A Critical Conversation on Climate Change ... - Green Choices

ways forward 351rogated by Indian villagers, Peruvian fisherfolk, or poor communitiesacross the fence from Louisiana oil refineries is simply irrational. Suchideas need to be evaluated by people who know from experiencewhat commodification of land, water and air mean to the poor, whatthe effects of nuclear contamination are, and how the World Bank’sclimate policy works on the ground – and who have their own interestsand are evolving their own contributions toward dealing withthe crisis. The initiatives of organisations and networks such as Oilwatch,Palang Thai, Platform, Friends of the Earth, the Centre forScience and Environment, Rising Tide, the New Economics Foundation,the Durban Group for Climate Justice and tens of thousandsof other groups, many of them located at the grassroots in both Southand North, already go far beyond the default thinking of global elites.But work on climate change and the search for ways out of the crisiscan’t be carried forward fruitfully without an even more thoroughgoingdecentring of the debate.Any study of ‘alternatives’ must begin with this truth – not with acall for yet more formulas to feed to, and nourish, the institutionsthat bear so much of the responsibility for the climate crisis and manyothers. This special report has been a modest plea for greater understandingof that truth.