Now, we must turn Paris rhetoric into reality

by Robert McLean.

Rhetoric from last month’s Paris climate talks now need to be turned into reality.

Professor John Wiseman.

That, of course, is going to be easier said than done for quietly, and maybe even unintentionally, the business-as-usual brigade continues with its behaviour almost as if discussions in the French capital had not happened.

The world’s economic juggernauts have just one responsibility and that is to make a profit, even though that advance in economic matters comes at a cost in externalities, a reality not even noted on balance sheets. Those externalities include the biosphere in every sense.

Discussion about the climate, the causes of its changing behaviour, its impact upon earth and subsequently how those changes would affect humanity reached something of a fever pitch in the lead up to and during the Paris conversations, but now, just a few weeks later, it seems we have slipped back to our old ways.

That’s a little unfair, for while little has changed in terms of societal governance, in popular terms, countries around the world have formally acknowledged the reality of and implications of climate change and most have voluntarily set goals to reduce the carbon dioxide emissions.

And the further heartening news is that there is a broad agreement about revisiting those goals in a scheduled way to ensure something tangible is actually happening.

But with the whooping and hollering about the success of the Paris talks quickly fading, the behaviour that brought us to the brink with climate change appears to continue unabated – corporations continue, despite costs to the environment, their drive for unceasing and ever-expanding profits.

However, although the world’s governments appear to be little more than servants to those earlier mentioned economic juggernauts, we are seeing considerable positive movement from the cities of the world and countless non-governmental organizations.

Deputy Director of the Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute, Professor John Wiseman, was at the Paris talks and was impressed with the sweeping bottom-up pressure being put upon the world’s governments by many cities and a dazzling array of NGOs.

However, and Prof Wiseman agreed, the efforts of cities and NGOs alone will not be enough to slow the effect and impacts of climate change and we need governments of all political colours to institute a style of governance that will slow, stop and ultimately reverse humanity’s carbon dioxide emissions.