Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

“For decades, I asked such intellectuals and academics with pretensions of worldliness how they could only consider the Democratic or Republican Party's policies on domestic matters, which affect some 345 million Americans, versus global matters that affect eight billion people. The answer consistently boils down to the fact that both parties pursue imperialist policies around the world. Since the only variation in their programmes relates to domestic issues, it becomes necessary to vote for the ‘lesser evil’  and defend it as an absolute good to defeat the more evil.” Indeed. Even Noam Chomsky believed (probably still believes) in the ‘lesser evil’ dogma. He advocated a vote to John Kerry in 2004. Massad rightly calls such a dogma a myth and parochialism. Frantz Fanon, however, “ understood by the early 1960s that only the colonised would be able to defeat the ongoing imperial depredations visited on the globe, especially given the complicity of the white liberals and socialists o...

“Welcome to the wackier side of geoengineering - deliberately intervening in the Earth's climate system to try to counteract the damage we have done to it .” We? Historical responsibility for climate change is at the heart of debates over climate justice The fault of humanity? The 1% emit more than double of the poorest half of humanity Climate breakdown responsibility

“It is … urgent to re-examine the Derna tragedy in light of a long history of colonialism, confiscation of natural resources and destruction of living and non-living things for Western hegemonic purposes via war and militarism.” Related When you hear the buzzwords ‘our way of life’, ‘our values’, ‘democracy or authoritarianism’, not to mention ‘there is a jungle over there’ (Josep Borrell), ‘wasps in the Middle East’ (Thomas Friedman), ‘terrorism’, etc. think of this: The Imperial Mode of Living

Highlights from Jason Hickel 1)  Compensation for atmospheric appropriation .  This is my top highlight. We show that rich countries have already dramatically exceeded their fair-shares of the carbon budget for 1.5 ° C and 2 ° C and are rapidly appropriating the fair-shares of others, forcing them to mitigate faster than would otherwise be required. In a scenario where all countries aim for zero emissions by 2050, rich countries will owe $192 trillion to global South countries in compensation for atmospheric appropriation. In  Nature Sustainability . 2)  Climate change and racial justice .  Rich countries and elites are overwhelmingly responsible for excess emissions, but communities in the global South—and Indigenous and racially minoritized groups within nations—face a disproportionate burden of illness and mortality due to climate change. The climate crisis is a process of atmospheric colonization, and the consequences are playing out along colonial lines. Ma...

According to Unicef UK, Every day, 14-year-old Tenasoa, who has lost the use of her legs, works in a mine to earn money for her family. "I don't know the origin of her disability,” explains her mother. “She has to work because it allows us to increase our income.” In Madagascar, about 10,000 children work in the mica mining sector . Mica is commonly found in products such as cosmetics, paints and electronics – and mining it requires people to work in dangerous conditions underground. Long-term exposure to mica dust can irritate the lungs and cause irreversible fibrosis that causes blood to be coughed up. In the mine where Tenasoa works, she sorts and cleans 2 kilogrammes of mica per day. Forty children work in the mine. They labour for seven days a week, with no access to school or health services. The dry, rocky landscape leaves few other ways to make a living. As one of the elders says, "If we don't work, we don't eat, it's very simple. Men, women and childr...

Why did Libya floods result in such a large loss of life? كان من الممكن تفادي سقوط معظم القتلى  The BBC: A Libyan politician says the country's deadly flooding was a disaster waiting to happen Guma El-Gamaty, head of the Taghyeer Party, says budgets to repair the dams were not allocated properly after Colonel Gaddafi was overthrown Most of the thousands of deaths in the Libya floods could have been avoided, the UN's World Meteorological Organization says Warnings should have been issued, leading to evacuations, "and we could have avoided most of the human casualties"

A long but must read piece by Göran Therborn

Not a single word about UK’s imperialism. Poverty, excessive inequality, productivity …

Systematic delays, economic opportunities and the risk of green colonialism

Five Crises

Carbon dioxide beneficial for plants, chief culprit of climate change

Richard Seymour: Owing to the increasing technological difficulties and commercial disadvantages associated with fossil fuels, Tooze worries that I am too “sanguine” about the chances of “green modernisation”. I do argue that the far-sighted members of the ruling class might react to this crisis by accelerating “the transition to renewables” with “more energy-efficient buildings, transport and supply chains” and even competition “over who transitions fastest”, resulting in trade wars over the control of the rare metals needed to make solar panels. What Adam Tooze gets wrong about capitalism and climate change

“ Whilst attempting to show his leadership on climate, Biden was at the same time trying to persuade the OPEC oil producers to increase production, so as to keep petrol prices down for US consumers.” — Jon Sopel, the BBC Then Biden was seen asleep. ‘Mission accomplished’.

Historical responsibility for climate change is at the heart of debates over climate justice

They keep repeating that humans are responsible for climate change. Are most humans in poor nations the same as the rich in the advanced capitalist countries? Are the humans controlling the multinational companies the same as working class and middle class humans in the poor countries? Humans are responsible means the responsibility must be shared between capitalists–and the defenders of the dominant economic system–and more than half of the world population! The fault of humanity? The 1% emit more than double of the poorest half of humanity Climate breakdown responsibility

Is this shift sufficient to tackle the century’s social and ecological crises? Not nearly. Does it alter essential class relations? On the contrary: it strives to re-legitimize the social order. Is it unambiguous? No: while private finance has been kept out of new domestic infrastructure projects, the US is still driving privatization and deregulation in the global south and intensifying its new Cold War on China. Will it propel a new phase of economic expansion? I doubt it, due to the sheer scale of global overaccumulation and the fade-out of the industrialization bonanza. 1979 in Reverse

  Marwan Daoudy challenges core assumptions behind the climate-conflict hypothesis Related Interview with the Marwa Daoudi On blaming climate change on the Syrian civil war

  Smarter Empire 

“ A new Oxfam report finds that the richest 1 percent of people alone are responsible for  double the emissions  of the poorest 50 percent of the global population. That means that even if the working class of the Global North took all the individual actions that are recommended or we forced poor people in the Global South to stop having kids, that still wouldn’t solve the problem.” The class aspect

Former governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney, told the BBC that the answer to the climate crisis was investment in a green economy.  Carney  says the answer lies in a global pot of $170tn of private capital “which is looking for disclosure.” Now, just think what that capital could do for the earth and humanity. That is more than eight times the annual GDP of the U.S.! It is also a proof that the issue is not about lack of capital or resources but about political economic decisions tied up to the functioning of the capitalist system. Private ownership is one, if not the main, hindrance to real change.