Green Socialists

After decades of campaigning and legislation, most environmental problems have not substantially improved, and, indeed, some have become much worse. Among people there is an increasing awareness of the threat of climate change and there now seems to be a genuine interest in searching for the deeper roots of the problem. The ecology movement has called into question many aspects of modern consumerist society that are complicit in the environmental crisis. If a future socio-economic arrangement is to be sustainable it must take these criticisms to heart. Getting to the roots of the problem implies that we examine the socio-economic system under which we live. To do this, however, ecological ideas are not enough. If we seek to adequately explain the reasons for the environmental crisis we must clearly understand the economics of society that lead to environmental destruction.

 Many are convinced that the resources used by humans have already far outstripped the carrying capacity of the planet  that expanding population numbers present the greatest ecological crisis. The crude population explosion theory quickly collapses  when we focus on the question of how resources are distributed. The present surplus levels do not account for today's scarcity and hunger. There is more than enough food produced to sustain the current level of world population. Yet food somehow manages to avoid the mouths of those who can't afford to pay the price, being fed to livestock for the affluent to increase profitability yet it is the poor who gets the blame.

What is rarely raised in discussion is an alternative society without a profit-oriented economy. In other words, socialism which produces what people need, not what makes a profit Such a society would, for the first time allow genuine possibilities for ecological sustainability. With democratic control of economic activity we could realise the potential to recognise and stay within the limits of the ecological carrying capacity of the earth. Without profit-seeking businesses operating in their own interest, we will have eliminated the major social forces which resist environmental safeguards.

Some environmentalists activists lead the call decentralisation and localism. While it is important to pay attention to question of large-scale concentration of industry, doing so does not solve all of our problems. Certain industries require centralisation for efficiency, and economy of scale actually may reduce environmental impact in many of these cases. Each town cannot have its own factory to produce trains, yet the demand for transportation will not simply evaporate. The key is to meet this demand at an ecologically appropriate scale under a system that places a priority on protecting the environment. Under the current system, new technologies will always be implemented in order to create new products to sell, and to increase productivity for firms attempting to be more competitive.  Yet the introduction of a new technology does not automatically spell greater exploitation. A vision for a socialist society which functions in a complementary way and in harmony with nature is our goal. 

The mainstream environmental organisations seem unable or unwilling to absorb the hard political and economic lessons being taught to them, and continue to hope that capitalist institutions can live up to their promises. Such hopes are bound to be disappointed. The relationship between people and our environment is a central question for millions across the world today and has raised the spectre of environmental destruction on a scale previous generations could barely have imagined. The most serious issue is the threat of global warming which seems to be occurring already with many unusual weather patterns and extreme events. To the Socialist Party, the argument is simple enough. It is that the roots of the threat to the environment and to the future of the planet lie in the capitalist system itself and they cannot be solved within the capitalist system. The answer to this terrible threat is to build socialism. 

Without the drive to make a profit, wouldn't workers in the vehicle industry assert a right to insist on proper safety and anti-pollution features being built into all cars? Wouldn't workers in the food industry compel thorough standards of hygiene and prevent introduction of impurities and adulteration of any kind? Wouldn't construction workers in the architect office an the building site to assert their authority over what they demolish and what they build? . The problem is not industry or science, but the organisation of production under the control of a minority which lives by the greed of profit before all else. The continuing viability of civilisation itself demands  a social revolution that ends the threat of environmental disaster depends on that the class on whose labour the whole system rests upon. The future of society, and the environment, relies on whether the global working class can wrest control of society from the parasitic few and commence production for need and use instead of for profit and capital accumulation.