Why aren't we doing anything about it

Reading time: 7 minutes

TL;DR

Hot take

It’s not a science problem, it’s a science, societal, economic and political problem.

The systems that created this mess aren’t going to willingly turn themselves off and fix it.

Explanation

Decades of propaganda

There’s a long history of propaganda funded by the fossil fuel industry covered in the excellent podcast Drilled, Season 3 in particular. Fun fact - the PR industry used to openly call it’s work propaganda before World War I, but after the Germans gave it a bad name they rebranded to public relations (PR). It’s the same stuff.

People have been trained to believe that fossil fuels are intrinsic to their way of life and no other way is possible. Any potential change that threatens the fossil fuel industry must surely threaten their way of life right?

Companies and governments right now are telling you they are doing something about climate change, but for the most part that is greenwashing, not enough action or only focusing on new shiny things without tackling the hard stuff like turning off the old fossil fuel bits.

The PR and Ad Industry Moves to Get Ahead of Increasing Scrutiny on Greenwashing

Change is hard

You ever tried to go on a diet to lose weight? It’s hard, and the hardest part is at the start. Now have you ever tried to do that with a group of friends or family? In some ways it’s easier and in other ways it’s harder. Being able to talk about it with others and share tips and tricks is great, but amongst your group everyone falls off at some point. Ever tried to go on a diet with the entire planet? Damn, sounds hard but it’s just the kind of thing we need to do.

Climate change is a large, complex problem happening over multiple decades and it has multiple causes. Addressing it requires global cooperation. Change is hard, maintaining the status quo is easy. The majority of people in this world are just trying to survive, just trying to live their lives. In some ways climate change concern is a luxury concern - rich people who have the free time and resources to think and learn about it. But the impacts will be felt by all, but the poor people trying to survive will be hit hardest.

Money and Power

People and organisations with money and power rarely give that up just because they feel like it. Any economy and society wide transition to deal with climate change will directly impact the fossil fuel industry and all it’s downstream rich people.

If you’re the CEO of the widget factory, highly paid and with powerful connections to politicians and other industry figureheads, you employ tens of thousands of people and the company even donates some money to charity wouldn’t you be proud? Your daddy was a widget man, and his daddy before him - in fact he started the company and helped the local area grow the economy. Then some egghead tries to tell you widgets are bad for the environment and we need to stop making them. That’d mean all those people unemployed, and you’d be worth nothing! Do you think you’d just shut down willingly, or would you try and double, triple check this egghead’s work to prove it was just nonsense. When that doesn’t work, do some research for tech that makes the widgets less damaging and claim we can just use that. OK, long-winded analogy here, maybe just read The Lorax instead, but hopefully you get the point. Dismantling the fossil fuel industry requires taking on multiples of the biggest corporations in the world who have had a massive head start and endless resources to throw at combatting it.

It’s not speculation to say the fossil fuel industry has delayed action on climate change through political influence, advertising, lies and obstinance - it’s documented fact. Downstream from the fossil fuel industry there’s of course rich and powerful players whose own wealth and power is also related to the status quo - for example automotive manufacturers like Toyota. Changing from ICE vehicles to EVs requires a lot of costly work, why not try and eek out the status quo as long as possible?

Rich people think they’ll be fine

Rich people also think they will be fine from the impacts of climate change - and they will be initially, they can pay their way out of it. Bill Gates thinks the worst impacts of climate change won’t be felt until we hit 3°C warming and then it’s only an issue if you live near the equator or can’t afford air conditioning. I’ve got some bad news Bill, hundreds of millions of people fit that criteria. Just because you won’t be impacted doesn’t mean you can let the warming roll on.

People like things

Some climate solutions involve doing less of something, or stopping it altogether - e.g. fly less, eat less beef, drive a smaller, more efficient car. People hate having their comforts taken away or being told what to do by their government - especially rich entitled people in the global north, you know, the ones contributing the most to the problem.

To make our climate transition happen faster, or even happen at all it is going to require government regulation and intervention. What politician is going to run on a platform of taking away your SUV and delicious steak? None - in fact plenty of fear based campaigns by political opponents to climate change action spread this very idea already.

In my experience I’ve found the lower my household’s carbon footprint the better my life has become. Yes I am fortunate enough to have the financial means to do so, but my all-electric house has fantastic insulation which reduces my need for electricity in the first place. The solar panels on the roof pretty much cancel out my electricity bills over a full year. My electric vehicle is fantastic to drive and a modern marvel. It’s glorious to be charging up the car with excess solar straight from my own rooftop. Why can’t we make that easier and more affordable for everyone?

We’ve scienced the shit out of climate change - we know a great deal, but we’re still not doing enough about it. We need to now understand the social science of why that is and how to fix it.

The scientists have traditionally done the science and inform governments and industry about what we know. In this case, a problem that needs to be dealt with. How we deal with it comes down to policies set by government and markets created by industry. In needing to change those things we need storytellers and communicators who can explain why we need to change and what it means. We’ve relied on the politicians and industry leaders to do that, but as we’ve seen through decades of inaction they aren’t willing to explain that hard message.

All changes end up with winners and losers. Politicians have taken the easy road and avoided talking about this for the most part, or only focusing on the winners while neglecting the losers.

I think there is a role for social scientists here to help us better understand how to effect change, how societies progress and evolve and how we collectively change power structures that are holding us back.

There is a fantastic episode of the Planet: Critical podcast called The Cognitive Dissonance Crisis that explores this further. Give it a listen.