Deutsche Bank: Eco-Dictatorship Will Be Necessary
Source: (
https://bit.ly/3PMBocA)
Izabella Kaminska, formerly the Editor of the FT's Alphaville and
now the Editor of the Blind Spot, has flagged up an alarming
passage in a document published in January 2021 by Deutsche Bank
Research entitled 'What we must do to Rebuild'. Eric Heyman has
written the section about the tough choices the EU must face it if's
to meet its goal of achieving 'climate neutrality' by 2050 - Net
Zero, in other words - and says the following:
The impact of the current climate policy on people's everyday lives
is still quite abstract and acceptable for many households. Climate
policy comes in the form of higher taxes and fees on energy, which
make heating and mobility more expensive. Some countries have set
minimum energy efficiency standards for buildings or similar rules
in other areas. However, climate policy does not determine our lives.
We take key consumption decisions, for example whether we travel
at all, how much we travel and which means of transport we use,
whether we live in a large house or a small apartment and how we
heat our homes, how many electronic devices we have and how
intensely we use them or how much meat and exotic fruit we eat. These
decisions tend to be made on the basis of our income, not on climate
considerations.
If we really want to achieve climate neutrality, we need to change
our behaviour in all these areas of life. This is simply because there
are no adequate cost-effective technologies yet to allow us to
maintain our living standards in a carbon-neutral way. That means
that carbon prices will have to rise considerably in order to nudge
people to change their behaviour. Another (or perhaps supplementary)
option is to tighten regulatory law considerably. I know that
"eco-dictatorship" is a nasty word. But we may have to ask ourselves
the question whether and to what extent we may be willing to accept
some kind of eco-dictatorship (in the form of regulatory law) in
order to move towards climate neutrality.
When he says we have to "ask ourselvesÂ… whether and to what extent
we may be willing to accept some kind of eco-dictatorship" I don't
think he has a Net Zero referendum in mind. Rather, by 'ourselves'
he means the EU's ruling class. It has to ask itself whether it's willing
to pass laws forcing the EU's population to modify its behaviour to
meet the 2050 'climate neutrality' target, regardless of whether it
has a democratic mandate to do so or not.
I suppose we should be grateful that at least Heyman hasn't tried to
sugar coat this. It should be clear what "eco-dictatorship" means,
even to those most reluctant to accept that Net Zero zealots have
little love for democracy.
Stop Press: Izabella Kaminska has interviewed the neo-Malthusian
Turkish-American economist Nourel Roubini for the Blind Spot
podcast. In his book Megathreats: The Ten Trends that Imperil Our
Future, and How to Survive Them he argues that individual freedoms
will have to be sacrificed if we're to contain another pandemic or
avoid a climate catastrophe.
