The Campaign for Political Ecology
About ECO
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What is ECO trying to do?
ECO's aim is to inject truly ecological thinking into political debate.
What is ECO's philosophy ?
ECO's philosophy is ecocentric - that is, based on the understanding that our survival and that of millions of other species depends on the health of the Earth's natural systems. Such an understanding, therefore, should be central to all political decision-making.
No British political party has an ecocentric philosophy, value system or political programme. Even the Green Party puts concerns about human social justice before concerns about ecosystems. Environmental pressure groups increasingly avoid proposing measures necessary to protect the natural world if these appear to infringe human 'rights'.
What - in a nutshell - is ECO's view ?
ECO believes that human activity is now impacting on the global environment to a disastrous extent. While the scale of human suffering, oppression, and injustice in many parts of the world is heart-breaking, political efforts centred solely on making life for human beings more secure, more comfortable and more successful, will ultimately fail, resulting in environmental melt-down and more human suffering.
Concerns purely for human-welfare must be transcended by a 'post-humanist' world view: allocation of resources in the fairest way within the constraints imposed on us by the Earth. That means looking critically at individual consumption of goods and services, and reforming the technologies used to provide them so that the environmental impact is reduced. It also means challenging the 'right' for humans to continue expanding their numbers. Otherwise all the improvements which technological reforms might achieve could be wiped out by the ever-increasing number of consumers.
What kind of future society does ECO wish for?
ECO's goal is a society in which the institutions and lifestyles do not degrade its citizens, nor deprive future generations of an environment that can sustain their lives, nor threaten the survival of other species with whom we share the Earth.
Surely "sustainable development " is taking us there?
ECO is deeply worried by the glib use of the term 'sustainability' without consideration of the underlying concept. Even where this is used to convey the aim of ecological sustainability, there is generally little appraisal to show that the project being proposed, when added to hundreds of similar projects, would in fact be sustainable. A great complacency has developed around the use of this term: tweak the technologies a bit, label them 'sustainable' and then everything is hunky-dory.
Is ECO a political party ?
No. We only seek to inform and influence.
What are ECO's main issues?
Our guiding concepts are limits, diversity and stability. The key issues are overpopulation, overconsumption and uncontrolled technology. They are based on the equation:
I = P x A x T
(where I is humanity's environmental impact, P is population/human numbers, A is affluence or resource consumption per capita, and T is the technology factor - higher if wasteful and polluting and lower if 'greener'.)
ECO's publications examine the ways in which all these factors could be reduced and consistently emphasise the importance of tackling all three. We acknowledge that worldwide inequality and injustice add immensely to the complexity of the problem.
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How ECO operates
A small voluntary team meets at intervals to discuss additions to the website and to pool ideas.
To contact us, please send an email to eco-cpe@bigfoot.com or write to ECO at 17 Fog Lane, Manchester, M20 6A, UK.
Advisors
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ECO Home Page
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This page last updated: 30-June-2003
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
Thinking before the act..........
NEWS RELEASE
May 7 2007
COMBAT CLIMATE CHANGE WITH FEWER BABIES – OPT REPORT
A radical form of “offsetting” carbon dioxide emissions to prevent climate change is proposed today – having fewer children.
Each new UK citizen less means a lifetime carbon dioxide saving of nearly 750 tonnes, a climate impact equivalent to 620 return flights between London and New York*, the Optimum Population Trust says in a new report.
Based on a “social cost” of carbon dioxide of $85 a tonne**, the report estimates the climate cost of each new Briton over their lifetime at roughly £30,000. The lifetime emission costs of the extra 10 million people projected for the UK by 2074 would therefore be over £300 billion. ***
A 35-pence condom, which could avert that £30,000 cost from a single use, thus represents a “spectacular” potential return on investment – around nine million per cent.
The report adds: “The most effective personal climate change strategy is limiting the number of children one has. The most effective national and global climate change strategy is limiting the size of the population.
“Population limitation should therefore be seen as the most cost-effective carbon offsetting strategy available to individuals and nations – a strategy that applies with even more force to developed nations such as the UK because of their higher consumption levels.”
A Population-Based Climate Strategy, the OPT’s latest research briefing, is published today (Monday, May 7 2007). It says human population growth is widely acknowledged as one of the main causes of climate change yet politicians and environmentalists rarely discuss it for fear of causing offence. The result is that a “de facto taboo” exists, throughout civil society and government.
One consequence is that “couples making decisions about family size do so in the belief that it is a matter for them and their personal preferences alone: the public debate and awareness that might have encouraged them to think about the implications of their choices for their fellow citizens, the climate and the wider environment have been missing.”
Other points in the briefing include:
*Providing low-carbon electricity for the 11 million extra UK households forecast for 2050 would mean building seven more Sizewell B nuclear power stations or 10-11,000 wind turbines.
*Global population growth between now and 2050 is equivalent in carbon dioxide emissions terms to the arrival on the planet of nearly two more United States, over two Chinas, 10 Indias or 20 UKs.
*Even if by 2050 the world had managed to achieve a 60 per cent cut in its 1990 emission levels, in line with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s recommendations and the UK Government’s target, almost all of it would be cancelled out by population growth.
It concludes: “A population-based [climate] strategy…involves fewer of the taxes, regulations and other limits on personal freedom and mobility now being canvassed in response to climate change…To sum up, it would be easier, quicker, cheaper, freer and greener.”
Valerie Stevens, co-chair of the OPT, said: “We appreciate that asking people to have fewer children is not going to make us popular in some quarters. Equally, expressing concern about the environmental impacts of mass migration, which currently accounts for the bulk of population growth in the UK and will have a major effect on Britain’s carbon emissions, is a quick route to being labelled racist. But these are hugely important issues and the unfortunate fact is that both politicians and the environmental movement are in denial about them. It’s high time we started discussing them like adults and confronting the real challenges of climate change.”
She added: “Government fiscal measures that support child-bearing however many children a couple has, send a signal that increasing numbers are good for the welfare of everyone. In a world needing to diminish its consumption of key resources, especially energy, this is sadly no longer true.”
NOTES
*Based on 1.2 tonnes of carbon dioxide per return flight (Department for Transport).
**Stern Review, October 2006.
***Fertility levels in the UK have been below replacement level (2.1 children per woman) for around 30 years. Inward migration is currently the main driver of UK population growth, accounting for over 80 per cent of projected increase to 2074. However, even without the effects of immigration, demographic momentum – the result of the large numbers of children produced in earlier age bands reaching child-bearing age – would have prevented any population decline up to the present. The total fertility rate (TFR) peaked in 1964 at 2.95 children per woman, but this was followed by a rapid fall in the number of births per woman in the 1970s. In 2005 the TFR in the UK was 1.78 children; it is expected to level off at 1.74 (Office of National Statistics).
The full briefing is available on the OPT’s Briefings and Submissions page.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Optimum Population Trust, 12 Meadowgate, Urmston, Manchester M41 9LB, UK
Tel: 07976-370 221 email: info@optimumpopulation.org
May 7 2007
COMBAT CLIMATE CHANGE WITH FEWER BABIES – OPT REPORT
A radical form of “offsetting” carbon dioxide emissions to prevent climate change is proposed today – having fewer children.
Each new UK citizen less means a lifetime carbon dioxide saving of nearly 750 tonnes, a climate impact equivalent to 620 return flights between London and New York*, the Optimum Population Trust says in a new report.
Based on a “social cost” of carbon dioxide of $85 a tonne**, the report estimates the climate cost of each new Briton over their lifetime at roughly £30,000. The lifetime emission costs of the extra 10 million people projected for the UK by 2074 would therefore be over £300 billion. ***
A 35-pence condom, which could avert that £30,000 cost from a single use, thus represents a “spectacular” potential return on investment – around nine million per cent.
The report adds: “The most effective personal climate change strategy is limiting the number of children one has. The most effective national and global climate change strategy is limiting the size of the population.
“Population limitation should therefore be seen as the most cost-effective carbon offsetting strategy available to individuals and nations – a strategy that applies with even more force to developed nations such as the UK because of their higher consumption levels.”
A Population-Based Climate Strategy, the OPT’s latest research briefing, is published today (Monday, May 7 2007). It says human population growth is widely acknowledged as one of the main causes of climate change yet politicians and environmentalists rarely discuss it for fear of causing offence. The result is that a “de facto taboo” exists, throughout civil society and government.
One consequence is that “couples making decisions about family size do so in the belief that it is a matter for them and their personal preferences alone: the public debate and awareness that might have encouraged them to think about the implications of their choices for their fellow citizens, the climate and the wider environment have been missing.”
Other points in the briefing include:
*Providing low-carbon electricity for the 11 million extra UK households forecast for 2050 would mean building seven more Sizewell B nuclear power stations or 10-11,000 wind turbines.
*Global population growth between now and 2050 is equivalent in carbon dioxide emissions terms to the arrival on the planet of nearly two more United States, over two Chinas, 10 Indias or 20 UKs.
*Even if by 2050 the world had managed to achieve a 60 per cent cut in its 1990 emission levels, in line with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s recommendations and the UK Government’s target, almost all of it would be cancelled out by population growth.
It concludes: “A population-based [climate] strategy…involves fewer of the taxes, regulations and other limits on personal freedom and mobility now being canvassed in response to climate change…To sum up, it would be easier, quicker, cheaper, freer and greener.”
Valerie Stevens, co-chair of the OPT, said: “We appreciate that asking people to have fewer children is not going to make us popular in some quarters. Equally, expressing concern about the environmental impacts of mass migration, which currently accounts for the bulk of population growth in the UK and will have a major effect on Britain’s carbon emissions, is a quick route to being labelled racist. But these are hugely important issues and the unfortunate fact is that both politicians and the environmental movement are in denial about them. It’s high time we started discussing them like adults and confronting the real challenges of climate change.”
She added: “Government fiscal measures that support child-bearing however many children a couple has, send a signal that increasing numbers are good for the welfare of everyone. In a world needing to diminish its consumption of key resources, especially energy, this is sadly no longer true.”
NOTES
*Based on 1.2 tonnes of carbon dioxide per return flight (Department for Transport).
**Stern Review, October 2006.
***Fertility levels in the UK have been below replacement level (2.1 children per woman) for around 30 years. Inward migration is currently the main driver of UK population growth, accounting for over 80 per cent of projected increase to 2074. However, even without the effects of immigration, demographic momentum – the result of the large numbers of children produced in earlier age bands reaching child-bearing age – would have prevented any population decline up to the present. The total fertility rate (TFR) peaked in 1964 at 2.95 children per woman, but this was followed by a rapid fall in the number of births per woman in the 1970s. In 2005 the TFR in the UK was 1.78 children; it is expected to level off at 1.74 (Office of National Statistics).
The full briefing is available on the OPT’s Briefings and Submissions page.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Optimum Population Trust, 12 Meadowgate, Urmston, Manchester M41 9LB, UK
Tel: 07976-370 221 email: info@optimumpopulation.org
Wednesday, August 8, 2007
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