Article by Omar Bashir

Photo by Noah Bikoro on Unsplash

Climate change has become more significant within sociology and in the wider world in recent years; this has led to a deeper exploration of its causes, which, in turn, led some groups, such as contemporary Marxists, to conclude that capitalism caused climate change and was also the reason the climate crisis would not improve as long as capitalism was around. This leads me to the questions this article will aim to address: is capitalism contributing to the climate crisis? What can be done to help remedy the climate crisis?

The simplest way to illustrate how capitalism contributes to the climate crisis is through a Marxist framework (Urry, 2009), with Marx and Engels comparing capitalist society to ‘the sorcerer, who is no longer able to control the powers… he has called up by his spells’. This is to say that, as capitalism has progressed, the contradictions within the system have only grown and will continue to do so. In terms of the environment, this can be seen in large corporations (such as Shell) being motivated by profit margins and shareholder value to continue damaging the environment through the drilling and distribution of oil despite the risks being known since these same corporations aided in making the world reliant on fossil fuels. This shows how the contradictions in capitalism beget even more contradictions and skew peoples’s motives toward their benefit over that of the collective as any employee at a company that profits from the production of fossil fuels has a vested interest in the maintenance of fossil fuel production and, by extension, the climate becomes collateral damage in the pursuit of profits.

In ‘Sociology and Climate Change’ (2009), Urry uses Dubai as an example of another way that capitalism is detrimental to the environment: through the neo-liberal status quo that emphasises an abundance of choice and free markets. Dubai is a perfect example of this; within a country that is only 53 years old, it is a nation built to serve capitalists (hence its status as a tax haven). Dubai embodies the capitalist spirit, with non-stop growth that comes at the expense of migrant workers resulting from the need to drum up more tourism perpetually; there always needs to be something new and shiny to attract more tourists (money) to the country. Having lived there, I can attest that there are constantly new construction projects being built. If this wasn’t already bad enough for the environment and a clear sign of the over-indulgent neo-liberal ideals that Urry identified, then the fact that many of these projects can end up unfinished is; this occurs as developers are over-confident in the potential of a project for investment, start building, then run out of money to build or tear down the project, leaving hollow metal and glass shells in the middle of the desert as a symbol commemorating our capitalist hubris. The desire for freedom is fulfilled, but at what cost?

Various solutions have been proposed with the knowledge that capitalism is contributing to the climate crisis. The ecological modernization theory (Mol) acknowledges capitalism’s contradictions while still suggesting that the climate crisis can be remedied under a capitalist system, arguing that the innovation that is facilitated by free-market capitalism will ultimately lead to the development of new, green technologies that mean our economic system will not need to be overturned. Other solutions, such as the Marxist Treadmill of production theory (Schnaiberg, Gould and Pellow, 2008), are more pessimistic about capitalism, with this theory aligning with Urry’s in the belief that climate change is inevitable under capitalism as the requirement for constant growth will lead to over-exploiting the environment. Therefore, the proposed solution to the climate crisis is simple: end capitalism. Both solutions have their merits, with the ecological modernization theory being the easiest solution to enact. The treadmill of production theory aims to fight the climate crisis on the widest scale possible by making huge societal and economic changes globally. However, these methods have their drawbacks as ecological modernisation theory may not be able to go far enough in addressing the contradictions in capitalism and the treadmill of production theory having a goal that may be over-ambitious and, even if possible, would take at least years to put into action as it requires a change in the global economic system. The solution for the climate crisis is not simple and would optimally be the end of capitalism, until then, we as individuals must keep trying to hold corporations accountable for their damage to the environment.

References:

Urry, J. (2009). Sociology and Climate Change. The Sociological Review, 57(2_suppl), pp.84–100. doi:https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-954x.2010.01887.x.

Marx, K. and Engels, F. (1848). The Communist Manifesto. J E Burghard, pp.14–21.

A. Mol, G. Spaargeren, (2014), Routledge International Handbook of social and Environmental Change, Abingdon, Oxon. Routledge

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