Grünen Kapitalismus - Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung

The new corporate consensus might well be encapsulated in the slogan
“We’re all green now.” Such a claim is neither more nor less true than
the recently repeated (on a Newsweek cover) phrase from early-20th-century
Great Britain: “We’re all socialists now.” While the new green mode
was resisted by the Bush administration, it was integral to the corporate
coalescence behind Obama’s campaign for “change.” The environmental
policies that we can now expect to see have for some time been
advocated by the green establishment, and are of course all well within
the parameters of capitalist economics. 196 Just as government social programs,
however, do not constitute socialism, so the enactment of certain
green measures – whether by corporations or by the government – does
not mean that the health of the ecosphere has suddenly been accorded
the urgent priority it deserves.
In effect, the standard capitalist response to a recognized problem whose
solution would defy the system’s logic, is to devise complex instruments
to address the matter indirectly. We have noted this pattern in general
terms, referring to Thomas Friedman’s ideas for creating marketincentives,
and comparing his approach to that of the notoriously inefficient
US healthcare system. As of mid-2009, a similar approach is being
applied in an effort to respond to economic hardships produced by the
recent financial collapse. Instead of the government establishing work
programs that would provide direct services – paying otherwise jobless
individuals to staff them – what it principally does is to extend massive
subsidies to the financial institutions, in the “hope” that these will in
turn (and despite unfavorable market indicators) resume their loan activities
and thereby revive “the economy.” The standard capitalist response
to the environmental crisis is similar. It was pushed by Vice-President
Al Gore in the 1990s, in relation to the Kyoto negotiations, and
has now been embraced by the Obama administration. It is known as
“cap and trade.” Whether the target is GHG emissions or other pollutants,
the idea hinges on “motivating” companies to improve their performance,
by establishing a system of tradable fines or subsidies. If a
company reduces its ecological footprint, it can then either sell the re-
196 For a perceptive critique of green-capitalist economics, see Kovel 2007, 173 ff. A comprehensive
exposition can be found in Burkett 2006. The overarching point is well
encapsulated by Ackerman (2009, 48): “Since the most important benefits of climate
protection are priceless, any monetary value for total benefits will necessarily be incomplete.”
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