The chaotic nature of capitalist markets has brought the planet to the current predicament of growing poverty, growing water and food stresses, spreading desertification, ocean acidity and more frequently occurring natural disasters. As well we see the rapid extinction of many species of animals and plants that fall victim to the disasters or can’t adapt quickly enough to the changes.
The capitalist economic system ignores the material realities that all production ultimately depends on the use of materials drawn from the natural world, and all waste from production and consumption eventually finds its way into the environment. The current state of climate instability is the greatest ever market failure.
Sustainable development must be a priority goal, not only for the survival of the human race but also for life as we know it. This is only possible through the democratic social control of the means of production, rational planning and production for people’s needs.
These issues are completely antagonistic to capitalism; a system that generates environmental disasters, unemployment and wars. Socialism offers the scope and means that capitalism does not have to solve the environmental crisis and to deliver a sustainable planet for all.
Workers must be part of climate solutions, and benefit from just and equitable transition programs. To free themselves from the climate chaos workers and trade unions must be bold and join with other groups to fight for system change. This will not happen without struggle.
The history of the coming decades has to be one of massive environmental struggles, alongside the struggles for workers’ rights and to save humanity from exploitation and oppression. Workers and their communities must draw on the tactics of working-class struggle to win urgent action on climate change and material wins for the working class.
Governments doing the bidding of their corporate masters are running fierce political and media campaigns to confuse and divide the people about who are responsible and who are victims of the environmental problems.
Large capitalist media lobbyists point the finger at the working-class families for their habits while the interests of certain sections of monopoly capital are left untouched. This dangerous idea lulls otherwise socially minded individuals into the illusion that individual-level decisions alone are the solution to the environmental crisis. The Australian government talks about mitigation and adaption.
Adaption as a solution is flawed by the same false premise as growth being without limits and mitigation through technology while bound to profits will not deliver.
The scientific and technological development of technology for reducing carbon emissions, mitigation and renewables remains in the hands of the big corporations whose primary reason for such technology is profits. Western governments have failed to provide the means for such technology in developing countries in line with their commitments under the Kyoto Protocol. These developments have the prime objectives of fuelling profits and green-washing their supply chain to appear as environmentally friendly to their consumers.
The Communist Party of Australia demands for technological development to address the climate crisis be in the hands of the people. There must be a redistribution of wealth to combat global inequality created by climate change and a process of a just transition for workers.
The CPA demands the Australian government to commit to zero carbon emissions by 2050.
The CPA campaigns for an end to the capitalist system, an end to the wars that see the US military emerge as the largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions in history.
The CPA calls for global cooperation, a sharing of knowledge and technological resources, the immediate commencement to building the infrastructure required to support an energy and transport system based on 100 percent renewable energy.
Communist Party of Australia.