Paper short abstract:

Beginning with Ghosh's and Whyte's analysis the climate crisis and colonial injustices are intimately linked, I argue that a sustainable solution to the climate crisis requires not only technological fixes but also a focus on indigenous peoples' access to the capability of affiliation and the (re-)building of kin relationships across different social institutions.

Paper long abstract:

The year 2023, which by a large margin was the hottest year on record and for the first time pushed past the 1.5-degree goal of the 2015 Paris agreement, was a stark reminder of the urgency of the climate crisis. In his 2021 book "The Nutmeg’s Curse" the Indian novelist Amitav Ghosh, who was born in Kolkata, convincingly shows that injustices against indigenous peoples are intimately connected and arise from the same perspective on the world as the climate crisis. Ghosh argues that both injustices are the direct result of centuries of colonialism and a capitalism that views “the world as resource; landscapes as factories, nature a cheap.” (Ghosh 2022, 73)

The philosopher Kyle White, a North American Potawatomi relative, argues that, for reasons similar to those identified by Ghosh, that we have reached a crisis or tipping points in kin relationships of trust, mutual consent, and reciprocity across different societies, which are due to “the operations and impacts of colonialism, industrialization, and capitalism” (Whyte 2020, 5). This, Whyte argues, results in an apparently irresolvable tension: On the one hand, the climate crisis requires urgent action. But treating this crisis purely as managerial technological problem threatens to perpetuate colonial injustices. On the other hand, restoring trust and building kin relationships across societies requires time, maybe even several generations—that is, it requires times, which in light of the urgency of the climate crisis we don't have. As Whyte argues we are confronted with two urgent crisis which would have to be solved together but require dramatically different speeds to resolve. Whyte ends his essay with the plea that “urgency must be aimed at addressing ecological and relational tipping points together” (6) but leaves completely open how this could be possible in light of the tension he has identified.

In this talk I provide a philosophical analysis of the climate and relational crises from the perspective of the capabilities approach and the related integral human development approach (Keleher 2018) to suggest a pragmatic response to the entwinements identified by Whyte and Ghosh. According to Martha Nussbaum’s version of a capabilities approach (Nussbaum 2011), being able to engage in various forms of social relations is required by human dignity and human flourishing. Many indigenous peoples understand their societies and relationships to include beings and entities beyond humans (see Whyte 2019). Colonialism and the climate crisis interfere with human flourishing by interfering with reciprocal social relations within indigenous societies and by violating social relations of trust, mutual consent and reciprocity between indigenous peoples and other institutions. Or, from the perspective of integral human development, colonialism and the climate crisis undermine persons standing in relation of radical solidarity with each other (and with other beings or entities recognized as part of the social network of kin relationships). But is it “too late for indigenous climate justice” as Whyte suggests, because restoring the capability of social affiliation and building kinship relationships requires time which the climate crisis does not grant us?

I argue that at least a partial answer to Whyte’s worry lies in recognizing that addressing climate injustices and standing in solidarity with one another does not require equal and equally timed contributions or “sacrifices” from all of us In fact, our responsibilities in face of the climate crisis are dramatically unequally distributed, as the World Inequality Report 2022 makes amply clear (https://wir2022.wid.world/chapter-6/), with the top 10% of emitters being responsible for close to 50% of all carbon emissions. The dramatic imbalances in responsibilities allow for differential responses. We should ask for urgent “sacrifices” from the highest emitters. But these responses will to a large extent consist in technological “fixes”. At the same time, we urgently ought to begin to address the injustices resulting from denying the capability of engaging in rich kin relationships characterized by trust and reciprocity. (Re-)Building such relationship takes time. But if, as Ghosh and Whyte argue, solving both the climate crisis and the relational crisis requires going beyond managerial and technological solutions, a sustained and long-term solution to the climate crisis will require urgent action on solving the relational crisis as well – with its own different time-scales: we need both quick action by the highest emitters but also long-term solutions that will require relationships of trust, mutual consent and reciprocity—relationships of radical solidarity—across different societies, including indigenous peoples with their richer perspective on the entities and beings that can be embedded in social relationships of mutual solidarity.

References:

Ghosh, Amitav. 2022. The Nutmeg’s Curse: Parables for a Planet in Crisis. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/N/bo125517349.html.

Keleher, Lori. 2018. “Integral Human Development.” In Routledge Handbook of Development Ethics, edited by Jay Drydyk and Lori Keleher, 29–34. London: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315626796.

Nussbaum, Martha. 2011. Creating Capabilities: The Human Development Approach. Harvard University Press.

Whyte, Kyle. 2020. “Too Late for Indigenous Climate Justice: Ecological and Relational Tipping Points.” WIREs Climate Change 11 (1): e603. https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.603.