Wednesday, October 5, 2011

Election policy



Policy for difficult times



·        An awareness of the approach of physical limits to human civilisation around 1970 led to a forecast of overshoot and decline in a perfect storm around 2030.  A burgeoning human population is passing the limits of a finite planet, including food, water and energy, and heading for collapse.  Now 40 years of that 60-year period have passed.  Events are following the forecast path and the crisis is only 20 years away. 
·        Many elements of that forecast have occurred as expected, including oil peak, climate change, species extinction and economic crisis.  The signs of approaching limits are clear. Our civilisation may soon crash. 
·        Nothing has been done in the past several decades of denial.  Instead here has been an increase in control by a global oligarchy fixated on growth.
·        The threat facing us is frightening, but unfortunately it is the reality.  The challenge is to stop pretending that the current way of operation is sustainable.  We must stop being scared and calmly deal with the real world. 
Those challenges are well documented.  In the words of the United Kingdom’s chief scientist Professor John Beddington, “we head into a perfect storm in 2030, because all of these things are operating on the same time frame”. 
The Island Bay World Service (IBWS) pamphlet “Twenty years to disaster?” provides an introduction and lists useful references, as does Derek Wilson’s new book “The growth syndrome: economic destitution”.  Other IBWS publications such as “NZ 2030, the world’s lifeboat” explore the New Zealand situation. 
We find ourselves at a critical point of history.  These considerable challenges demand a vigorous reaction, with policies suited to the today’s problems and opportunities.  Many current ways must be reconsidered, and changed; this is no time for ‘business as usual’.  Here are some suitable policy directions.  Challenge every political party in the coming general election.  Most continue policies from a past age that deepen the crisis.
This could be a great time to be alive, a time of challenge and action as we turn away from the selfish hedonism of the consumer society, with its acceptance of intolerable inequality, indecent wealth and miserable poverty, to a revitalised and caring society providing a decent life for everyone together with a recognition of the limits of a finite world and respect for the environment.  We must turn the ship around and build a better life for our children instead of leaving them with a damaged planet and a sad society.  As we work our way through difficult times, we should take care of one another and stop relying on some future trickle-down economic growth to put things right.
Here are some basic policy points.  It is notable that there is no conflict among them – actions to move to a sustainable economy, to reduce oil use and greenhouse gas emissions, will also move to greater equality and deal positively with the causes of child poverty and so many other social problems.


Some policy goals and actions

·        no more consumer society, cut consumption and production
·        reduce advertising
·        stabilise the population
·        act to reduce greenhouse gas emissions directly without the money-go-round carbon trading scheme
·        end coal mining
·        scrap ‘Roads of National Significance’
·        end importation of gas-guzzling SUVs
·        build public transport
·        downsize tourism and dissuade people from travel, with no advertising for flying trips that produce huge amounts of greenhouse gases and burn valuable oil
·        increase taxes, moving to collective responsibility and collective action
·        provide a job for everyone, meaningful, well paid, with dignity
·        assist family formation, remove the reduction in benefits for couples, provide a universal child benefit
·        stop asking mothers to leave their children for work
·        aim for a national effort, not fragmented local action
·        emphasise national self-sufficiency
·        increase public ownership of basic services
·        introduce import controls, so we produce for our own needs and employ our own people
·        limit and control the activities of banks and financial institutions
·        end conditioning in a belief in the need to consume ever more
·        free the media from foreign ownership and control by advertisers 
·        free education and science from central control, so teaching and research is run by and for those involved, not centrally directed for conformity and growth
·        reorganise the public service to serve the public and not political masters


Produced by The Island Bay World Service, www.ibws.blogspot.com.