Factors Contributing to Climate Change
The values, interests and power relations of different actors have influenced responses to climate change. Global warming is one of the most pervasive and worse issues of our time (Mohapatra, et al., 2015, p. 2). It has unprecedented impacts on where individuals can grow food, settle, build towns and depend on the working environment for the services they offer (Adedeji, et al., 2014, p. 115). In many of the areas, the rises in sea level, as well as changes in temperature are already putting the environment under stress. This has affected the wellbeing of the human being. The climate has changed throughout the Earth’s history. Some of the aspects of the disaster are not normal while others are. Current world temperatures are warmer compared to five years ago. If the situation is not rescued, the resulting climate change in the next few years will be extremely unusual. Economic activities are the major causes of climate change (Bhandari, 2018, p. 6). Everybody starting from governments, individuals and firms are setting up policies to help mitigate the problem through reduction of greenhouse gases (Stern, et al., 2014, p. 282). The attempts to curb climate change have been politicized hence making it impossible to mitigate the disaster (Tschakert, 2012, p. 144).
I have learned about climate change in the first two assessments. I have learned that human beings majorly cause climate changes. Several attempts have been made to mitigate the disaster. However, different actors have influenced such efforts. In this essay, I will explain how interests, values, and power relations of different actors have affected the response to global warming drawing on political ecology.
The Earth is experiencing several changes with respect to past climate records the records (Leining & White, 2015, p. 1). Global warming has been taking place since the earth came into existence some thousands of millions of years ago. It has caused a redistribution of chemical elements between the atmosphere and lithosphere. Today, the surface does not look the way it looked several years ago. The global average temperatures have greatly been influenced. Over an extended period, the globe has experienced various changes in the statistical distribution of weather patterns. The difference has been the most important issue affecting our environment for the last several decades (Rahman, 2012, p. 2). Some of these variations include changes in time within a period of long-term mean conditions and exceptions of average weather conditions. Weather events have also become unreliable with some regions of the globe such parts of the United States experiencing extreme conditions (Bradford & Pappas, 2017). Biotic processes, volcanic eruptions, human activities such as agriculture and volcanic eruptions among others are some of the factors which have been believed to be great contributors to the changes in climate (Swim, et al., 2011, p. 251). The most significant cause of the global environmental changes remains to be human beings. The reactions between natural variations in the global biological and physical structures broadly affect human activities and vice versa (MacMillan, 2016). Fuel consumption and agriculture remain to be the major suspects (Salvo, et al., 2013, p. 500). This has put scientists and other specialists on the run to look for ways that curb this menace. However, different actors with different interests, values, and power relations have influenced the responses to the climate change as an international environment issue either politically, economically or socially. This research essay attempts to conclude how various actors have affected response to climate change drawing all arguments on political ecology. The final part presents my conclusion in as far as the influence of varied actors on the answers to climate change.
Impact of Varied Actors
It is crystal clear that man is behind the significant part of global environmental changes. If nothing is done to this effect, man’s life on the planet will be under threat in the next few decades. Having researched on the history, causes, consequences, and response to the environmental changes in the earth, I will recommend future researches that will help to come up with better methods of curbing climate change without receiving criticism from other actors.
Madzivhandila and his co-author in their article on “politics of climate change: why should Africa mitigate?” argue that countries whose economy is stable have on several occasions refused requests from the countries that depend on them to reduce gas emissions from the industries that rely on them economically (Madzivhandila & Niyimbanira, 2016, p. 91). For the countries that have resolved on taking the bull on their heads to reduce the emissions, a snail pace concerning development has been witnessed. Developing nations, on the other hand, have also resolved to speed up development to drive away the high rate of poverty, unemployment as well as other critical issues affecting them. Due to the weak infrastructure in these nations, an alternative has not been left for them other than adapting to the impacts of climate change rather than majoring on ways of mitigating the variations in climate (Jackson, 2015).
The desire to make more wealth has influenced attempts to address global warming (Hickel, 2016). Scientists have given warnings in respect to the emerging global warming for the last few decades. However, this has been rubbished by fossil fuel industries and their allies. As the climate change scientists argue, the people involved in the fossil fuel business create false information that is passed through mass media and the persisted politicians to create an impression of lack of evidence for the climate changes. The oil industries also pay some fake climate scientists to falsify the existing climate change hypothesis (Happer & Philo, 2013, p. 326). In as much as these false scientists cannot be ignored, what they say always has a more significant impact on the public. The few remaining climate change analytics are therefore seen as enemies of development by these emerging nations. In simple terms, the days that climatic change was a scientific issue are long gone. The present climatic change is politically motioned, and it is highly influenced by political decisions which are economically and timely inclined (State, 2013).
Challenges affecting Response to Climate Crisis
The whole idea of climate science has been politicized (Baviera & Maramis, 2017, p. 275). The United Nations organized general and international meetings arranged through the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change have clearly shown proof that there the whole idea of climatic change has been politicized. For example, the first Kyoto Protocol that was supposed to be the initial multinational strategy to be agreed upon on matters climate change was strongly politicized and contested (Poppick, 2017). The present policies on climate change are more political. Their products are stagnated. The current socio-political status quo is the opposite of what was expected. This has offered a low probability on the hopes of any transformations. In simple terms, climate change now provides a good ground for politics. It gives a mileage for ideas that can sustain one alive politically. It only becomes relevant to some politicians only if it captures voters attention.
Lack of sufficient advanced technologies has hindered the response to climate change (Nath & Behera, 2010, p. 142). Global warming is a big issue which needs a lot of research activities from several fields. For instance, communication of whatever ecological problem the menace has been unique among politicians, media and ordinary people. In most of the cases, mass media divide into various groups when it comes to climate change issues. The smallest group is the one that supports the idea of mitigating climatic variations while the other group judges any action taken to curb the menace as immature and unreliable. There is still an intense debate on whether developing countries should absorb the idea of mitigating climate change. Other section of scholars sees that it is ideal for the developed nations to handle the climate change issue since they are the most significant contributors to the problem.
Industrialization is a challenge in most of the developing nations (Mendes, et al., 2014, p. 121). Some parts of the globe are still weak, for example, Africa. These countries remain adamant to adopt the idea of mitigating global warming since the concept means committing more funds to the program a resource that is already a problem. This has been fueled by the fact that some of the most developed nations such as the United States have remained adamant about solving these complications.
Greenhouse gases need to be stabilized to mitigate the issue of climate change fully. The idea of stabilization revolves around preventing harmful anthropogenic interference with the climate system. Scientists argue that if this stabilization is attained to acceptable levels, the ecology will naturally adapt to climate change thus ensuring high food production (Harris & Roach, 2017, p. 11). This will enable a smooth flow of economic developments. In simple terms, if industrial emissions, agricultural emissions, ways of generating power and other greenhouse gas contributors are reduced, then a massive step towards curbing climatic change will have been made. Some of the proposed responses to this environmental issue include the use of solar power, thermal energy and hydrogen among others. To the contrary, economically, this is a significant harm to the normal process of economic growth. It leads to a worse situation in the developing nations particularly those faced with high levels of unemployment, poverty and those affected by drought and flood hence the reason why the idea has not been bought.
Future Recommendations
Developing nations are considered to face the impacts of climate change than their developed counterparts. Distribution of the harmful effects of global warming is associated with the low adaptability capacity in the developing nations (Bowen, et al., 2012, p. 2). These countries majorly invest in adaptive or mitigating ways of dealing with the threat majorly after the occurrence of a major threat such as flooding. For developing nations to spend on mitigation ways and still be able to maintain a balance in their economy is a very complicated case.
The international climate policy majorly encourages nations to be dominant in global warming mitigations policies. Most of the countries in the developing countries have majored in adaptation measures. This makes developing nations disadvantaged as they are mostly concerned with mitigation factors. A clear line stands between mitigation and adaptation strategies as the resources are scarce. The choice of a country regarding adaptation or mitigation depends on the countries income. Most of the decisions on either to adapt or to mitigate global warming are influenced by the occurrence of extreme weather conditions (Madzivhandila & Niyimbanira, 2016, p. 99).
Climate variation is the present common topic in the scientific and media area (Yujie, 2915, p. 732). How extensive media covers issues to do with climate change has always been a point of concern. To effectively mitigate this menace, the general public needs to be thoroughly fed with the right information about the risks associated with climate change for them to fully support the proper mitigation practices. The article six of the United Nations committee in charge of climate change urges governments to make and initiate programs that educate the general public on global warming and its effects. This will serve to ensure that the general public gets the right information to participate in how to mitigate the issue entirely. However, climate change is not a simple issue. Its cause is not visible, its impacts are not so evident, it cannot be fixed quickly, quietly and as well there is no better way of setting it. This makes climate change a complex issue to communicate to people. Those who listen to the media are people of diverse objectives, for example, politicians and the ordinary citizen. We all know that politicians are more vocal in the society than anybody else. They, therefore, use this advantage to lure the public to their sides. For example, if research emerges showing that a particular factory that belongs to a specific politician is contributing to global warming, the politician will at this point employ another scientist who will contradict the prior information. After that, the politician will devise ways of protecting his business by convincing people that his factory emissions are within the manageable levels. This affects the approaches which might have been employed in place to tackle the menace.
Democrats have shown a sincere desire to mitigate climate change and reach low levels of carbon dioxide emission than their counterpart democrats (Popovich & Albeck-Ripka, 2017). However, it is not yet explained to what extent this nations make their commitments a reality due to the widespread corruption most of this nations face. This corruption makes it a challenge for the democratic governments to take any step towards mitigating climate change. Most of these democratic rulers are always short-sighted. They tend to focus on short-term goals rather than long-term goals of mitigating climate change. As (Povitkina, 2018, p. Online) argues, in most of the cases as this leaders pursue their victory in politics they channel all their focus on providing visible outcomes to their electorates instead of focusing climate change problems affecting their nation.
To add to the list, business interests have also influenced response to global warming negatively. According to (Povitkina, 2018, p. Online) business interests which are always parallel to issues affecting the environment still, have substantial influences on political decisions in democratic countries. This drives political leaders away from strategizing and implementing policies that help in reducing gaseous emissions.
Short term behaviors which go against the long-term desires of the community always complicate the presence of corrupt institutions. Environmental, economic studies have made it clear that corruption through the aid of several disruptive forces amplifies the production of carbon dioxide (Biswas, et al., 2011, p. 24). Corruption has succeeded in lowering inspection quality, monitoring and ability of the leaders to effectively design and put into action policies that would help in mitigating global warming. Trust between individuals as well as governments have reduced hence impending voluntary compliance. The extractive power of the state is diminished therefore preventing higher revenues of tax. This, in return, contributes to environmental budgets. Consequently, policy-settings in the environment are affected as business interests are given powers and channels to influence political decision making.
With all this mechanisms in place, corruption affects the smooth functioning of democracy in responding to global warming as an international environmental issue. Carbon dioxide which is much like any other emission is a result of industrial activities whose countries borders can define (Kuntsi-Reunanen, 2015, p. 3). Therefore, national political institutions of these countries are the ones supposed to tame these emissions. They are supposed to do this through the adoption of emission reduction strategies or policies as well as ensure compliance and regulation of radiation within their borders. Nonetheless, corruption being in place, it becomes impossible for this countries to attain these goals which are not favorable to most of the people in this countries.
Lack of transparency and perceived responsibility to respond to global warming; many nations have had long-term disagreements over the type of greenhouse gases emissions that they should use for example livestock emissions, carbon dioxide emissions, per capita emissions per year or even deforestation emissions (Beukel, 2016). Long in the past, there has not been a fairground in respect to the release of carbon dioxide among all countries. This has consequently raised a challenge of who should restrict the emissions and at what time of industrial development should a state subject itself to such restrictions. This has made it impossible to mitigate global warming as the emissions which are the major causes of it have not been tamed. For instance, China alone emits more carbon dioxide that Canada and the United States put together.
There has been a disagreement between developing and developed countries. The developing countries blame their counterparts for having created the climate change crisis through their carbon dioxide emissions in the 20th century (Lannoo, 2016). As a result, developing countries have refused to pay the costs needed to address the challenge arguing that it is only the developed nations who should pay for it. However, the developed nations have refused to take full responsibility for the same. As a result, an argument has erupted on how to make cuts in greenhouse emissions. The developed world argues that the said cuts should be based on long-term emissions prompting laboriously polluting countries like China and India to cut down their emissions. However, on the other hand, developing nations have a different angle of view on the issue. They argue that global warming has been brought up by long-term accumulation of the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere for an extended period rather than just a single year emission (Kirby, 2013). So they stick to the view that developed countries should own up to the whole idea. This has paralyzed all attempts to mitigate the international environmental issue.
Conclusion
Even though a consensus is growing that global warming poses a greater danger to the society and evidence is playing itself out, the urge to respond to the menace has received a lot of challenges. This paper discussed how the interests, values and power relations of varied actors influence responses to climate change. This paper revealed that there is a strong relationship between political, social and economic issues with climate and climatic changes. The mitigation of climate change has been politicized. The focus sections for climate change politics are mitigation, adaptation, technology, finance as well as losses which are studied and well quantified. Unfortunately the urgency of climate change challenge with the inclusion of the implication to almost all the sides of a countries economic interest heaps structural loads on the present global institution which have been developed over the last few decades. Out of this paper, it was certified that rapidly developing nations which see traditional sources of energy as the only means to fuel their development, aggressive surrounding organizations which are well funded as well as established fossil fuel power paradigm which boast a mature and complicated infrastructure in politics all combine to make global warming mitigation steps more polarized.
Additionally, disputes between developed and developing nations on who should own the whole menace of global warming also add to how different actors influence response to climate change. Additionally to the list are corruption, internet and development of technology in the media sector add to the list. The world is moving towards the wrong direction in as far as climate change is concerned. Therefore, rescue measures to curb some of the actors influencing response to climate change need to be researched on and put into action with immediate effect before it is too late.
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