The California wildfires, climate change and capitalism
The wildfires ripping through California and Oregon have exposed yet again the dangers posed by climate change and the inability of capitalist governments to deal with it.
The wildfires ripping through California and Oregon have exposed yet again the dangers posed by climate change and the inability of capitalist governments to deal with it.
For all the proclamations by corporations and governments that they accept the need to reduce fossil fuel use, carbon emissions rose to the highest ever level in 2019.
It is not “humanity” that is guilty of contributing to climate change or the destruction of the ecosystem. It is the capitalist class.
Democratic no less than Republican administrations have imposed austerity policies and prosecuted the decades-long social counterrevolution that continues today.
The only solution to the climate change crisis lies in the struggle against capitalism.
There are currently 27 major wildfires in California. In some areas, evacuations are barely staying ahead of the spreading flames.
The heat wave and numerous wildfires were all predictable, so why wasn’t California prepared?
The EPA loosened air pollution limits at the very time that coronavirus was becoming pandemic in the United States.
That the Australian prime minister denied any link between the fires and global warming epitomises the organic incapacity of the ruling classes internationally to address, let alone resolve, the climate crisis.
While Bolsonaro invokes rabid dictatorship-era chauvinism, world powers are using the fires to further their own strategic aims.