February 8, 2008

Democracy is Bad For The Collective

A new book sure to be embraced by the Left argues that the pending doom of global warming requires that liberal democracy must give way to "a form of authoritarian government by experts" who can lead us to confront the climate crisis. The book also argues that humanity must give up its "loving marriage to economic growth." In other words, to save the planet we have to be poorer and live under tyranny. I never realized that China and the USSR were environmental utopias... [Hat tip: Jonah Goldberg's Liberal Facism blog]

One of the book's co-authors actually points to China as proof that authoritarianism is the way to go in battling environmental doom:

Liberal democracy is sweet and addictive and indeed in the most extreme case, the USA, unbridled individual liberty overwhelms many of the collective needs of the citizens. The subject is almost sacrosanct and those who indulge in criticism are labeled as Marxists, socialists, fundamentalists and worse. These labels are used because alternatives to democracy cannot be perceived! Support for Western democracy is messianic as proselytised by a President leading a flawed democracy

There must be open minds to look critically at liberal democracy. Reform must involve the adoption of structures to act quickly regardless of some perceived liberties. It is not that liberal democracy cannot react once it sees a threat, for example, the speedy response to a recent international financial emergency. If governments can recognise a financial emergency and in an instant move heaven and earth (and billions of dollars, pounds sterling and euros) to contain it, why are they unable to do the same in response to a global environmental emergency? Quite simply our system is seen to live and breathe by the present economic system; the problem is that living and breathing within the confines of the world ecological systems is contrary to the activity of progress and development as defined within liberal democracy.