A radical suggestion for creating a global infrastructure that is both sustainable and green might rely on nations working together to find a solution to a range of potentially devastating problems, according to Cardiff University's Peter Wells. Writing in the International Journal of the Environment and Sustainable Development, published today by Inderscience, Wells warns that of a Green Junta that could bring about a right-wing agenda by stealth, in the name of environmentalism.
Attempts to achieve lasting positive change at the local, national, and international level often fails because consensus between many different groups and interested parties is very difficult to achieve. The US and Australia having yet to ratify the Kyoto Protocol on climate change could be seen as one such failed consensus. Agreement at certain levels is possible, but Wells points out that consensus between multiple stakeholders, while acceptable at a political level, increasingly seems inadequate to the task of creating sustainable societies.
Wells explains that there are several global problems we now face that present us with an increasingly uncertain future. These include, climate change, formerly known as global warming, the North-South imbalance, failing oil reserves, dwindling water resources, reduced biodiversity and species extinction, deforestation, population growth and the rural-urban shift, globalization and over-consumption, and the detrimental distribution of wealth. The increasing impact of these problems on individuals, regionally and globally, he says, suggest a world almost in freefall. "Drastic, rapid and dramatic change is needed," Wells says.
The failure of global governance, Wells' research suggests is to blame, but the current political spectrum across the globe cannot hope to bring about the drastic and rapid changes the solution requires. Instead, Wells speculates that a "strong government for a crowded planet" might be the only
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Contact: Peter Wells
wellspe@Cardiff.ac.uk
Inderscience Publishers
27-Jun-2007