The US military may be the last defender of climate science within the Trump administration, but don't expect the Pentagon to fight for climate justice. Preparing for climate crises is a funding boon for the military, which exists to uphold a fossil fuel-hungry empire that is driving climate disruption in the first place.
Trump's obsession with security is not an anomaly, but a reflection of a growing tide of fear-based politics that has also shaped the climate change debate. In an interview about TNI's book, The Secure and the Dispossessed, Nick Buxton reflects on the 'securitisation' of climate change and the need to advocate a just transition.
The Paris COP21 talks failed to deliver a meaningful result, judged from either a scientific or social justice point-of-view. However it did reveal the presence of an increasingly sophisticated and powerful climate justice movement that heralds the most hope for a just response to the global climate crisis.
The desperate search for ways to combat climate change gives rise to new mitigation policies and projects, such as the support of large-scale ‘sustainable ’ forestry plantations. However, climate justice and climate mitigation cannot be met as long as large-scale industrial plantations continue to marginalise small-scale indigenous forest users who actively protect biodiverse forests.
Book review by Robert J. Burrowes of The Secure and the Dispossesed: How the Military and Corporations are Shaping a Climate-Changed World. The book is edited by Nick Buxton and Ben Hayes, who are both associated with TNI.
Open Democracy interviewed Ben Hayes and Nick Buxton, who argue that the climate change agendas of governments and corporations have securitised and militarised environmental policies to the world's detriment.
What if government and corporate elites have given up on stopping climate change and prefer to try to manage its consequences instead? In the weeks running up to the major UN Climate Change Conference in Paris (COP21), this event examined issues raised by a new book, 'The Secure and the Dispossessed: How the Military and Corporations are Shaping a Climate-Changed World'
In addition to having a strategic role as a provider of jobs, food needs, and economic sustainability, small-scale fisheries also become an important driver in conserving fish and natural resources through a variety of local knowledge.
We often use the term "Commons" to explain, that we aim at transforming our societal organization. But which realistic concepts do we have at hand to regain the control over our energy system? We need to ask the question of ownership: Shall the energy system pass into public ownership? Shall we fight for it on all levels, at the municipal, regional and national level?
John Hilary, Diana Aguiar and Brid Brennan discuss how we need to move beyond reformist politics in a convergence of citizens, organised citizens, organisations social movements, trade unionists, peasants, women organisations, and indigenous peoples to reclaim sovereignty over the resources of the planet.
There is no shortage of words in the latest negotiating document for the UN climate negotiations taking place in Paris at the end of November – 32,731 words to be precise and counting. Yet strangely there is one word you won’t find: military. It’s a strange omission, given that the US military alone is the single largest user of petroleum in the world and has been the main enforcer of the global oil economy for decades.
This public event will highlight the risks that provisions negotiated as part of trade agreements – such as ISDS – can pose for governments’ ability to regulate to protect the environment and act on climate change.
Ben Hayes and Nick Buxton, editors of the forthcoming bookThe Secure And The Dispossessed, ask: do we really want the military and corporations to lead on how we deal with the climate crisis?
While the world’s scientists and many of its inhabitants despair at the unfolding impacts of climate change, corporate and military leaders see nothing but challenges and opportunities.
Multinational corporations such as Anglo American undermine crucial climate policies and promote false solutions, which allow them to profit from the climate crisis, according to a new report released 8 December during the UN climate talks.
Climate talks in Lima will be subject to intense lobbying by some of the biggest industrial polluters. They not only cause serious social and environmental conflicts where they extract fossil fuels, their capture of decision-making also prevents a real solution to the climate crisis.
