Green New Deal

I have been thinking about “The Green New Deal.” While certainly pro about the movement, I have little hope that the current framing will capture the energetic imagination of that larger constituency needed to own it, refine it, make it real, and build upon it. And, its naming does it no favors outside of those already so inclined.

My biggest concerns are captured by a bit of Sean Connery dialogue in the 1997 film “The Untouchables.” As he lay dying on his apartment floor after being shot by a Capone henchman, he grabs the noble Elliot Ness to utter with his last breaths “What are you willing to D0!” It seems we, those of us with environmental/sustainability orientations, have a sense of what we want others to do. What changes are we willing to make ourselves? Calling this a “green” movement is, in my view, not a great start. 

I don’t think the proponents are considering enough how deeply their narrative is counter to the US national narrative. I’ve read that the US is legally a Nation, but it is only actually a nation – a collective consciousness – in times of war or sizable national or regional disasters that have clear causation and for which the remedies are logical.  

In climate risk terms I think we need to ask what is our “MAGA?” If we don’t have a better metaphor, all the positives that some restructuring of our systems will be ignored by most as seeming hostile to their futures. The national imagination around which the change, sacrifice, opportunity and compromise conversation can be real and looked forward too will be limited to those who are already true believers.

Most of risks created by human behavior for human society and global ecosystems have come from positive motives rather than negative. Innocent ignorance, willful ignorance as well as greed have played a role in masking the consequences of our collective actions. Many will be unable to “hear” that they/we are at fault because they have simply been doing what, as good Americans, they/we were supposed to do. 

Market capitalism has been branded as a synonym for freedom for most of us.  It has been an amazingly successful and dangerous confluence. Market capitalism has facilitated desires for betterment of a kind (material) and enabled its pursuit. People are not likely to accept responsibility for doing things that the entire national myth reinforces. And if they don’t feel responsible, they will not own and empower the need to change.  

The Green New Deal asks that they/we are take responsibility and sacrifice because the cumulative effects of the pursuit of freedoms. What are they going to get that they can be certain is worth changing for? It is a serious problem. As serious as an educational system in which we are not taught how to embrace science and doubt.

In the near term, and this is an emergency, intervention strategies that are effective cannot be hostile to the national myths. So, from my point of view, they need to coopt the myths and help capitalists and labor get much more prosperous in pursuit of climate and labor friendly strategies. This notion, creating market mechanisms and tax policies that create competitive advantage for those willing to do their business in a new way, including creating jobs, is in part a reality already. But at the scale it needs to occur it will be repugnant to the constituencies driving the Green New Deal agenda. This worries me.  

As a tangible example, assumptions are made within Green New Deal orthodoxy that we can substitute solar and wind for fossil fuels without any consideration about production intensity. I have forgotten the specifics but given the efficiency of solar and wind in the foreseeable future the land take for production and distribution would be greater than the landmass of the US (or something like that.) Any real solution will require much greater residential densities and dramatic growth in nuclear plants. Neither have been palatable to the “green” movement in the past. They have cowered in the face of the need for real discussions about what is needed.  

So, this brings me to the “what are you willing to do” question. Is this problem important enough to address the prevailing myths of the green movement itself as well as the national myth that freedom and capitalism are the same thing? I am not seeing it yet and am doubtful. The science is clear that there is a real and present danger to the future of the nation and world if we ignore the need for a full expression of the national will toward a new energy policy, changes in land use patterns, infrastructure, transportation, etc.  if the answer to the question “what are you willing to do” is only tell others how they should change then nothing will change. If the answer, for greens as well as markets, is change us in ways that make you more successful through your own changes, then it might.