What Lies Beneath

My library card has really been getting a workout this summer. I love a good story. Lately I've been on a bit of a maritime kick, having recently devoured the true-life story of The Wager , a ship that ran aground in 1743 attempting the gauntlet around Cape Horn, which yielded 33 improbable castaway survivors. Following it up with Annie Proulx's The Shipping News , a book so good I can hardly bear to finish it, officially made it a trend. Among the sea and salt and beating-heart tides, two images have come to occupy my inner monologue: a looming iceberg like a perfectly balanced top, and the shuddering moment when a floundering vessel becomes swamped before slipping below the surface.

We are infinitely contained, layered among the matryoshka of the universe

Our annual report published earlier this year explains how to begin mapping complex systems by creating an iceberg model. They're a classic systems-thinking tool, but an additional layer is often left out: the container. All the way down, below the systems, structures, and mental models, are the things that contain us. In the literal sense, one could say the ocean is the container upon which the iceberg rests - empty the ocean of water, and the whole iceberg comes crashing down. For most of the systems we model, the container typically includes things like democracy or capitalism. The container is built from all the foundational conditions of the system that are rarely challenged or expected to change.

Most podcasts I've heard over the past week highlighted the myriad regulatory and political actions that must come together, just so, to bring down carbon emissions and prevent climate catastrophe. This fantastic episode of Zero is the perfect example. Building the electricity grid of the future is a challenge of enormous scale and importance in our current strategy to address climate change. Executing it requires pulling the levers of political power in a complicated dance that expects rational actors to adhere to our cultural norms of government.

Democracy is the ballast, and if we lose it, all our models of the future cease to exist. I hope not to belabor the analogy, but if democracy is the container on which we rest the future, how are we thinking about attending to our rapidly-listing vessel? All the solutions we think will save us are predicated on the assumption that our democratic system can function. The United States is not alone in struggling to maintain democratic norms during a highly contentious election, but the sheets and rigging holding us against the storm were not designed for this century . We're at the slippery end of a very long slope toward full-blown dysfunction.

The most urgent climate policy is civic engagement

It seems so clear to me that we must treat climate policy as a democracy-strengthening exercise, and it's not difficult to imagine what that might look like. And yet, I'm not clear on where the grand bargain is being made. Which stalwart champions pledging billions to degrees Celsius is willing to pledge billions to save the very system that must deliver our solutions?

Too often, the leading arguments being made to support climate policies, which are already very boring and technical, are based on "counterfactuals". If we don't all agree to pay this big amount now, we will have to pay a lot more later. The problem with that argument is that it's largely unpersuasive from a psychological standpoint. Perhaps what you say is true, but who among us can truly know the future? It's easy to think of numerous future conditions that might negate your counterfactual argument.

We're just nibbling around the edges here, playing small ball with climate criminals and expecting the rules to still matter in the future. I've never been less confident that we're even playing the same game anymore. If I could direct the resources of every climate action fund, I would bring them together into a war-effort-level campaign to improve civic literacy, motivation, and access.

Imagine this:

A climate narrative and movement built on an empowered citizenry. It has it all: solidarity, good vibes, good jobs, beating the bad guys who thought they could trick us. You can tap into our thirst for nostalgia, invoking times when Americans united against a common enemy, when we stood arm-in-arm and fought for our rights. Tap into the indignation we all feel when we've lost something to someone else's greed or hubris.

I see TV ads, viral videos, and an army of TikTok memers - clear, simple, emotional calls to action that bring the opportunity for social connection. Build a self-reinforcing movement by turning it into a community. Give people something to feel excited about and really lean into it.

THAT is the climate action we most urgently need.

I will say the other quiet part out loud, though: regular, everyday consumers shouldn't be expected to pay for most of this. If we keep trying to go that way, we won't get very far. Do you think voters will hold fast to their fear of climate change while footing an ever-growing bill? I wouldn't put money on it.

How far can you stretch the limits of your imagination?

It's difficult to imagine a future set of solutions not delivered via democratic processes. I'm not saying they don't exist, but it probably involves a lot less justice, a lot more pain. If we cannot demonstrate real climate progress, very soon, there are even greater risks at hand. How much do you know about geoengineering? It's not science fiction, but it should be considered the absolute last resort, "break glass in emergency" kind of solution. Check out this episode of Energy Policy Now for the current state of play. Very low technology barrier - practically any country in the world could unilaterally pump sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere to create clouds and haze and reduce temperatures. Eventually, someone will, the consequences be damned. We don't know what would happen and the risks of unintended or runaway consequences are staggering. Imagine a technology of almost nuclear-weapon gravity, but it's accessible even with a moderate national pocketbook.

We are in the midst of a paradigmatic sea-change of both physical and metaphorical dimensions, with all the violence that will entail. If we sail onward into the storm without reinforcing our rigging, it won't be pretty.