Photo: NASA/Kathryn Hansen, Flickr
A few years ago, in what became a quite (in) famous YouTube clip, United States senator Joe Inhofe brought a snowball into the U.S. Congress. During a climate change debate, Inhofe pulled out the snowball from a plastic bag and said: “We keep hearing that 2014 has been the warmest year on record. But do you know what this is? This is a snowball, and its just from outside here. So it’s very, very cold out”. What senator Inhofe failed to understand was that it does not matter how cold it is in Washington D.C. on a specific day. Instead, as research has confirmed over and over again, increasing greenhouse gas emissions raise the average temperature on earth over time. Therefore, in this edition we share some perspectives on issues related to climate change which may change our planet as we know it. Meanwhile, Senator Inhofe’s hunt for snowball and cheap points continues, although chances are it will be increasingly difficult for him to find one. We will, however, offer some thoughts on why Inhofe is in denial, on the consumerist culture, climate refugees, biofuels and the North-South divide. FREDRIK BJÖRKSTEN
RETHINKING MIGRATION IN THE CONTEXT OF CLIMATE CHANGE The large numbers of displaced populations we see today have been responded to with overall regressive measures. Matthew Scott, an international lawyer specializing in migration, talked to us about the possibilities and challenges of displacement in the context of disasters and climate change that lie ahead. Matthew Scott is an international lawyer at the Raoul Wallenberg Institute who focuses on migration in the context of disaster and climate change. He explains the challenges with the current legal framework under which refugees are addressed. – The idea of a ‘climate refugee’ does not readily fit within the requirements of the refugee definition under the UN Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, which defines the status and the rights of refugees, says Scott. This is because it is difficult to pinpoint climate change as the single cause of migration. Climate change can rather be understood as a risk amplifier gradually deteriorating livelihoods. – A toolkit approach that can address the diverse forms of displacement in the context of disasters and climate change is therefore necessary, Scott stresses. In addition to the UN Convention, we need complementary protection mechanisms, such as the European Convention of Human Rights, and contextual policies that address specific conditions in particular regions or sub-regions. It is also important to highlight that most displaced people either move to neighbouring countries or stay within their home country. Hence, action with a focus on internal displacement is called for. Matthew Scott shares some positive trends on migration and adaptation strategies. For instance, New Zealand is discussing the possibility of a ‘climate
refugee’ visa for people in their immediate neighbourhood, whose livelihoods are challenged as a result of climate change. This is an example of orderly migration - meaning that migration is used as an adaptation to climate change rather than as a last exit. – Mobility as a strategy enables people to move with dignity, Scott emphasises. Even if this would require a new governance system that puts conditions on states regarding migration, Scott remains cynical to this kind of realisation: – States are unlikely to adopt new international obligations that go against their perceived economic and political interests in a world that is still very state-centric. He views the current global trends as proving this point, taking Brexit as an example.
security today that plays to people’s fears, Matthew Scott follows. – People are scared of both climate change and of migration, of large volumes of people that cannot be controlled. This fear leads us to think “how can we stop this?”, instead of “how can we use a nuanced toolkit that includes a human rights-based approach?”. The ultimate response becomes force and increased border security. Scott speculates that climate change could be the key cross-border challenge that makes states willing to cooperate. But how much damage that needs to be done before states will act beyond their short-term national interests, is an answer only future can tell. LOUISE GRIPENBERG & KLARA EITREM HOLMGREN
Migration entails economic and cultural benefits. Nevertheless, states often focus on the short-term socioeconomic pressures that the large influx of migrants result in. There is also a strong narrative of national
Climate change can be understood as a risk amplifier that increases the vulnerability of livelihoods and contributes to an increased displacement of people.
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Photo: Mohammad Ponir Hossain, Flickr
COMBATING CLIMATE CHANGE THROUGH BIOFUELS - AT WHAT COST? Biofuels seem to be an important step in the combat against climate change, as they represent a renewable and less polluting alternative to fossil fuels. However, its agricultural production provokes controversial discussions. Several international organisations seek to raise awareness about the social and ecological impacts of the rising biofuel demand. One of the EU’s political priorities is the production and promotion of renewable energy. When adopting the Kyoto Protocol, an international treaty that commits State Parties to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the EU committed to a 20 percent greenhouse gas reduction by 2020. To reach that goal, the Renewable Energy Directive (RED) was implemented in 2015. It is a policy that regulates the replacement of 10 percent of all transport fuels, with renewable energy sources (such as biofuels) in each EU member state. Biofuels imported to the EU need to fulfil certain sustainability criteria listed in the RED. These are standards that aim at ensuring an eco-friendly biofuel production and do not harm biodiversity. The criteria determine that biofuels must achieve greenhouse gas savings of at least 35 percent in comparison to fossil fuels and that they cannot be grown in areas such as wetlands and forests. Despite these attempts to standardize sustainability, several non-governmental organisations argue that its social and ecological impacts are not sufficiently being taken into account. The pitfalls of Biofuel The U.S., Brazil and the EU consume 80 percent of the global biofuel production, with the EU being the only region heavily relying on imports of feedstock for biofuels and food to replace its own biofuel production. In 2008, around 41 percent of its biofuel was imported from the global south, where rising production leaves its traces. Companies from high income countries operating in the global south have been accused of grabbing land for their production of biofuel crops. These projects are mostly supported by the World Bank and carried out in the name of development. The creation of employment and foreign direct investment inflows to low income countries are considered a step towards economic progress, but the local population is being deprived of its land, which ought to be their first source of food. In addition, they are often employed as seasonal workers, leaving them without any income for a certain period of time.
EU-standards aim at ensuring an eco-friendly biofuel production. But are social and ecological impacts taken into account sufficiently?
Photo: alh1, Flickr.
Food or Fuel? There is an ongoing debate within the EU about what role biofuels should play. However, little is reported about the social and political consequences of its production in the respective countries and even less regarding the ecological aftermath that could follow. The introduction of biofuels seems to be an important step in the battle against climate change. But farmers in many countries are paying a high price and the ecological impacts are still unforeseeable. On a global scale, we are observing a rising demand for food through the increase of the world population, while farmland is declining and simultaneously being used to grow crops for fuel instead of food. The result is an increase in food prices, to a great extent motivated by the EU’s inexhaustible demand for biofuels. ELIN FREDRIKSSON & BRITA BAMERT
Besides the social side effects, these enormous agricultural projects have an immense impact on the ecosystem. Some of the pitfalls include land degradation through monocultures and the extensive use of water.
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HUNGER FOR CONSUMPTION Amidst the chaos in contemporary politics with an escalating polarization, another story has passed by relatively quietly. For the first time in decades, during 2016 global hunger increased instead of decreased. The number? Some 38 million people. The Food and Agriculture Organization claims that the reason, contrary to populist belief, is the one-two punch of climate change and conflict. Climate change risks both starting and exacerbating conflicts, which is already happening, adding to the evidence for the urgency of climate action. On this topic, there is some concern that Donald Photo: Private Trump is the canary in the coal mine, giving a glimpse of a future dystopia of climate change deniers. Scientists, media and politicians will have to keep working for the scientific evidence to prevail. Despite all their flaws, I cannot help but believing in climate change movies such as An Inconvenient Sequel or Before the Flood to this end.
cannot, of course. Satisfaction turns out to be bad for business. In the words of the sociologist Zygmunt Bauman: For a kind of society which proclaims customer satisfaction to be its sole motive and paramount purpose, a satisfied consumer is neither motive nor purpose – but the most terrifying menace. Guilt trips aside, isn’t it remarkable that while climate change wreaks havoc, our culture encourages buying more and more stuff, indulging in continuously changing trends of disposable fashion, weekend flights and wi-fi connected digital photo frames? Where are my Hollywood movies on consumerist culture? While another 38 million starve, our hunger for consumer goods keeps growing. KRISTOFFER BERGLUND
It is no longer a controversial claim that overconsumption is detrimental to climate change. However, while global hunger is increasing by millions, we are gripped by Black Fridays, Cyber Mondays and an endless stream of new products looking to fill whatever gap (manufactured or otherwise) there is in our lives. The twist is that they
WHY DO WE IGNORE CLIMATE CHANGE? Despite increased awareness and research showing that climate change is real, peoples concern for the problem have been shown to decrease, including mine. Why do we rather ignore climate change than face it? Per Stoknes presents five main barriers that helps us ignore this issue and brings clarity to why many of us rather not talk about climate change.
The first one is distance: that we see climate change as something far away in terms of both time and space. It is a future problem, making us less willing to act on it now. It feels socially distant especially for people living in the global north, as the first ones to suffer from the impact of climate change are people living in the global south.
Over the last twenty-five years with increased awareness and research on climate change, the overall concern people have for climate change has decreased. This applies even more so to high income countries than in other parts of the world. We know that climate change is real, so why do we ignore it?
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The Norwegian economist and psychologist Per Espen Stoknes raises the question if humans are inevitably short-term thinkers, and if so, what changes are needed for us to start thinking long-term about climate change? According to Stoknes, there are five main barriers that help us ignore this issue.
Photo: Matias Rengel, Unsplash
One of the most famous climate change deniers is the president of the United States, Donald Trump.
The second barrier is the “doomsday” narrative through which media have continuously portrayed climate change. This has especially affected younger generations, leading to the new phenomenon of “eco-anxiety”. Feeling that we are living under a constant threat can lead to depression, or that our defense mechanism kicks in making us ignore the problem to be able to cope. The other barriers put forth by Stoknes are dissonance, denial, and identity. We are aware that our lifestyle is not sustainable, so we start making excuses, choose to doubt science or point fingers to feel better about ourselves. We might justify our choices as we see them as part of our identity, like the kind of car we drive and our food choices. This is why I personally rather not think about climate change. It is something big and scary that gives me (eco)anxiety, but at the same time it feels far away and complicated to fully adapt to. While feeling this way, I still know too much to be able to deny it, and hopefully so do you. So what can we do to start thinking long-term? Following Per Espen Stoknes reasoning, rather than making climate change distant we have to make it more local and social. Instead of using pictures of polar bears in an Arctic without ice, we need to use human faces – actual people affected by the climate crisis. We all have to speak more about climate change, not just politicians that we feel socially distant too. We can also impact
Photo: Flickr
others by changing social norms. Studies have shown that if one house in a neighborhood put solar panels on their roof, the neighbors are most likely to follow. Furthermore, we should collectively push politicians, decision-makers and businesses to make the sustainable option the default option. Nudging people in the right direction can do a lot for the climate. What I find most important, however, is that we need to change the way we talk about climate change. We need to create a narrative we believe in to find the will to engage and be part of the solution. Stoknes suggest that 75% of communication concerning climate change needs to be about opportunity. I want to believe that people will think and act long-term on climate change if there are more favorable conditions for doing so. The stone age did not end due to lack of stones, we just found smarter ways of living. Now is the time to choose to live smarter.
Photo: Private
FREDRIKA SWENO
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Photo: Khuroshvili Ilya, Flickr.
THE ENVIRONMENT: THE VICTIM IN THE BATTLE BETWEEN LOW AND HIGH INCOME COUNTRIES. Climate change is global in its nature, yet nations argue who ought to undertake the responsibility of solving the issue of global warming. International negotiations resulted in the Kyoto Protocol, which exempted low income countries from any obligations. Frank Baber, from the Raoul Wallenberg Institute, proposes a human rights approach in order to find a solution to global warming. In a historic perspective, bearing the industrialisation in mind, high-income countries in the West have extensively contributed to the increasing levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere. However, with present knowledge we can forecast dreadful consequences if low-income countries decide to walk down the same path. Yet we cannot deny low-income countries the right to socio-economic development. As low-income countries begin their quest for growth, their CO2 emissions drastically increase. In international negotiations for environmental agreements, there are discussions concerning if the amount of responsibility a country has to undertake should depend on their economic status. Low-income countries claim that they simply do not have the economic capacity to invest in the environmental issue, whereas high-income countries recognize that the global and complex nature of climate change requires that all nations are equally responsible for achieving a sustainable environment.
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Existing Methods Earlier methods for international negotiations aiming towards environmental agreements where perceiving low-income countries as a homogeneous group with similar characteristics. However just as high-income countries, every low-income country is unique with a variety of features. The same goes for development strategies. History reveals that there is no universal blueprint for sustained economic growth. The differences amongst low-income countries calls for various development models with sustainability as a distinct feature. The Kyoto Protocol was adopted in 1997 as the first attempt by the United Nations to control anthropogenic CO2 emissions. The agreement fell short as a result of contrasting political interests demonstrated by a clear distinction between two recognized groups; low-income countries and high-income countries. The Kyoto Protocol revolved around high-income countries, who signed binding targets to decrease the global CO2 emissions with 5.2 percent. The rest were defined as low-income countries, who were excluded from the agreement and not obligated to undertake any responsibility. Accordingly, high-income countries aim to reduce their CO2 emissions, while low-income countries continue to emit greenhouse gases.
The failure of including the global nature of CO2 emissions is a clear evidence of the political character in climate negotiations that neglects the role of the environment. The problem of political self-interests are still present in current climate negotiations such as the Paris Agreement, displays an urgent need for new methods to solve the issue of global warming. Human rights approach The conventional methods of solving environmental issues have proven to be ineffective. Countries fail to take responsibility for their CO2 emissions, because economic interests are prioritized over engagement in the environmental issue. However, there are innovative methods that have yet to be tried. Frank Baber, from the Raoul Wallenberg Institute, argued in an interview for a unique method of resolving environmental issues. An efficient method of safeguarding environmental rights is to primarily focus on basic human rights. One example is the right to clean water, which is a multidimensional right that can focus on meeting basic human needs as well as ensuring a sustainable use of resources. Environmental rights will thus be protected by ensuring human rights.
point. From a legal standpoint, human rights are an efficient way to ensure that the environmental rights are protected and it is politically sensible for all counterparts. Frank Baber further discussed the enforcement issues concerning environmental rights. Enforcement of environmental rights comes with great difficulties, especially regarding public international law, including issues concerning human rights. However, the difficulty can vary. The case of Ratko Mladic demonstrates the strength of enforcing human rights over environmental rights. Mladic was sentenced to life in prison for human rights violations. He also committed severe damage to the environment, which he was never charged of. Frank Baber argues that the human rights battle has more potential weapons than the environmental battle, consequently making this method the most efficient approach in the battle for a sustainable environment. MATHILDA ENGLUND & DIMEN HOSHIAR
Frank Baber explains that environmental rights are abstract and complicated to grasp, whereas human rights are more concrete and much more relatable. CO2 emission can neither be seen, heard nor smelled. On the contrary, it is easy to put yourself in the shoes of someone who lacks the access to clean water. Human rights provide a better starting point than abstract environmental rights. Moreover, the right to clean water is already enshrined in binding international agreements which may not be regulated in the strongest way possible, but they do exist and provide use with a clear starting-
GUEST COLUMN: WHAT CAN CIVIL SOCIETY TEACH STATES? At this year’s UN climate conference COP23, the host country Fiji tried a new concept called The Open Dialogue which allowed civil society and states to meet. With that being categorized as new concept, it is safe to say that there is room for improvement when it comes to the inclusion of civil society in the COP’s. Although, as part of the opening remarks of that meeting someone said: “Today we will not be negotiating, today we will learn from civil society”. At first I thought it referred to learning as in “listening to feedback from the civil society” and that seemed to be
the general interpretation during the meeting. But when I recently looked through my notes and found this quote, it got me thinking of learning in the terms of “what civil society can teach states”. Especially when it comes to empowering people for climate action. So, what does civil society have that states lack? I would argue that there are three main things; a vision, legitimacy and freedom of borders. Driven by a common objective view or purpose non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have a unique trait in their visonarity; allowing for more ambitious ideas and making engagement contagious. Building the politics on visions and working for a defined purpose is something that I think many states forget nowadays.
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Furthermore civil society organisations consists of people who have actively chosen to involve themselves, rather than have been born into something. It gives them a legitimacy to represent their members that is hard to beat. Maybe this could be the case for states as well, if one was freer to choose which country to be a citizen in. The key feature of civil society, that is also its greatest comparative advantages to states, is that it does not have to respect borders and thus have the possibility of mobilising people from all over the globe. States are trying to do the same, through different forms of international cooperation such as the UN, but are not nearly as good as doing this at a grassroot level.
civil society strengths.
should
realize
its
We all should realize that trough civil society we have the capacity to accomplish far more than can be reached through slow UN processes, that just recently understood that meeting with civil society is important. If you and I and everyone else start understanding and utilizing those strengths, I am sure we will stop global warming in no time!
To conclude, states do have a lot to learn from civil society. However, my message is not that the UN is going to turn in to a large environmental NGO in order to become more successful in combating climate change (even if that would be great). On the contrary, I think
Foto: Privat
KAJSA FERNSTRÖM NÅTBY The Swedish Youth Delegate to COP23
FUF MAGAZINE Nr 1 2018 WEBPAGES www.fufmagazine.com www.fuf.se ADVERTISING fuf@fuf.se EDITING AND LAYOUT Agnes Cronholm Kristoffer Berglund Viktor Stocke
WRITERS Fredrik Björksten Louise Gripenberg Klara Eitrem Holmgren Elin Fredriksson Brita Bramert Kristoffer Berglund Fredrika Sweno Mathilda Englund Dimen Hoshiar GUEST COLUMNIST Kajsa Fernström Nåtby
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