There can be little doubt about the centrality and severity of the environmental crisis in the present day. Driven by the mindless "grow-or-die" imperative of capitalism, humanity's destruction of the biosphere has reached and even surpassed various critical thresholds, whether in terms of carbon emissions, biodiversity loss, ocean acidification, freshwater depletion, or chemical pollution.
The Green New Deal will need to be subject to constant vigilance and pressure—from experts who understand exactly what it will take, and from social movements that have decades of experience bearing the brunt of false climate solutions.
We live in an era of plagues because of capitalist development, argues socialist author Mike Davis. In this transcript from a conversation streamed live on April 11, 2020, Davis also says coronavirus has exposed the gap between a tiny rich elite and the rest of us—creating space to put forward socialist ideas.
When I think back on this crisis in the years to come, two images will stay with me. One is of ordinary Italians singing to one another across balconies in solidarity with neighbors in isolation and caregivers on the frontlines. The other is that of the Indian police hosing down migrant workers and their children with bleach for ‘daring’ to walk cross country once their workplaces closed during lock down and no public transport was available for them to get home.
Joanna Bozuwa, J Mijin Cha, Daniel Aldana Cohen, Billy Fleming, Jim Goodwin, Ayana Elizabeth Johnson, Daniel M Kammen, Julian Brave NoiseCat, Mark Paul, Raj Patel, Thea Riofrancos, Medium, March 24, 2020
Daniel Denver of The Dig interviews Thea Riofrancos and Daniel Aldana Cohen, co-authors with Kate Aronoff and Alyssa Battistoni of A Planet to Win: Why We Need a Green New Deal.
For nearly 30 years, America’s four biggest rail companies—which move the majority of the country’s coal—have spent millions to deny climate science and block climate policy.
