Andrew Scott
Director, Practical Action
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In a fundamentally unjust world which faces the prospect of catastrophic climate change, the two greatest challenges facing humanity are, how to achieve equity in social and economic affairs, and how to ensure our own long-term survival (and that of other species). The crises of the past year, in energy, food and finance, highlighted the global nature of our challenges and our global interdependence in addressing them. The measures being taken now to address these crises and the recession which has followed, are not necessarily going to help us address the bigger longer-term challenges.
Under the current approach, the way to address poverty and environmental sustainability has been the pursuit of economic growth, to increase people’s resources, to allow markets to deliver the goods and services they need; and to look towards technology development to take care of the ‘technical’ problems, such as inefficient production, disease, pollution, and scarcity of natural resources. This approach in the past has failed to take account of environmental costs and to stop the growth of deeper inequality between rich and poor.
The poorest and most disadvantaged people in the world will be most affected by the effects of climate change, but are least responsible for causing it and least well-equipped to deal with it. Principles of justice and sustainability must combine when we consider the local action needed to enable them to adapt to global climate change. This means strengthening their resilience to the increasing number of disasters; it means building their capacities to adapt to future change; and it means reducing poverty and their vulnerability to events completely outside their control or influence.
Social, cultural and environmental sustainability should be at the heart of our economic system — in other words, we need an economics as if people mattered. For this we need policies and institutions which make decision takers in government and business, at all levels — local, national and international — more socially accountable. We need technologies which strengthen ecosystems, preserve diversity and contribute to sustainability and resilience; technologies which avoid waste, and will not constrain the choices left open to future generations. Closer links between producers and consumers, and protection from harmful external economic forces are likely to promote growth and technical innovation which is more focused on the poor and, at the same time, does less environmental damage.
The global change that will be necessary to achieve social justice and truly sustainable development in the world can only be realised through the collective and accumulated effort of like-minded people and institutions. Governments, business and civil society must make sure that all of their work is consistent with these general principles and contributes to these aims.