: we built an America - more and more stores - to sell more and more stuff, to more and more Americans, which triggered more and more factories in China, powered by more and more coal, that earn more and more dollars, that went to buy more and more T bills, that were recirculated back to America to build more and more stores, to sell more and more stuff.
And that cycle basically had become unsustainable for a number of reasons. One is the incredible imbalance of our consumption and China's savings, that we built all this huge horde of global dollars that basically triggered more and more people inventing more and more crazy ways to get higher yield out of those dollars, and that finally exploded in the mortgage and credit default swaps. that was one problem.
But the other problem is that this system really required living off and stripping off more and more stocks, stocks of natural resources, and not living off more and more renewable flows. And in that sense Mother Nature was telling us what the market was telling us: we can't do this anymore. That if we try to pass on this way of growing standards of living to our children, we're going to blow up.
What was missing in the system? What was missing in the system, Leigh, is that both the market and Mother Nature were not honestly pricing things. The market was not pricing the real risk of some of these derivatives and credit default swaps, and when you don't price the real risks of things, OK, and the real potential cost, then these kinds of explosions happen, because people go to excess. And at the same time we were not allowing Mother Nature to price the real cost of what we were doing climatically. The cost of putting all this CO2 in the atmosphere.
So we had a kind of unreal system. We were living, as a world community, as if there were no laws of gravity, either in the financial markets or in Mother Nature's universe. We could do whatever we want and there would be no cost. And I think what happened in 2008/2009, is that the real cost became so big, and they just smacked us right across the head. And therefore coming out of this, it seems to me we need to find a different way of raising standards of living, but it's got to begin with putting the real cost on things, the real cost of these derivatives, so people won't think they're free and therefore do crazy, reckless things, and the real cost of carbon in the atmosphere, so people don't think polluting the atmosphere is free, and therefore do crazy things.

It is becoming very clear that the future as forecast by the Club of Rome is now becoming a reality.

We have hit the wall. As we start to realise that we must change the global economy, we need to listen to the voices of those that predicted the collapse. We need to look for a new path.

Today the Club of Rome is developing a new vision for world development:

It is clear that the present path of world development is not sustainable in the longer term, even if we recognise the enormous potentials of the market and of technological innovation. New ideas and strategies will be needed to ensure that improved living conditions and opportunities for a growing population across the world can be reconciled with the conservation of a viable climate and of the fragile ecosystems on which all life depends. A new vision and path for world development must be conceived and adopted if humanity is to surmount the challenges ahead.
In response to this intellectual and practical challenge, the Club of Rome will undertake a three year programme on "A New Path for World Development" so as to achieve a better understanding of the complex challenges which confront the modern world and to lay solid foundations for the action which must be taken to improve the prospects for peace and progress.

The Club will focus on the following issues.

1. Environment and Resources

2. Globalisation

3. World Development

4. Social Transformation

5. Peace and Security

The Club will convene five small high-level expert meetings successively over the three year period, 2008 - 2010, one on each of the clusters of issues identified above. Each meeting should produce a clear statement on the issues, risks and opportunities ahead with an outline of the principal strategies and measures required in response. As the Programme proceeds, the insights and knowledge gained from each meeting will provide clear perspectives of constraints and opportunities as the context for the next meeting. By recognizing such linkages, the knowledge acquired will be cumulative and will produce innovative insights as the Programme proceeds.

As we look for solutions to the global situation it is becoming increasingly clear that the only way forward is a new path. We should listen to those who predicted the collapse nearly forty years ago. We must be willing to change and support those who are showing us some direction.

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A new development architecture

Submitted by John Pratt on April 12, 2009 - 10:50am.

The major objective of progressive governance should be to reduce the massive inequalities that characterise the world today, while facilitating sustainable growth. This implies reducing the fairly generalised trends towards increasing inequalities within countries that have characterised the world in recent decades. It also means reducing the massive inequalities in per capita incomes among countries, which explain about 70 per cent of world income inequalities. The new development architecture should focus on this latter dimension of world inequalities and should include at least five elements, some of which serve broader objectives of global governance.

1. Create a global fund for development assistance

2. Design truly development friendly world trading rules

3. Revamp the IMF

4. Enshrine “policy space” in WTO and IMF rules and practices

5. Create a strong UN Social and Economic Council

We need to realise that we are truly part of one world and the only way forward is to fight inequalities where ever we see them. We have taken the first steps down the path towards globalisation. We must now have the courage to complete the journey. There is no way we can turn back now - we have come too far.

Obama promises to take the lead on climate change

Submitted by John Pratt on April 6, 2009 - 7:59am.

"To protect our planet, now is the time to change the way that we use energy,'' Mr Obama told a crowd gathered at Prague Castle on Sunday for his only public speech during his maiden tour of Europe.
"Together we must confront climate change by ending the world's dependency on fossil fuels by tapping the power from the sources of energy like the wind and the sun and calling upon all nations to do their part.
"And I pledge to you that in this global effort the US is now ready to lead.''

The US is now promising to take the lead on climate change. Europe is already well in front of Australia and the US is picking up the pace. If Australia remains timid and tries to cling to black industries using coal we will be left behind. Do we want to be part of the new age or do we want to remain in the stone age?

Submitted by Pat Donnelly on April 5, 2009 - 10:12pm.

Misconceived and mischeivous.

Merely helpful to divide and restrain the weak minded who are enslaved to an environment. The Club did not invent it and do not cherish those within it. The more I see of their slaves, the more I agree with the Club. Who are the members of the Club of Rome? Why the persons who most benefit from globalization in reality.

Please look carefully before you support any but your own family! They use emotive language to suck you into whatever cause they want. Don't be a dupe.

Australia will develop manufacturing, using robots and yeasts and algae. Donkeys need not apply!

Tim Flannery's message to the G20

Submitted by John Pratt on April 2, 2009 - 2:42pm.

"We believe that this year we are at an historic crossroads. Either we establish a new more effective global climate treaty to tackle the climate problem or we jeopardise our common future," the letter said.
"Either we invest in new infrastructure and technologies that will help our economic strength and resilience, or we choose the infrastructure and technologies of the past."

Tim Flannery is correct to point out that the world is at a crossroad. We cannot continue to invest in old technologies, we cannot afford to prop up old industries. We will need every cent to bring about a green future.

Time for the green energy revolution is now

Submitted by John Pratt on April 2, 2009 - 7:23am.

One of the most heartening developments over the last few months has been the transformation of green energy from an environmental interest to an economic and national security interest. Previously, solar panels and wind turbines were viewed only as tools to fight climate change. Now, however, they are viewed as tools for job growth and economic recovery, and President Obama has made room for green energy and climate change in his budget, even including revenues from a cap-and-trade carbon regulation.
Given this heady combination of factors, we believe that growth in green energy and clean technology will continue for many years to come. The dangers of a fossil fuel-driven world are enormous; climate change and other environmental hazards are real and growing threats to our survival. Our collective awareness of these problems and our drive to tackle them head-on have reached critical mass around the world. And the primary solutions to the problems — renewable energy sources and efficiency technologies — are becoming more effective, more scalable, and less expensive by the day.
The time for the green energy revolution is now. The current recession may slow down its progress, but forward movement seems inevitable.

As the G20 leaders meet in London let's hope that the economic package discussed will be focused on the green energy revolution. It would be a global disaster if we survive the economic down turn but have no money left for developing green energy.

The black heart of the ALP

Submitted by John Pratt on April 1, 2009 - 3:08pm.

Professor Newman has also questioned the credentials of "clean coal" technology.
"Coal is not a renewable resource, it's the major source of climate change emissions," he said. "A long-term future around increases in coal would be a mistake."...................
More than $1 billion is being spent expanding Newcastle's Coal loading facilities.

The ALP is in a real bind over its policy to back the coal industry. Why would you spend over $1 billion on a industry that must be phased out?

It is time to come clean.

Make or break issue

Submitted by Anthony Nolan on April 1, 2009 - 4:41pm.

John Pratt, coal is going to be the make or break issue and it will probably be fought out over an extended period.

Coal mine owners aren't noted for the social conscience and are not about to give away their profitable interests in the name of common human good.

At a closer level, however, the issue requires some serious analysis. The ALP is well aware of two major factors associated with coal - taxes (ie government revenue) and traditional , male "blue collar" jobs. Coal mining is the heart of old Labour working class identity. It is at the core of residual proletarian consciousness. It is part of the labour tradition.

Unhappily it is also at the core of a great deal of masculinist proletarianism. The upshot of this is that it is likely that the entire industry will be protected by Labour in often irrational ways because to talk about winding the industry back will undermine blue collar masculinism within the ALP. You know, heartland stuff about the ALP representing the working classes and so on.

This introduces another theme - which is the need for social democracy to be genuinely social rather than operating as a stalking horse for the advancement of particular class interests. By that I mean that social democracy needs to represent a much broader constituency than (usually male) trade unions.

We'll see how this plays out.

This will be my broken record

Submitted by Hamish Alcorn on March 30, 2009 - 9:32pm.

John, yep I reckon we do think similarly. Nice to be figuring that out.

You do come to a fairly concise conclusion as to what you want for this country, and excuse me if I use it as an excuse to get excited about what I've already been on about on Webdiary and will no doubt slowly become a broken record.

"I am looking for a solution where Australia can be more than a quarry. I think we will need a manufacturing industry. We should not end up as China's quarry and Japan's beach."

Firstly, the Theory of Comparative Advantage, hopelessly flawed and inadequate as it is, makes a very broad point when it comes to a country like Australia, which, to some extent at least, makes some sense. The theory says that if a country has a large area and a small population then it will tend toward extraction industries (mining and agriculture basically) rather than manufacturing industries. A place like Singapore, on the other hand, with virtually no land and a scarily huge population, is gonna make shit, and not just for its own consumption. In practice this theory is abused mightily, but it makes a broad sort of sense.

But as you say, we don't want to just sell rocks, like in CJ Dennis's Glugs of Gosh. Sure we have a lot of land, but water is an issue, mining is not sustainable or reliable in itself, and, damnit! We want to make something.

Australia can take the lead in what should be - almost has to be - the biggest growth industry of this young century. We have the resources, land, scientific knowhow and, best of all, political opportunity, to manufacture forests which manufacture forest products. I dare you to imagine the range of things that 'forest products' can mean.

It strikes me as ironic that in the midst of what is often properly described as an ecological crisis, we have turned to all the grand sciences developed in the 20th century but one - ecology. Sure we can fiddle genes and engineer nanotech. Look we can collect carbon and bury it in the ground. Maybe we can figure a way to build a machine that will collect greenhouse gasses from the atmosphere and automatically store the carbon while secreting oxygen at the same time, just like a forest.

Ecology, the most extraordinary science in my opinion, is used in two ways as far as I can see. It is used to evoke the David Attenborough style awe that makes us want to save the wilderness, and so it should. And it is used by scientists to assess the damage of our developments, as it should. Why is this science not being put to work to create ecosystems?

We'd have to start with a university and a lot of land. The town of St George might be ideal, in the headwaters of the Darling. Now we're not just planting millions of trees, though that would be helpful in itself. We can develop the science of building landscapes from the bottom up, using (and immediately giving worth to) the millions of species available to us. The science has a long way to go, but a good forest engineer should one day have the same prestige as a good architect.

Forests can be managed with much less water than crops, and over time benefit the whole water cycle from rainfall to soil retention and flood mitigation. What's unique about Australia is here it could be pioneered economically, in that a huge part of the investment is into increasing the equity of very cheap land. But it is a long term investment, and until the pioneering work is done and the market realises that professional ecologists can design landscapes to maximise their productivity over time, and hence maximise their equity increase, it will require concerted funding, public and private.

In my mind - and nowhere else that I have yet found - this is the future. It's rural renewal, ecological repair, requires an educated, specialised workforce and can be profitable in many ways. Ok I'm mostly thinking of bee products and timber for the Darling, but as the science develops there are endless possibilities for making productive and efficient forest landscapes.

And we can export this technology, to clapped out soy farms of the Amazon basin, to deforested and denuded Himalayan mountains, to anywhere that has been ruined. If you're worried about these being marginal places or about water and salination in the Murray, you're underestimating trees, and their extraordinary variety worldwide. Sure you need an irrigation system to get them going, but not too much and less to nothing over time. Many trees once they're established will, in drought, sit there, dry up and stop growing, until it rains at which time they'll grow again. They can take any amount of unsorted organics, barely treated effluent and greywater - they're not fussy.

Anyway, I haven't finished with this topic, and probably never will, but my point is that this is something Australia could make, whilst making full use of its large area with small educated population.

Ocean forests

Submitted by Jay Somasundaram on April 2, 2009 - 6:41pm.

A somewhat controversial idea is getting more mainstream. It suggests that 10% of the world's annual carbon production could be sunk, fairly easily, cheaply and with possible major beneficial side effects.

needs v exchange

Submitted by Paul Walter on March 31, 2009 - 2:04am.

Hamish, that was a great post. Additionally, a man who loves Attenborough loves one of the most beautiful people of our time, someone this poster has an unequivocal feeling of respect and affection for.

It's true that others also are seeking ways of remedying problems arising from historical uses and abuses of ecology. A while back, I recall watching a doco in which scientists were rediscovering the ways in which the old Amazonian tribes people had been able to repair and even produce a good soil symbiotic with their gardening practices. Which is something better than even even we've managed. And monocultures are destroying local knowledge at a rate that is breathtaking against the milllenia taken to build up effective local practices.

But does it not seem true that there has been an anti-science movement develop in society, parallel coincidentally with neoliberalism with cuts in funding to science and education made easy, that is against the tide of what you are proposing?

Opportunities all over Australia

Submitted by John Pratt on March 30, 2009 - 10:25pm.

Hamish, one of my dreams for country Australia is to be the powerhouse of alternative energy. For example:

Lloyd Energy Storage is building two solar thermal power stations in Australia that will store thermal energy in purified graphite, allowing dispatchable generation on demand (Baseload, Intermediate and Peaking Power), reducing the very high losses in remote areas on the grid and reducing the need to upgrade transmission system. Lloyd has built their pilot plant near Cooma, Australia. The system involves a shipping container sized Graphite Block mounted ontop of a fairly low tower 18-20metres. Graphite has high thermal capability-to 3,500C, low emissivity, very high thermal conductivity, as well as being non-toxic and nonexplosive and stable over many temperature cycles, It increases its heat storage capacity as the storage temperature rises. The system allows thermal energy to be stored at the point of collection and held before being converted to electricity during the day or after sun down.

So many opportunities and a very exciting future.

Forest products and solar energy to name just two.

Get the Minds

Submitted by Hamish Alcorn on March 31, 2009 - 9:30pm.

Absolutely John. Renewables and forests. A new economy, where growth is good.

Right about now we need research dollars and expanded university departments, and we should be poaching the best scientists in these fields from overseas before they poach ours.

Oh Yes

Submitted by Hamish Alcorn on March 30, 2009 - 7:25pm.

By the way John, I'll be interested in the conclusions the Club of Rome come up with. Whether I like them or not (I suspect I will to a large extent) I'm sure it will be a rigorous document that illustrates the sort of society we might strive for - something to march for if enough people mobilise around it, if indeed marching is deemed necessary, and something to which can be said, "THIS would be better than the present".

I also strongly suspect that The Club of Rome will make a broad assumption that liberal, capitalist, democracy (more or less 'the system') will still be the political framework with which the job must be done, with many changes of course, to be passed by legislation by elected representatives.

Past the point of no return

Submitted by Alga Kavanagh on March 30, 2009 - 5:52pm.

What I can't understand and find increasingly hard to accept, is the majority of humanity is in denial and all we are seeing is a repeat of the past, but on a bigger scale. Globalisation has been tried over and over and each time it fails. Just about every century has seen some form of ideology controlled by the elites, trying to globalise the world they can reach, for their sole benefit. Whilst preaching to the gullible it's in their best interests and will work for them. Yet all we are now faced with is a looming fatal failure of just about every aspect of society.

The next logical step, which is a repeat of the last time not long ago, is anarchy, war, resulting in a human population cull and if anything survives this time, reconstruction. The major problem with this revolution of the ideological merry go round is, it's not just an economic and ideological collapse, but an ecological and environmental one as well. The whole of world society is completely reliant upon the system for it's ability to survive, so the downfall will be catastrophic. With Australia increasingly dependent upon food and commodities from other countries, as the world economy collapses, so will food supplies. In the past we've been able to grow food and not have to worry, now our environment is incapable of doing that on the scale required, every day our options diminish as our politicians argue, big business denies and Rudd flies the world babbling on about keeping the elitist status quo alive and in control.

We've gone past the point of no return and are now becoming victims of uncontrollable outcomes. Economic growth can't work, it requires more and more dwindling resource use, more and more disposable products to increase consumption and more and more people to buy them and go into debt. It also relies upon the system operating constantly on credit or in debt so as to minimise expenditures, as profit growth is the only accepted outcome.

The revolution starts on Wednesday

Submitted by John Pratt on March 30, 2009 - 11:57am.

What do you make of what's happening in the world's economy today?

We face three critical issues: climate and environment, poverty and development, and finance and economy. These issues are intimately linked. We cannot try long-term solutions to one while disregarding the others. We cannot just look at the next quarter or next electoral period. We have to have a long-term view and we must respect the complexity of the problem, which is very much interlinked. The Limits to Growth said we could not continuously consume vast amounts of resources forever. It said if we are clever, we're going to go this way, if we are stupid we are going to go that way.

And which path are we on?

More on the stupid track because although this warning was made nearly 40 years ago we more or less carried on exponential economic growth regardless of the environment consequences. Now we are coming to a point where the climate and ecosystems just cannot cope.

Martin Lees Secretary General for the Club of Rome.

Yes we are on the stupid track alright. How do we bring about change? The ALP and the Libs seem focused on the short term. I think the issue is as important, if not more so than the fight for freedom of slaves in the 1860's the only way forward was a civil war. Already families are divided it seems almost impossible to bring about peaceful change.

They hoped for 10,000, but in the end more than triple that number turned out on London's streets for the biggest demonstration since the beginning of the economic crisis.
The Put People First march yesterday was organised by a collaboration of more than 100 trade unions, church groups and charities including ActionAid, Save the Children and Friends of the Earth. The theme was "jobs, justice and climate" and the message was aimed at the world leaders who will be gathering for the G20 summit here this week.
The marchers, estimated at 35,000 by police, accompanied by brass bands and drummers and a colourful assortment of banners and flags, walked the four miles from Embankment to Hyde Park, where speeches from comedian Mark Thomas and environmental campaigner Tony Juniper, and music from the Kooks, made for a party-like atmosphere....
Chris Knight, the anthropology professor suspended from the University of East London last week for suggesting that bankers might be lynched, was wandering the march alone. "I just met a copper and I said to him, 'Is this the revolution?' He said: 'No, this is the dry run, the revolution starts on Wednesday. Midweek is when we will really start to dance'."

Talk of revolution and lynching, will people have to die to bring about the necessary change? Will the conservative forces be willing to fight to the death to stop change? Let us hope that a peaceful change is possible but we are running out of time.

What's the revolutionary platform?

Submitted by Hamish Alcorn on March 30, 2009 - 12:20pm.

Hey John, what are the protestors demanding? I assume they reckon something needs doing and I assume they reckon governments have to do something. Obviously they don't agree with the strategies being discussed. What do they reckon?

My guess is they would have very little united front on these questions, which guarantees that Wednesday will be a noisy flop.

A demand for change

Submitted by John Pratt on March 30, 2009 - 1:01pm.

You're right Hamish, there is definitely many views being expressed. I guess a lot would think globalisation has been a failure.

Fletcher Jones is good example of the collapse of Australia's manufacturing industry an industry that was sacrificed on the altar of globalisation.

At that time of his death, Fletcher Jonesand Staff was one of the largest clothing manufacturers in the world, with almost three thousand employed in four factories and thirty-three stores through every Australian state and capital city. Arguably, no single person or firm had done more to transform the clothing sector and, to change Australian dress standards, particularly among men, than Fletcher Jones and his staff It took another 20 years after FJ's death for the company to succumb to the same fate. The abolition of tariffs and cheap imports are often cited as reason for the failure of the company.

Australia has become a quarry with most of our manufacturing industries driven off shore. Globalisation is making Australian workers compete with Chinese workers or Indian workers on much lower wages and conditions.

There was a time when we could produce cars, aircraft, farm machinery, clothes, using Australian labour and resources.

The was nothing we could not produce in this country.

Globalisation has left us in a very vulnerable position as the world 's demand for our resources falls. Hundreds of thousands of jobs are at risk.

The current economic system demands continuous growth. Many of the protesters argue that continuous growth on a finite planet is impossible.

We will have to change whether we like it or not. The big question is how long it will take to bring about change. A slow change will cause more death and suffering than a quick change. Perhaps revolution is the only way to bring about a quick change. As conditions get worse I am sure there will be more and more call for revolt remember Paris at the start of the French Revolution.

I guess the common bond is a demand for change.

The current system has failed and we desperately need a new one.

We may have to tear down the establishment to bring about the change.

It is hard to predict the future but change is inevitable. Peaceful change would be preferable and maybe democracy will help us to achieve change.

Unemployed and starving people may not have time for democracy.

"Change"

Submitted by Hamish Alcorn on March 30, 2009 - 7:06pm.

John, you made me think of a Chomsky You-tube I looked at the other day. I was wondering what Chomsky thought of Obama, so I searched around and found some interviews. I wasn't impressed mostly because Chomsky clearly hadn't looked at Obama's writings and policies in any detail, which of course is the crime he so often (rightly) accuses his critics of.

But the reason you made me think of it was more ironic than that. Chomsky's observation was that Obama was full of flowery rhetoric using key words like... "Change", but with no substance. It appears that you're saying the protestors want "Change", but with little other agreement. I can see Chomsky's point as such, but maybe he's facing in the wrong direction when he makes it.

These leaders, on the other hand, are trying to do something. I don't know if they'll get it right but it's a tough gig. Surely without a clear, "We demand that you do X", the protest is just another cultural experience. Are they - or some of them - going to attempt to disrupt the G20 meetings? If so, are they sure they're helping the situation, which is a very serious one? Are they sure - and the stakes are high here for millions of real human beings - they're not making the situation even harder?

If protestors want some sort of general awareness raising or revolution or whatever they're going to need more numbers. Do you think this vague call for 'Change' with no clear program, along with major disruption, is going to help them attract recruits? Another way, HOW are they helping anyone at all? Methinks that many of them are people for whom being marginal protestors is basically an identity badge as much as anything. I speak from personal experience, not just conjecture.

"The current system has failed." Well yes it has in many ways, so far at least. The other available systems in the World however are coping even worse, and are showing none of liberal democracy's propensity for self-criticism and creative adaption. What makes me marvel at our system, next to any in history or any other in the World, is ability to respond and change to different situations. At the moment I have just a little hope, but I can't see any chance with anything but our current liberal capitalist democracy (albeit with ongoing change and adaptation). The changes in the last 20 years - an incredibly short moment in history - have been unbelievable if we search for historic or global reference points to compare it with. Just my opinion there.

And globalisation? With respect, you make out as if globalisation is something the elites hoisted on us, when in fact I think it was hoisted on them as much as us by the march of history. The various 'free trade agreements' that have been thrashed out are not designing or implementing globalisation, they are attempting to respond to it. Generally, ironically, they're really attempts to strategically hold globalisation back in the interests of various powerful interests.

Globalisation is out of control, here to stay, and not all bad. Apart from food, music, culture and the like, one thing that is globalising fast is the Middle Class, to the extent that we're becoming a global people for whom national borders are archaic inconveniences. This is a powerful class, and it has values, ecological and humanitarian. We just have to decide what we want from our liberal democracies, and we can have it, in time. We may not lead, but we do run the place.

History ain't over 'till it's over. But amorphous, "The system is bad; we want change" cries won't help us a jot. Our leaders need concerted, constructive criticism but they also need some support and understanding. I certainly wouldn't want to have to solve the current crisis. I hope they get some things right, and we'll go from there.

Cheers.

Change

Submitted by John Pratt on March 30, 2009 - 8:14pm.

Hamish, thanks for your thoughtful response. I think we hold similar views. When I write I am writing as a champion for change. I try to encourage others to give the politicians the support they need to make the necessary changes. We do need change and I feel sooner rather than later. There are a lot of positive things happening - the election of Rudd and Obama has both nations moving in the right direction. Let's hope at the G20 meeting and at Copenhagen we see a shift in global policy. When I talk of revolution I hope we do not have to resort to revolution but I am convinced we will have to change and if the conservative side opposes the change civil strife is probably on the cards.

I think like the civil war in the US the issue of climate change is dividing families and we will soon have to take sides. I hope for peaceful change but look at what Hansen is organising in the US:

Hansen wrote that there is a "profound disconnect" between public policy on climate change and the magnitude of the problem as described by the science. He praised Obama's campaign rhetoric about "a planet in peril", but said that how the new president responds in office will be crucial. The letter contains a wish list of three policy measures to tackle global warming.
Hansen lambasts the current international approach of setting targets to be met through "cap and trade" schemes as not up to the task. "This approach is ineffectual and not commensurate with the climate threat. It could waste another decade, locking in disastrous consequences for our planet and humanity," the Hansens wrote.

When I discuss globalisation, I believe I hold an internationalist view. I think it is a good thing that jobs are moving from the First World to the Third thereby raising Third World living standards. I am looking for a solution where Australia can be more than a quarry. I think we will need a manufacturing industry. We should not end up as China's quarry and Japan's beach.

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