Capitalism Versus the Environment

Year in and year out we release millions of tonnes of hothouse gases into the atmosphere. Tropical forests are destroyed and farm-land seriously degraded.  These are global changes which involve incredible risks. Some of the dangers are understood but nobody knows and nobody can predict the critical point when any combination of such changes might produce a sequence of further rapid changes which would be catastrophic from a human point of view. Obviously, we share the concern of the environmentalists about the importance of the problem, and we too want a planet where we do not damage the environment. The first thing we've got to do is identify the cause of the problem and here the Socialist Party begins to part company with most ecologists. If one reads the literature from the likes of Friends of the Earth and others, you'll notice that they never truly identify the cause of the problem. Global warming and climate change result from the economic limitations of a system that puts privileged class interests before the needs of the community. The cause is capitalism which puts profit before needs and which therefore puts profit before the protection of the environment. The problem is out of control because the economic constraints of the system prevent the problems being solved. Rational resolutions to environmental destruction are impossible in the mad world of capitalism. 

It must be clear that a set of problems which are global in scale, affecting populations across the entire planet, can only be effectively tackled by cooperation between all peoples. You can't have the world divided up between rival capitalist states — all driven by economic competition both within their boundaries and between each other and all driven by the economic pressures of profit and class interests, with a good many of them at actual war with each other — and expect to be in a position to solve the problems of the global environment. Effective action has got to be based on world cooperation. we have to be in a position of control. In other words, we must be in a position of being able to make democratic decisions about what must be done and must be free to take the necessary action, using the available means without any economic constraints. It is surely self-evident that unless we have cooperation and control we are never going to begin to solve the problem and that we cannot get cooperation within capitalism.

The various international conferences on climate change have failed to make any significant progress and it could be said that they are mere forums for empty rhetoric, intended to put a public relations gloss on government inaction. However, the fact that these are international discussions does recognise one important thing. They accept that the problems are global and that global consensus is required for action on a global scale. What dooms them to failure is the fact that they take place in a world that is divided into nation-states which are in economic competition with each other. This makes global consensus impossible and rules out any effective global action. The pressures to keep down costs and protect profits means that the technology for reducing pollution is either ignored or applied in a minimal token way. With all people united about their shared interests, the division of the world into rival capitalist states will be replaced by a democratic administration organised on a world, regional and local levels. The global nature of the problem would surely require a world energy organisation and we can anticipate that its functions could include bringing together technical experts and planners from across the world and setting up research projects. This research would not be constrained by costs and it would not be tainted by commercial or nationalistic interests. Nor would it be shrouded in secrecy or geared to national security. So, in a completely open society, such a world energy organisation would make available all the most up-to-date information on the problems of pollution together with the various technical options for acting on them. Such information would be the basis on which democratic decisions would be made.

To get cooperation we first have to get rid of the present system which is based on economic competition. We need to establish a system based instead on common ownership, a world socialist cooperative commonwealth, where all means of producing and distributing goods and all productive resources are held in common by the whole community. This means the end of the wages system through which workers are exploited for profit and the end of producing goods for sale so as to get that profit. It means people living and working in the community in a relationship of direct cooperation with each other, producing the goods and running the services that we need. This is a way of organising the community where the use of money will be entirely redundant. If we establish common ownership, if we set up a society which is run solely for human needs as a result of people cooperating together, we are at fast in a position where we can control our actions. Under capitalism, we are at the mercy of economic forces that nobody can control. Get rid of these economic forces and we are at last in a position to make democratic decisions about how best to use production for the benefit of the community. With the establishment of socialism, we will throw off the economic shackles of the profit system and break through into the freedom to use all our talents, skills and energies to solve problems through co-operation.

The object of the Socialist Party is to create relationships of co-operation between all people and to solve the problems caused by capitalist society. Initially, this will involve a commitment to great world projects requiring a new democratic administration, new institutions, and expanded production. However, we can also anticipate that in a situation where much of this great work has been accomplished there could be an eventual fall in production. This suggests the possibility of a sustainable, "steady-state" society which could work within the natural systems of the environment in a non-destructive way. When te Socialist Party speaks of a stable, sustainable society we do not mean a static society in which there is no development. On the contrary, when liberated from the profit motive of corporate research and the military machines of capitalist states, science will flourish and will serve the interests of all people. Nor do we suggest that new science will not result in new technology. The urgent need for care of the environment will be just one field where research and new technology would be given priority. However, we should also recognise that the abolition of all the economic constraints imposed by the market system on the use of labour will bring enormously increased powers of production. In socialism it will be possible to produce vast amounts of goods. It is in the light of this fact that people in socialism would have to ask if it makes sense to go on and on producing whilst using up the planet's resources or whether there should be voluntary limits to consumption and an eventual scaling down of productive activity. The Socialist Party do not presume to lay down in advance what decisions will be made in socialism we can set out a possible way of achieving an eventual zero growth society operating in a stable and ecologically benign way. This could be achieved in three main phases. First, there would have to be emergency action to relieve the worst problems of food shortages, health care, and housing which affect billions of people throughout the world. Secondly, longer-term action to construct means of production and infrastructures such as transport systems for the supply of permanent housing and durable consumption goods. These could be designed in line with conservation principles, which means they would be made to last for a long time, using materials that where possible could be re-cycled and would require minimum maintenance. Thirdly, with these objectives achieved there could be an eventual fall in production, and society could move into a stable mode. This would achieve a rhythm of daily production in line with daily needs with no significant growth. On this basis, the world community could reconcile two great needs, the need to live in material well being whilst looking after the planet which is our shared home in space. Seen solely from a technical point of view there is no doubt many ways in which the damage caused by pollution could be reduced with different uses of labour. But before any of these can become real options on which communities can freely make democratic decisions, labour itself must first be liberated. Labour must enjoy its own freedom outside the present enclosed system of commodity exchange in which it is confined to its function of profit making and the accumulation of capital.

The idea of a zero growth, sustainable society is not new and has been put forward by the Green movement. But whilst many of the declared aims of the Greens appear to be desirable these are contradicted by a fatal flaw in their policies. They stand for the continuation of the market system. The environmentalist activists aim to retain the market system in which goods are produced for sale at a profit. This must mean the continuation of the capitalist system which is the cause of the problems of pollution in the first place. Those in the environmentalist movement has never been able to answer the question which is how it can achieve a zero growth, sustainable society whilst retaining a market system which includes an irresistible, built in pressure to increase sales for profit and where if sales collapse, society tends to break down in recession, unemployment, and financial crisis. The only way in which the aims of the Greens could be achieved is through socialism. Not even in the most optimistic dreams of defenders of the free market will the "care of the environment" ever be made to equal "accumulation of capital".