{"id":60,"date":"2021-09-23T08:44:31","date_gmt":"2021-09-23T07:44:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/decolonising.cls-uk.org.uk\/?page_id=60"},"modified":"2021-09-23T21:24:41","modified_gmt":"2021-09-23T20:24:41","slug":"decolonising-and-decarbonising-the-origins-of-capitalism-and-climate-change","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/decolonising.cls-uk.org.uk\/?page_id=60","title":{"rendered":"Decolonising and Decarbonising: The Origins of Capitalism and Climate Change"},"content":{"rendered":"

The 2018 hurricanes Irma and Maria signal the emergence of a new climate regime in the Caribbean. At no point in the historical records dating back to the 1880s have two category five storms struck the eastern Caribbean in a single year. The Caribbean is seeing repeated and prolonged droughts, an increase in the number of very hot days, intense rainfall events causing repeated localised flooding, and rising sea levels.<\/span><\/p>\n

The slogan “1.5\u00b0C to Stay Alive!” was adopted by the Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre. A world warmed by no more than 1.5\u00b0C is one in which existing Caribbean societies have a future. However, the emissions reductions that have been voluntarily agreed through the United Nations have been predicted to lead to warming of 2.7-3.7\u00b0C.<\/span><\/p>\n

A good place to start on the discussion is <\/span>Leon Sealey-Huggins (2017) \u20181.5\u00b0C to stay alive\u2019: climate change, imperialism and justice for the Caribbean, <\/span>Third World Quarterly<\/span><\/i>, 38:11, 2444-2463<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

The failure of the efforts by the “international community” to deal with climate change can partly be attributed to the domination of the discussions by the old imperialist powers, those who, as representatives of the major historical and current polluters,\u00a0 are mainly responsible for the state the climate is in.<\/span><\/p>\n

It is now well established that the origin of the current crisis of global warming can be traced back to the widespread adoption of the coal-powered steam engine by the British textile industry in the early 19th Century. Since then the drive for profit has been linked to the vastly increased use of fossil fuels, resulting in massively increased production of greenhouse gases and other pollutants.<\/span><\/p>\n

Malm, Andreas. (2013). “The Origins of Fossil Capital: From Water to Steam in the British Cotton Industry”. <\/span>Historical Materialism<\/span><\/i>. 21. 15-68<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

The full argument can be read in Malm’s book: <\/span>Fossil Capital The Rise of Steam Power and the Roots of Global Warming<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Industrialisation in Europe and North America required a primary accumulation of capital, the initial funding that could start the process.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

John Bellamy Foster, Brett Clark and Hannah Holleman, “Capitalism and Robbery: The Expropriation of Land, Labor, and Corporeal Life”, <\/span>Monthly Review<\/span><\/i>, December 2019 (Volume 71, Number 7)<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

This started by driving peasants farmers from their farms and the privatisation of common land that had previously been open to the use of all; processes known as clearances and enclosures.<\/p>\n

A detailed explanation of the process of enclose can be found in <\/span>A Short History of Enclosure in Britain<\/span><\/i> by Simon Fairlie<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

Linebaugh, Peter. 2014. Stop, Thief!\u202f: The Commons, Enclosures, And Resistance. Oakland: PM Press<\/span><\/a> is a well written collection of essays on this topic.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ian Angus has written two articles for Climate and Capitalism<\/span><\/p>\n