We seem to be stuck in a never-ending loop of corruption and greed. It is now time for real change, with leaders who prioritise the planet over profits, not empty promises to get elected or increased power.
The problem is that all mainstream politicians and political parties measure progress in pounds, pursuing economic growth and profit, GDP, to the exclusion of all else, including wellbeing. People and the environment are sacrificed when they get in the way of economic growth. The public are asking: what are the solutions to the problems of the economy, the deficit, climate change and the ecological devastation? The true nature of the problem has to be acknowledged and until that is established, there is little point in coming up with solutions.
The current ideology is that solutions have to be attractive to the key players so that they want to take action but effective solutions may well be totally unattractive to many of them. Leaders, governments, billionaires, don’t want to actually change a system which gives them their wealth and power, which is disastrous for the climate and ecological crisis. People have wasted time trying to convince leaders and governments to take action which they are against taking.
The public accepted that we need to take action on the climate and ecological crisis over 30 years ago and voted for governments that promised action. It wasn’t the public’s fault that both sides of the political divide were lying and had no intention of doing what they promised. It was wrongly assumed that to create change, you aim to provide the politicians with evidence of the problem; then they will fix it. If fixing the problem is contrary to their agenda, they won’t even try to fix it. They will actively obstruct the necessary action.
The all-out pursuit of economic growth and profit is not only inconsistent with addressing the climate and ecological crisis, it is the whole cause of the crisis. Politicians promise to address the problem that threatens the very existence of our civilizations. However, as they are solely focused on GDP, economic growth and profit, they won’t even consider a solution that interferes with that. There is no way to address the climate and ecological crisis that has been caused by the mindless pursuit of economic growth and profit without acknowledging this – but governments, leaders, politicians, corporations, and billionaires, refuse.
Part of the solution is not to just try and persuade the powerful and wealthy to take action, but to focus on convincing them that change is coming, whether they like it or not, and if they don’t act, the climate crisis will crush economic growth. All this misguided attempt to block climate action is premised on the wholly false idea that we can continue with business as usual, pursuing maximum growth and profit, for a long time into the future.
If we continue down that path, the radical change that will happen is the collapse of our civilisation. It is about time that one of the alternative ways of measuring progress listed below is introduced worldwide.
- Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI): This American metric subtracts social and environmental costs from GDP. It considers factors like the cost of pollution, crime, and natural resource depletion.
- Inclusive Wealth Index (IWI): This index from the UNEP adds the social value of natural assets to the value of economic, human, and produced assets.
- Green GDP: This metric subtracts the cost of environmental damage from GDP.
- Human Development Index (HDI): This United Nations index is a popular progress indicator for developing economies.
- Thriving Places Index (TPI): This UK index measures the wellbeing of people and the planet.
- Better Life Index (BLI): This OECD index compares wellbeing across countries.
Any of them would be better than GDP!
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Pauline Meechan, Dukeries Eco Watch