Climate Change: Address the Rich and the Poor Differently?

When it comes down to addressing climate change and reducing emissions, it is a universal issue: the consequences will affect everyone, and everyone is responsible to doing their own part. The question is, what part does one play and how does it differ? This question is clearly one with no easy answer, especially when applied to countries, the rich and the poor, the developed and the underdeveloped. Duncan Green is the author of the blog posts for Oxfam International, and touches on the issue in the blog titled “Trade v climate change: what should developing countries be asked to do?”, and supportively presents Oxfam’s point-of-view.

The problem is how climate change should be addressed differently by rich and poor countries, and to what extent. Green presents Oxfam’s informal solution, which roughly suggests that rich countries carry a heavier burden of responsibility than poor ones, as they are responsible for the majority of atmospheric carbon dioxide build-up in the past century (Green 2009) and have the means to significantly reduce their emissions. It is also suggested that the best current solution is for developed countries to reward and fund underdeveloped countries in their efforts to reduce emissions, since they do no have the means to support an underdeveloped economy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

By supporting this solution, Green indirectly addresses the demarcation problem. According to Oxfam and supported by Green, it is morally correct for developed countries to take on the greatest responsibility, as they have the wealth, and therefore, the ability to take meaningful action in reducing emissions, as well as the ability in aiding underdeveloped countries to do so as well. Protecting the environment is what is morally correct, and by taking action in dramatically reducing emissions and funding underdeveloped countries, high financial priority is morally incorrect.

Green establishes what is morally correct (protecting the environment) and morally incorrect (financial priority), which is the basis for his point-of-view. From there, one can apply the consequentialist’s and nonconsequentialist’s views to the proposed solution. In this case, the solution supports both the consequentialist and nonconsequentialist viewpoints. According to Green, highest priority lies in the issue of climate change and the consequences everyone will face if there is a late and insufficient amount of action in preventing them; this coincides with the consequentialist’s viewpoint, since it addresses the needs of the majority. The proposed solution also addresses individual needs, being those of the individuals in underdeveloped countries. Again, underdeveloped countries do no have the means to support both a weak and developing economy and the climate change cause, and it would be unfair to ask as much action from them as from the rich, developed countries; this concern for individual needs concurs with the nonconsequentialist’s viewpoint.

Though the solution proposed by Oxfam seems extreme, it does not seem to be enough, as the situation appears to be ominous no matter the solution, as outlined by the following:

‘A pathway to keep warming well within 2°C demands both that emissions in industrialised countries are reduced, well below the 1990 baseline adopted by the UN Climate Convention… Yet even if industrialised countries were to cease all emissions from today, developing-country emissions alone would overshoot the 2°C pathway by 2020 on current trends…’ (Green 2009).

However, no matter how dire the situation seems to be, actions must be taken immediately, and applying the proper ethical implications, the right solution can be drawn and the outcome beneficial to all of humankind.

References

Green, Duncan. “Trade v climate change: what should developing countries be asked to do?” From Poverty to Power. 19 June 2009. Retrieved 3 November 2009. http://www.oxfamblogs.org/fp2p/?tag=ngo-policy