Published on Alternet (http://www.alternet.org)
Home > Naomi Klein: Now Marches Are Banned at the Paris Climate Conference -
What's at Stake
________________________________________
Naomi Klein: Now Marches Are Banned at the Paris Climate Conference - What's
at Stake
By Naomi Klein [1] / The Guardian [2]
November 24, 2015
Whose security gets protected by any means necessary? Whose security is
casually sacrificed, despite the means to do so much better? Those are the
questions at the heart of the climate crisis, and the answers are the reason
climate summits so often end in acrimony and tears.
The French governments decision to ban protests, marches and other outdoor
activities [3] during the Paris climate summit is disturbing on many levels
[4]. The one that preoccupies me most has to do with the way it reflects the
fundamental inequity of the climate crisis itself and that core question
of whose security is ultimately valued in our lopsided world.
Here is the first thing to understand. The people facing the worst impacts
of climate change have virtually no voice in western debates about whether
to do anything serious to prevent catastrophic global warming. Huge climate
summits like the one coming up in Paris [5] are rare exceptions. For just
two weeks every few years, the voices of the people who are getting hit
first and worst get a little bit of space to be heard at the place where
fateful decisions are made. Thats why Pacific islanders and Inuit hunters
and low-income people of colour from places like New Orleans travel for
thousands of miles to attend. The expense is enormous, in both dollars and
carbon, but being at the summit is a precious chance to speak about climate
change [6] in moral terms and to put a human face to this unfolding
catastrophe.
The next thing to understand is that even in these rare moments, frontline
voices do not have enough of a platform in the official climate meetings, in
which the microphone is dominated by governments and large, well-funded
green groups. The voices of ordinary people are primarily heard in
grassroots gatherings parallel to the summit, as well as in marches and
protests, which in turn attract media coverage. Now the French government
has decided to take away the loudest of these megaphones, claiming that
securing marches would compromise its ability to secure the official summit
zone where politicians will meet.
Some say this is all fair game against the backdrop of terror. But a UN
climate summit is not like a meeting of the G8 or the World Trade
Organisation, where the powerful meet and the powerless try to crash their
party. Parallel civil society events are not an addendum to, or
distractions from, the main event. They are integral to the process. Which
is why the French government should never have been allowed to decide which
parts of the summit it would cancel and which it would still hold.
Rather, after the horrific attacks of 13 November [7], it needed to
determine whether it had the will and capacity to host the whole summit
with full participation from civil society, including in the streets. If it
could not, it should have delayed and asked another country to step in.
Instead the Hollande government has made a series of decisions that reflect
a very particular set of values and priorities about who and what will get
the full security protection of the state. Yes to world leaders, football
matches and Christmas markets; no to climate marches and protests pointing
out that the negotiations, with the current level of emission targets,
endanger the lives and livelihoods of millions if not billions of people.
And who knows where this will end? Should we expect the UN to arbitrarily
revoke the credentials of half the civil society participants? Those most
likely to make trouble inside the fortressed summit? I would not be at all
surprised.
It is worth thinking about what the decision to cancel marches and protests
means in real, as well as symbolic, terms. Climate change [6] is a moral
crisis because every time governments of wealthy nations fail to act, it
sends a message that we in the global north are putting our immediate
comfort and economic security ahead of the suffering and survival of some of
the poorest and most vulnerable people on Earth. The decision to ban the
most important spaces where the voices of climate-impacted people would have
been heard is a dramatic expression of this profoundly unethical abuse of
power: once again, a wealthy western country is putting security for elites
ahead of the interests of those fighting for survival. Once again, the
message is: our security is non-negotiable, yours is up for grabs.
One further thought. I write these words from Stockholm, where I have been
doing a series of climate-related public events. When I arrived, the press
was having a field day with a tweet sent by Swedens environment minister,
Åsa Romson [8]. Shortly after news broke of the attacks in Paris, she
tweeted her outrage and sadness at the loss of life. Then she tweeted that
she thought it would be bad news for the climate summit, a thought that
occurred to everyone I know who is in any way connected to this
environmental moment. Yet she was pilloried for her supposed insensitivity
how could she be thinking about climate change at a time of such carnage?
The reaction was revealing, since it took for granted the notion that
climate change is a minor issue, a cause without real casualties, frivolous
even. Especially when serious issues like war and terrorism are taking
centre stage. It made me think about something the writer Rebecca Solnit
wrote [9] not long ago: climate change is violence.
It is. Some of the violence is grindingly slow: rising seas that gradually
erase whole nations, and droughts that kill many thousands. Some of the
violence is terrifyingly fast: storms with names such as Katrina [10] and
Haiyan [11] that steal thousands of lives in a single roiling event. When
governments and corporations knowingly fail to act to prevent catastrophic
warming, that is an act of violence. It is a violence so large, so global
and inflicted against so many temporalities simultaneously (ancient
cultures, present lives, future potential) that there is not yet a word
capable of containing its monstrousness. And using acts of violence to
silence the voices of those who are most vulnerable to climate violence is
yet more violence.
In explaining why forthcoming football matches would go on as scheduled,
Frances secretary of state for sport said: Life must go on [12]. Indeed
it must. Thats why I joined the climate justice movement. Because when
governments and corporations fail to act in a way that reflects the value of
all of life on Earth, they must be protested.
Naomi Klein is an award-winning journalist and syndicated columnist and the
author of the international and New York Times bestseller The Shock
Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism (September 2007); an earlier
international best-seller, No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies; and the
collection Fences and Windows: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the
Globalization Debate (2002). Read more at Naomiklein.org [13]. You can
follow her on Twitter @naomiaklein.
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Report typos and corrections to 'corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx'. [14]
[15]
________________________________________
Source URL:
http://www.alternet.org/environment/naomi-klein-now-marches-are-banned-paris
-climate-conference-whats-stake
Links:
[1] http://www.alternet.org/authors/naomi-klein
[2] http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/
[3]
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/18/cop21-climate-marches-paris-att
acks
[4]
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/nov/19/organisers-of-cancelled-p
aris-climate-march-urge-global-show-of-support
[5]
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jun/02/everything-you-need-to-kn
ow-about-the-paris-climate-summit-and-un-talks
[6] http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-change
[7] http://www.theguardian.com/world/paris-attacks
[8] http://europeangreens.eu/people/%C3%A5sa-romson
[9]
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/07/climate-change-violence
-occupy-earth
[10] http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/hurricane-katrina
[11] http://www.theguardian.com/world/typhoon-haiyan
[12]
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/052664ec179c422bb5e767d947f2ff4e/french-leagu
e-games-going-ahead-because-life-must-go
[13] http://naomiklein.org
[14] mailto:corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx?Subject=Typo on Naomi Klein: Now
Marches Are Banned at the Paris Climate Conference - What's at Stake
[15] http://www.alternet.org/
[16] http://www.alternet.org/%2Bnew_src%2B
Published on Alternet (http://www.alternet.org)
Home > Naomi Klein: Now Marches Are Banned at the Paris Climate Conference -
What's at Stake
Naomi Klein: Now Marches Are Banned at the Paris Climate Conference - What's
at Stake
By Naomi Klein [1] / The Guardian [2]
November 24, 2015
Whose security gets protected by any means necessary? Whose security is
casually sacrificed, despite the means to do so much better? Those are the
questions at the heart of the climate crisis, and the answers are the reason
climate summits so often end in acrimony and tears.
The French governments decision to ban protests, marches and other outdoor
activities [3] during the Paris climate summit is disturbing on many levels
[4]. The one that preoccupies me most has to do with the way it reflects the
fundamental inequity of the climate crisis itself and that core question
of whose security is ultimately valued in our lopsided world.
Here is the first thing to understand. The people facing the worst impacts
of climate change have virtually no voice in western debates about whether
to do anything serious to prevent catastrophic global warming. Huge climate
summits like the one coming up in Paris [5] are rare exceptions. For just
two weeks every few years, the voices of the people who are getting hit
first and worst get a little bit of space to be heard at the place where
fateful decisions are made. Thats why Pacific islanders and Inuit hunters
and low-income people of colour from places like New Orleans travel for
thousands of miles to attend. The expense is enormous, in both dollars and
carbon, but being at the summit is a precious chance to speak about climate
change [6] in moral terms and to put a human face to this unfolding
catastrophe.
The next thing to understand is that even in these rare moments, frontline
voices do not have enough of a platform in the official climate meetings, in
which the microphone is dominated by governments and large, well-funded
green groups. The voices of ordinary people are primarily heard in
grassroots gatherings parallel to the summit, as well as in marches and
protests, which in turn attract media coverage. Now the French government
has decided to take away the loudest of these megaphones, claiming that
securing marches would compromise its ability to secure the official summit
zone where politicians will meet.
Some say this is all fair game against the backdrop of terror. But a UN
climate summit is not like a meeting of the G8 or the World Trade
Organisation, where the powerful meet and the powerless try to crash their
party. Parallel civil society events are not an addendum to, or
distractions from, the main event. They are integral to the process. Which
is why the French government should never have been allowed to decide which
parts of the summit it would cancel and which it would still hold.
Rather, after the horrific attacks of 13 November [7], it needed to
determine whether it had the will and capacity to host the whole summit
with full participation from civil society, including in the streets. If it
could not, it should have delayed and asked another country to step in.
Instead the Hollande government has made a series of decisions that reflect
a very particular set of values and priorities about who and what will get
the full security protection of the state. Yes to world leaders, football
matches and Christmas markets; no to climate marches and protests pointing
out that the negotiations, with the current level of emission targets,
endanger the lives and livelihoods of millions if not billions of people.
And who knows where this will end? Should we expect the UN to arbitrarily
revoke the credentials of half the civil society participants? Those most
likely to make trouble inside the fortressed summit? I would not be at all
surprised.
It is worth thinking about what the decision to cancel marches and protests
means in real, as well as symbolic, terms. Climate change [6] is a moral
crisis because every time governments of wealthy nations fail to act, it
sends a message that we in the global north are putting our immediate
comfort and economic security ahead of the suffering and survival of some of
the poorest and most vulnerable people on Earth. The decision to ban the
most important spaces where the voices of climate-impacted people would have
been heard is a dramatic expression of this profoundly unethical abuse of
power: once again, a wealthy western country is putting security for elites
ahead of the interests of those fighting for survival. Once again, the
message is: our security is non-negotiable, yours is up for grabs.
One further thought. I write these words from Stockholm, where I have been
doing a series of climate-related public events. When I arrived, the press
was having a field day with a tweet sent by Swedens environment minister,
Åsa Romson [8]. Shortly after news broke of the attacks in Paris, she
tweeted her outrage and sadness at the loss of life. Then she tweeted that
she thought it would be bad news for the climate summit, a thought that
occurred to everyone I know who is in any way connected to this
environmental moment. Yet she was pilloried for her supposed insensitivity
how could she be thinking about climate change at a time of such carnage?
The reaction was revealing, since it took for granted the notion that
climate change is a minor issue, a cause without real casualties, frivolous
even. Especially when serious issues like war and terrorism are taking
centre stage. It made me think about something the writer Rebecca Solnit
wrote [9] not long ago: climate change is violence.
It is. Some of the violence is grindingly slow: rising seas that gradually
erase whole nations, and droughts that kill many thousands. Some of the
violence is terrifyingly fast: storms with names such as Katrina [10] and
Haiyan [11] that steal thousands of lives in a single roiling event. When
governments and corporations knowingly fail to act to prevent catastrophic
warming, that is an act of violence. It is a violence so large, so global
and inflicted against so many temporalities simultaneously (ancient
cultures, present lives, future potential) that there is not yet a word
capable of containing its monstrousness. And using acts of violence to
silence the voices of those who are most vulnerable to climate violence is
yet more violence.
In explaining why forthcoming football matches would go on as scheduled,
Frances secretary of state for sport said: Life must go on [12]. Indeed
it must. Thats why I joined the climate justice movement. Because when
governments and corporations fail to act in a way that reflects the value of
all of life on Earth, they must be protested.
Naomi Klein is an award-winning journalist and syndicated columnist and the
author of the international and New York Times bestseller The Shock
Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism (September 2007); an earlier
international best-seller, No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies; and the
collection Fences and Windows: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the
Globalization Debate (2002). Read more at Naomiklein.org [13]. You can
follow her on Twitter @naomiaklein.
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.
Report typos and corrections to 'corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx'. [14]
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.[15]
Source URL:
http://www.alternet.org/environment/naomi-klein-now-marches-are-banned-paris
-climate-conference-whats-stake
Links:
[1] http://www.alternet.org/authors/naomi-klein
[2] http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/
[3]
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/18/cop21-climate-marches-paris-att
acks
[4]
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/nov/19/organisers-of-cancelled-p
aris-climate-march-urge-global-show-of-support
[5]
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jun/02/everything-you-need-to-kn
ow-about-the-paris-climate-summit-and-un-talks
[6] http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-change
[7] http://www.theguardian.com/world/paris-attacks
[8] http://europeangreens.eu/people/%C3%A5sa-romson
[9]
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/07/climate-change-violence
-occupy-earth
[10] http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/hurricane-katrina
[11] http://www.theguardian.com/world/typhoon-haiyan
[12]
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/052664ec179c422bb5e767d947f2ff4e/french-leagu
e-games-going-ahead-because-life-must-go
[13] http://naomiklein.org
[14] mailto:corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx?Subject=Typo on Naomi Klein: Now
Marches Are Banned at the Paris Climate Conference - What's at Stake
[15] http://www.alternet.org/
[16] http://www.alternet.org/%2Bnew_src%2B