Why aren’t we really doing anything about global warming?

By Anton Botha

As the seriousness of global warming has become clearer, scientists, environmental activists, civil society, and even politicians have taken to informing, and warning, people about this crisis. Although this campaign has been informative by all accounts, it does not seem to have been effective. Knowledge of global warming and its effects is considered to be general knowledge, with several surveys by Wutter in 2005, Harding, Thorn, and Wallace in 2009 indicating that among the general public, between 70% and 80% agree that global warming is a reality. However, despite these high levels of awareness, only 9% of those surveyed who thought global warning was a reality were willing to make drastic changes to lower their environmental impact.

This of course invites the question: “Why, despite all the knowledge in our possession, are we as individuals so unwilling to take action if there is even a remote chance that we might avert global disaster?”

I believe part of the answer to this complex problem resides in a study conducted by Kellstadt, Zahran, and Vedlitz (2008) who surprisingly found that the more awareness people had of the climate-change problem, the less likely they were to take action to prevent it. It would seem that increased information about global warming and its effects resulted in a diminished sense of personal responsibly. This in turn was accompanied by increased confidence that scientists would be able to solve the problem.

This leads straight to another question: “Why would people place the very survival of the planet, themselves, and future generations in the hands of scientists when they themselves are at once the cause of, and the solution to, the problem?”

The answer to this question, like all those relating to complex phenomena, is multi-dimensional. However, one element, it could be argued, plays a disproportionate role in shaping people’s attitudes and behaviour toward this crisis. That element is discourse. Many discourses including, but probably not limited to, consumerism, neo-liberal capitalism, modernity, and post-modernism, have played their part in sculpting our minds, shaping the human mindset in the direction of apathy and environmental impotence. In this article, however, I would like to focus on a particular discourse that I believe has played a major role in the counterintuitive findings of Kellstadt. That is the discourse we have constructed concerning our relationship with the ontological realm, which includes the domains of nature and our relationship with the environment. This discourse is characterised by our belief that we have dominion over nature.

For clarity’s sake, discourse can be thought of as a complex system of thoughts, ideas, images, and other symbolic practices that constitute a net of shared meaning that serves to influence, direct, and prohibit the behaviour of those who operate within its bounds. Given this definition, though, how does discourse specifically influence the attitudes found in the study by Kellstadt et al (2009) on our mindset toward the environmental crisis?

Our current predominant ontological discourse is one characterised by the belief that the universe operates according to the laws of “determinism”. One could speculate that this discourse is as the result of the hangover left by modernity and the “natural” laws described by Newton and Einstein’s formula e = mc2. Both these scientific breakthroughs gave humanity unprecedented power and control over nature since we were suddenly able to control the then-smallest building blocks of nature. As explained by Foucault, however, in any discourse there are those with authority and those who are prohibited from speaking. In the newly formed Newtonian ontological discourse it was science and technology, and by extension those who called themselves scientists, that held this power. After all these were the people who split the atom and as a result could literally move mountains or put men on the moon. The average person, instead of resolving problems autonomously, started looking to science and technology for solutions to everyday problems. This ontological discourse, however, resulted in us placing the power to take action in the hands of scientists.

The current environmental crisis is no exception. People believe we live in a causal, linear Newtonian universe and that which can be explained can ultimately be predicted and controlled. Since we know what is causing global warming (scientists have told us) and science has demonstrated itself the most capable of all competing discourses to “control” nature, people have placed the responsibility of solving the current environmental problem in the hand of scientists.

This thesis, I believe, goes some way toward explaining the findings of Kellstadt. The more people know about the current environmental crisis the less they feel responsible as they believe this to be a problem with nature. As scientists have control over nature, the resolution of the problem resides with scientists. Insofar as Hollywood films are a barometer of the prevailing discourses, a series of films released in the 1990s and 2000s provides further support for the abovementioned thesis. Films, like Mimi Leder’s Deep Impact, Michael Bay’s Armageddon, Jon Amiel’s The Core, and Mick Jackson’s Volcano, to mention a few, tell the story of how nature launches a “surprise attack” on humankind and how the hero(es), with the aid of scientists (usually in white lab coats) fights back to overcome nature and avert disaster. These films, insofar as they turn nature into the villain that needs to be “taught a lesson”, are thus symptomatic of our ontological discourse, which sees humans as separate from nature and emphasises man’s ability to control and “conquer” it.

There is no denying the power of discourse. It has a substantial effect on the way people think and act. It is so powerful, in fact, that it channels people into patterns of behaviour that seem to defy all that is rational. History of course provides plenty of examples to back up such a statement: think only of the Salem witch trials, the Spanish Inquisition, and Nazi Germany, to mention a few.

However, as Foucault mentions in his observation about discourse, no discourse is stagnant. This is once again backed up by history. We know that discourses have changed in the past; therefore discourses are also likely to change in the future. However, the time limit imposed on us by our current environmental crisis does not afford us the luxury of waiting for an organic transition into a new more sustainable ontological discourse. If one, however, knows how the mechanisms that shape and drive discourse work, it should be theoretically possible to intentionally alter the course of any discourse if the proper resources were made available.

In his book Discipline and Punish, Foucault mentions some of these specific mechanisms. In particular he makes mention of “examination” and “ranking”. Examination is a kind of probation as it is premised on the idea that there is a correct and incorrect way of doing something. Ranking also tells people what behaviours are “referred” or discouraged by a particular discourse. In light of this, would it not be fruitful to start using these tools to shift our prevailing discourse?

Instead of the “Forbes 100 rich list” perhaps we can have the “Forbes 100 Green list” consisting of 100 people who have made the greatest contribution toward addressing our environmental crisis. Also, this process can be used in reverse — one could compile a list naming the “100 greatest environmental villains”. No company or individual, I would hazard to guess, would welcome an appearance on such a list. Furthermore, organisations and individuals who engage in manufacturing, development or other activities that could potentially harm the environment could be examined and issued licences. Only after they have shown the necessary knowledge in issues related to environmental management or ways of minimising greenhouse emissions would they be allowed to carry on their operations.

Of course in small ways this is happening already. Once again, if Hollywood is taken as a measure of the prevailing discourse, one can see a slow shift in attitudes, evident in the messages that underpin movies like James Cameron’s Avatar, and Roland Emmerich’s The Day After Tomorrow. These films paint a very different picture from the films mentioned previously.

In Emmerich’s film, the story is told of how weather patterns can shift in a matter of days to transform the world as we know it into something unrecognisable. This of course resonates with the idea of “tipping points” in complex systems, where small gradual changes can result in sudden dramatic outcomes in the system.

Cameron’s Avatar, on the other hand, attempts to demonstrate the interconnected relationship living beings have with the environment in very overt ways. The creatures that inhabit the fictional orb called Pandora actually have the ability to plug into a richly interconnected network of which all life on the planet is a part. The message here: “We are all part of one eco-system and cannot transcend or exist separately from nature.” Perhaps, and in line of our original goal of willingly influencing the dominant discourse, films of this nature can be encouraged or even actively scripted.

In conclusion, then, it would seem that in discourse reside the seeds of both our destruction and salvation. Now that some of the tools of discourse have been illuminated, we merely need somebody with resources and the will to guide the prevailing discourses in the right direction. Ironically, though, those in power have been put there by the very discourses they now need to challenge in order to save humankind. This is of course a most unfortunate turn of events …

Anton Botha is a lecturer at the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University and agrees with Douglas Adams that “there is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened.” By my own estimations this has happened a number of times.