Capitalism, Climate Change, and the Revival of City-States

Jan 7, 2013 2:19 PM

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Mar 2012

17649

According to Robert Hunziker, the elite rich won't be sticking around if and when climate change induced chaos strikes. Thanks to capitalism, climate change induced chaos is beginning to strike. Productive, global political discussion on climate change has been minimal, or even non-existent. Climate change is a global problem with a global solution, and so this lack of dialogue and lack of commitment must be remedied, before any progress can be made. It is uncertain whether the middle and poor classes will be able to lead a decent existence in the future, despite being technically better off than their present day counterparts in many ways (living standards rise over time).

Do you think that, for the rich elite, the revival of city-states imminent, or a fantasy? Might the rich elite, at some point, stop supporting global governments? If so, surely a global economic crisis, unrivaled in magnitude, would occur.

Climate change has adverse impacts of poorer countries, with a focus around the equator. These types of countries are going to be hit hard and often, and the richer countries, the ones response for climate change (roughly speaking), won't be willing to offer the assistance they ought to. Capitalism is upsetting Mother Nature, I believe that a new genre of non-fiction, dystopian novels is on the horizon.

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What I consider to be the most crucial read on climate change: The International Panel on Climate Change, 4th Assessment Report

The 5th Assessment Report is in progress, and will supersede the 4th upon release.

JoshJan 7, 2013 2:24 PM

LoneWolf said:
@Josh makes me sad to call myself Canadian.

Jan 8, 2013 3:16 PM

Elynxia

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Sep 2012

It's quite an unsettling matter, I'm not too sure on the so called elite rich thing, I tend to stray away from that nonsense. I will stay away from topics talking about it either, I prefer to think it's merely an exagirated view.
We are more civilized today than people think in my opinion, rich people still have a lot of power in this world, but not as much as they used to, and will hardly get away with anything drastic (Well, in first world countries that is) Poorer and more currupt countries are much more vulnerable to the currupt rich. Which can be clearly seen in Countries such as Russia, China, India, North Korea and many others.

The one thing which bugs me the most about Climate change, is that the possability of a more sustainable future merely relys on the profit which can be made. We choose money over the world.

There are quite a few sustainable techniques and methods already known which need serious investment and development to make them more efficient, but due to rigorous regulations and poor funding, the development of these techniques is too slow.
Alongside the money, you have like you said, the poorer and less fortunate countries who are behind the first world nations; their societies are currept, many due to faroun intervention, many due to long lasting wars and many due to poor living conditions.
But we have learnt quite a lot in the last 100 years, and the world as a whole is improving because of it. Such much as happend, and so much has be learnt and gained from it.

Don't be too depressed about the Climate change issue mind, the ammount we have changed over the years is staggering, especially in the last 100 or so years. It was only about 40 or so years ago that the Climate Change issue was arrisen quite globally, and only in the last 20 years has it been taken seriously.
We have come quite far in such little time, and just imagen what another 40 years will bring us. 2050 is looking to be quite a interesting year, as most sustainable plans are aimed for around then.

This is all from the top of my head, so sorry if I said anything incorrect there :) I have most likely gone completely off topic, and have written a wall of text not even vastly relevant to the said topic, apologies if I have :)

If you still doubt our future success, maybe this .gif of the world getting revenge will dampen your anger

ElynxiaJan 8, 2013 3:24 PM

Jan 8, 2013 5:33 PM

Regicide

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Jun 2012

1848

The rich are pretty rich atm and most of it is offshore wealth here you go so They can do anything they want really with like 10-15 trillion dollars. If you want to call that city-states, sure illuminati, whatever. Metabolic rift pretty much guarantees that the world won't be too enjoyable in the next 40-50 years because of the resource wars that are bound to happen and the lowering standards of living contrasted with the higher costs and worsening soil quality, more sporadic weather, etc.

ie. farmers can't use a lot of the stuff they've been using in the past 1/3 of the yellow river is polluted.

Most of the rich's wealth is not taxed, so they don't really help world governments etc at all except for like corruption (?) influencing corporations and the government to stop looking at the pollution issue in modern society.

I would disagree with the above poster
sure our agricultural techniques have increased tremendously, but not through sustainable farming, rather through the limited growth of pesticides.
health effects of the green revolution

yields have been decreasing, pests show almost complete resistance to pesticides that killed them only forty years ago, and fertilizers have punished the water supply significantly. Fao's 2010 stuff

sustainable farming imo is the only solution but the degraded arable land and pollution worldwide

more effects of the green revolution

roughly 2.5$ billion is thrown away worth of crop because of heavy metal pollution, 1/10 of china has been poisoned because of the green revolution post communist rule because of the green revolution (sustainable vs. nonsustainable)

I would say go back to the communist rule that the countries had in the past and you'd see large increases in health, sustainability, and its going to have to happen fast because soil degradation coupled with the growing population (iirc maybe 10 bil by 2050 give or take) isn't going to last much longer. Food security only grows for now.

~900 million people are malnutritioned
you can't sustain yourself with this kind of farming now and you won't be able to in the future

~"The place to improve the world is first in one's own heart and head and hands." (Pirsig)

Jan 8, 2013 8:31 PM

dankickyou

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Nov 2011

4952

No idea. But city states are strategically TERRIBLE for modern warfare. Unlike the 16th century Italian City-States high walls and hired soldiers cant protect the people inside from modern heavy ordnance.

So all those rich people are going to be vulnerable to the wrath of the common people.

PS, wasn't this a plot point in the 2012 movie? Just with giant arks instead of city-states.

dankickyouJan 8, 2013 11:47 PM

The Art of Eight

Jan 10, 2013 10:39 AM

Karpman

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Mar 2012

1816

A lot of these topics tend to have a economic touch to them, don't they.

The rich elite people will always have their say since they have money, and people are attracted to money no matter how you look at it. So reforms on a big scale probably won't happen, since rich people would like to stay rich and are undoubtedly influencing the decisions made at the top. Capitalism could be the fastest way to make money though, big companies pumping money in the economy to keep it going, and since their taxes aren't too different from the regular Joe, they won't stop anytime soon. The problem with this is that Joe won't be able to pay tax and will become poor, soon a poverty of a huge scale will occur if we try and take a chance with capitalism. So to avoid such things, a lot/some of the countries have a socialistic system, to make sure that this won't happen. Problem is; if the economy is rolling of a slope this won't have any positive effect.

I don't think they will go back to an elite system simply because of the fact that some lower classes won't take the changes and revolt, this would be catastrophic, since no country would wish for that as the damages and general thought and trust that they have of the government will sink even further. So what are they going to do? Probably nothing, a big victory for the conservatives, since any too big changes could lead to a destruction of the economy. Also, the lower and middle classes are in a greater number than the rich by a long shot, so unless they don't want to make the masses happy, nothing will change, which in turn isn't a too good thing either, considering this crisis and all.

Jan 16, 2013 3:39 AM

TheOttocrat

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Jan 2012

656

@karpman: I vehemently disagree that people would revolt if elitism was brought back in the rich west. It would be hard to achieve autocracy here in Britain, for example, as you have to gain power through democratic means, which is unfair. Dictatorship is not necessarily evil, it is just another form of government. Socialism is the way forward; socialism in a meritocratic dictatorship.
We should not follow egoism (a universally flawed idea) and instead verse our children properly in the ways of utilitarianism, which sub-consciously comes into play in people's lives anyway. Here in the UK, high school students don't learn philosophy and psychology until their fifth year when they are already moulded as a person. Before that it is illusively sub-branched under the negative stereotype that is - religious education. What happened to the aesthetic? What happened to our virtue and value? Since when did philistinism encapsulate our society? Since when did compassion subsume our power? And since when did the machine become our value? We are losing our humanity. We have long since forgotten how powerful we were. The machine is not our friend, it will become our enemy, and speaking of enemies, we are still stuck fighting ourselves whilst our attention is turned away from the stars. There are thing so that are paradoxical about us when we reveal the truth man would revolt for his illusions. Illusions of freedom and equality facilitated by woman who knows nothing of honour, virtue and friendship.
The time has come for realism. The time has come for us to truly refute, what is universally accepted by a bunch of blind men.

Jan 16, 2013 7:12 AM

Karpman

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Mar 2012

1816

TheAutocrat said:
I vehemently disagree that people would revolt if elitism was brought back in the rich west.

Are you so sure? A dictator needs to be extremely well liked by the people does he want to remain, and the option of freedom for the common is something anyone would want, thus I don't think the commoners want to lose any right they have gained over the last few centuries. I think you are no stranger to the news and must have seen that a few dictators have been revolted against by the people and where they have been overthrown, namely: Egypt and Libya.

TheAutocrat said:
It would be hard to achieve autocracy here in Britain, for example, as you have to gain power through democratic means, which is unfair.

Though I'd have to agree that the current way to elect a person to govern our country is a long way from perfect, it is not so easy to give referendum on such a grave matter, and making a decision behind the back of the people will surely not be seen as delightful.

TheAutocrat said:
Dictatorship is not necessarily evil, it is just another form of government. Socialism is the way forward; socialism in a meritocratic dictatorship.
We should not follow egoism (a universally flawed idea) and instead verse our children properly in the ways of utilitarianism, which sub-consciously comes into play in people's lives anyway.

Giving the power to do so much with a country is too much for anyone, that is why we have ministers and all kind of departments to make decisions. Most decisions which are made in a political direction affect a country, so it is best that it needs to go through various types of research first, and have a lot of people examine and agree/disagree with it.

TheAutocrat said:
Here in the UK, high school students don't learn philosophy and psychology until their fifth year when they are already moulded as a person. Before that it is illusively sub-branched under the negative stereotype that is - religious education.

Hmm. I have heard about the different schools there, here we have a type which could be translated in freeschool education, which is quite different educational ideas than the free school in the UK. It promotes thinking about problems, looking at what interests you at a young age, not having gone to one myself, I don't have too much input on it. Though this might be paid with a lack of practical learning, i.e. maths, grammar. Which is as well important since we learn quicker at a younger age.

TheAutocrat said:
What happened to the aesthetic? What happened to our virtue and value? Since when did philistinism encapsulate our society? Since when did compassion subsume our power? And since when did the machine become our value?

1. It is not seen as important in this business filled world.
2. Not to much, youngsters have become a bit more respectless towards the elderly, further than that, modernization has a high curve and so our interests have changed as well.
3. This is the age of technology, we have more interest for the latest gadget rather than a beautiful painting.
4. I don't think this is a bad thing, why would we be any more individualistic than we already are. An example of this is Greece, why would drop a country like that, nothing good will come for millions of people, are we really that inhumane?
5. The machine is a quick way to produce, giving us less costs and in turn more profit.

TheAutocrat said:
We are losing our humanity. We have long since forgotten how powerful we were. The machine is not our friend, it will become our enemy, and speaking of enemies, we are still stuck fighting ourselves whilst our attention is turned away from the stars. There are thing so that are paradoxical about us when we reveal the truth man would revolt for his illusions.

It might, there have been a ton of films and maybe even theories about the risk that a machine driven world might posses. These machines though, are giving us a huge boost in the form of discovering new things, advancing further in technology, reaching for new things, i.e. Mars, other possible planets.

The stars we see might harbor a lot of potentially dangerous things, but the nature of the human strives for new things, wants to keep exploring, is curious.

At the same time it also lies within our nature to quarrel among ourselves, we'd like to have as much land as possible, resources, weapons, anything that helps us as a country, we can't have enough of it.

TheAutocrat said:
Illusions of freedom and equality facilitated by woman who knows nothing of honour, virtue and friendship.
The time has come for realism. The time has come for us to truly refute, what is universally accepted by a bunch of blind men.

I can't agree on that one, women have shown to have as much worth in society as men. We are just not giving them the chance, history has only shown men on important positions, sure. But that is because women were never given a chance. How would you be able to judge that a woman does not know of those said things, unless you have intimately known one for a while.

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Capitalism, Climate Change, and the Revival of City-States

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