Sir, – I have been following this debate for a long time, but rarely have I encountered any serious discussion of a veritable herd of elephants crowding into the room. This relates to the potential conflict between an absolute necessity for often unpalatable action, and democracy. Put simply, what happens if an electorate is simply unwilling to vote for those policies and remedies which scientists, governments and supranational bodies say are now absolutely necessary if we are to avoid planetary catastrophe? Yes, you can say that, so far, democracies have tended to come down on the side of the angels.
But there are disturbing murmurs of resistance, notably in the US and the UK, to measures that will impact adversely (as they see it) on people’s lives and livelihoods.
Comprehensive decarbonisation is going to cost households a small fortune if rigorously and swiftly applied. Things that people take for granted as a “right” – travel, energy use, food production and so on – will all be affected.
How are democratically elected governments going to sell that to their voters? There is a dangerous level of complacency within democracies that most people are “rational” and will take the long view. That assumption was rudely shattered by Brexit and may well be reinforced if Donald Trump and the Republicans win the next US general election.
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It would be problematic if the price of taking swift action to combat the climate emergency was the imposition of dictatorial autocracy to achieve it. But we may be facing that scenario. – Yours, etc,
IAN d’ALTON,
Naas,
Co Kildare.
Sir, – Martin Sandbu (“The West shouldn’t give up on ‘gentle commerce’ just yet”, Opinion, Business, August 11th) writes that we should hold on to the Enlightenment belief that trade and political concord reinforce one another. Ireland has benefited hugely from this within the EU.
Why then have we allowed ourselves to exploit our good fortune to become a major international tax haven and, from the inside, undermine that very belief? Any damage we do to climate is far outweighed by our facilitation of global greed and ever-increasing global inequality. Our financial services industry, much more than farmers, needs to be held to account. – Yours, etc,
PAUL CONNOLLY,
Cavan.