March 26, 2020 - 7:00am
Among all the relentlessly grim news, pictures of nature flourishing as humans withdraw have been little moments of light. #rewildtheworld seems the appropriate Instagram hashtag, but I’m reminded more of a line from the biblical book of Chronicles. After Israel is carted off for exile in Babylon we are told: “The land enjoyed its sabbath rests; all the time of its desolation it rested, until the seventy years were completed”.
Nature needed a sabbath, because the nation had not obeyed the mosaic law, which set out clear limits on humankind’s use of the land in order that both could flourish, and had instead exploited and mistreated creation. History doesn’t repeat, but it does rhyme.
Much has been made of the temporary drop in C02 emissions caused by the global economic slowdown. In a piece for UnHerd Stephen Pollard rightly criticised any triumphal crowing at this, but completely misunderstood the argument for why using this time to accelerate a transition to lower carbon ways of living and working is essential. Not, as he seemed to think, to forever trapping people in their homes, but because without tackling climate change, as ruthlessly and rapidly as the world has (to varying degrees) responded to this virus, we will live through them with ever more regularity.
Climate change, deforestation and biodiversity loss all make pandemics more likely. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has warned that as the world warms, new emerging viruses will be increasingly seen, and our current economic models make their spread almost impossible to control. If we needed any more arguments for governments taking rapid and decisive action to decarbonise, this one feels pretty persuasive right now.
Governments around the world are already designing economic stimulus packages to endeavour to resuscitate economies on life support. Millions pushed into poverty by economic collapse is a strong motivation to favour speed over creativity. The temptation to use tried and tested methods, leaning on fossil-reliant industries, will be strong, but cowardly and counterproductive. Credible models such as the European Green new deal among many others exist and are ready to be implemented. At the very least if the more than $5 trillion currently spent on fossil fuel subsidies globally could be redirected to clean energy our economies could come back to life rapidly and sustainably. This is not a case of choosing the planet over the people, but choosing the people by protecting the planet.
Widespread isolation, a rising death toll, economic collapse — all these things feel almost as traumatic as the biblical story of exile. If we can learn the lessons of that text, and reshape our economies in ways that respect our own and the planets limits, it is not impossible that this deep tragedy could lead us to a new promised land.
Elizabeth Oldfield is the former head of Theos. Her writing has appeared in the FT, Prospect and The Times. Her Twitter handle is @esoldfield
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When we finally get through this stage there is likely to be an economy in tatters, extreme stress on government budgets and very high unemployment. To suggest that this would be a good time to introduce a series of sweeping reforms is reckless in the extreme and could result in severe privation; a catastrophic collapse and political destabilisation. Perhaps that’s the intention.
What an interesting perspective, thank you. I often think on what it means in my modern life to let things lie fallow for a season and I don’t recall having read that verse in Chronicles before. That the world would need a rest from us when we have used it inappropriately instead of cultivating it properly is very compelling.
Good story but there is no evidence to support the theory that our use of fossil fuels or modern agriculture has lead to an increase in pandemics. The idea that both can be easily or rapidly transitioned away from without a catastrophic collapse and widespread austerity and death is a dangerous fantasy.
THE GREEN REICH: Ban everything we can, eco-tax the rest: this could be the motto of the environmentalists in politics. If human CO2 is the problem, then Man must be restrained, controlled, suppressed in every one of his CO2-emitting activities: that is to say, in the totality of his actions. Researching environmentalism from the root of its anti-humanist ethic to the staggering heights of its actual demands ” banning cars, aircraft, meat, nuclear energy, rural life, the market economy, modern agriculture, in short, post-Industrial-Revolution modernity ” Drieu Godefridi shows that environmentalism defines a more radical ideology in its liberticidal, anti-economic and ultimately humanicidal claims than any totalitarian ideology yet seen. “Dividing humanity by a factor of ten” is the environmentalist ideal. “Godefridi says we have good reason to be alarmed. Not by climate change, but by the endless, hazardous-to-humans measures that activists propose in response.
Perhaps it is for this reason that Godefridi chose a more ominous title for the English version of his book, wherein the “logic” of Hitlerism concerning Jews is now extended to include all of humanity.