A constant refrain from environmentalists is that the
current economic development approach is unsustainable as perpetual growth is
impossible in a world of limited resources. Capitalism is leading humanity into,
if not oblivion, then a very dark and frightening future.
I think we are misreading the situation.
First, financial and political elites are decidedly NOT
climate deniers, given their strategies play to an acceptance of the end of
life as we know it.
What we are witnessing is the shameless scramble for the world’s
remaining resources, the deliberate exclusion of those considered undesirable (which
seems to be the great majority of citizens), the reduction or elimination of programmes
of climate change mitigation and adaptation, and the mocking of any hint of social
or environmental justice.
Second, we have proof of concept that humans are not bound
by Plant Earth. Science fiction has become science faction. The discovery of Earth-like
planets, the regular headlines 'life on Mars', celebrity space travel and so on
show that wealthy elites no longer consider themselves constrained by earthly
limits and are injecting billions of dollars into space research on the premise
that we need ‘options’, yunno, just in case [insert latest apocalyptic scenario].
Planet Earth seems to be a lost cause to many powerful people, and they are
voting with their money with the object of voting with their feet.
As Fredric Jameson noted (2003), it is easier to imagine the
end of the world than the end of capitalism.
This appalling situation can be understood as a unique confluence
of capitalism’s hellbent destructive innovation in the search for profit with the
Christian eschatological appetite. Prior to becoming Pope Benedict XVI, Joseph
Ratzinger (1988) wrote a challenging text on
the history of eschatology, the study of the ‘last things’, often interpreted
as ‘the end times’, in which he reminds us that the preaching of Jesus was focused
on the imminent end of the world which was not seen as a particularly distant
event. Thy Kingdom Come.
The ongoing brutality visited upon Gaza present, for some, is the fulfilling of
Biblical prophecy. One US Baptist pastor rejoiced in the genocide as “God has
allowed us to see the day when His prophetic clock started running again. We are
the generation to see the final biblical prophecies come to pass…The King is
coming!” (Lavin, 2023).
What has this to do with the ramping up of unsustainable resource
extraction?
Indigenous (Potawatomi) scholar Kyle Whyte (2017) describes the ongoing
colonial oppression of Indigenous Peoples as an outcome of capitalism and
industrialisation, particularly at the hands of the fossil fuels sector. He
tags Garret Hardin’s Poverty of the Commons as framing an analysis of rich
countries as being like lifeboats surrounded by drowning poor people – a result
of deteriorating environmental and economic conditions. There is only so much space
on a lifeboat and survivors have an obligation to prise the fingers of the
drowning hordes from constrained safety. Is this not the argument of conservatives
everywhere (though most volubly in the US) who see ‘hordes’ of immigrants
threatening their (energy intensive) lifestyles? Build the wall.
But the creativity of capitalism is inseparable from its
self-destruction.
The 2023 centre right/far right government of Aotearoa assumes
the country is facing an existential threat of economic oblivion. This fear justifies
the dilution or circumvention of standard parliamentary procedures (NZ slipped
from 3rd to 4th in Transparency Internationals Corruption Index; Transparency
International, 2024) and voters are mocked for their concerns over biodiversity
(Mills, 2023) and privatisation (Shaw, 2025) and the stuttering progress
on sustainability is poised to be dismantled.
Yet I see this fear sitting within a wider existential fear of
a loss of their cultural identity, principally exemplified by a Māori
renaissance, many decades in the making, that parallels other social movements of
increasing ethnic diversity, non-binary genders and sexual fluidity, and women’s
rights (the right to birth control and abortion are under threat in multiple
liberal democratic and authoritarian states). Rich white people are losing
control, and this is the disaster.
Jameson, F. (2003) ‘Future City’, New
Left Review, (21), pp. 65–79.
Lavin, T.
(2023) ‘These Evangelicals Are Cheering the Gaza War as the End of the World’, Rolling
Stone, 17 November. Available at:
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/political-commentary/gaza-war-evangelical-leaders-cheer-end-world-1234884151/
(Accessed: 8 May 2025).
Mills, L.
(2023) Goodbye, minister tells frogs impeding mining | Otago Daily Times
Online News. Available at:
https://www.odt.co.nz/regions/west-coast/goodbye-minister-tells-frogs-impeding-mining
(Accessed: 25 February 2025).
Ratzinger,
J. (1988) ‘Introduction: the state of the question’, in Eschatology: Death
and Eternal Life (Dogmatic Theology). Washington D.C: The Catholic
University of America Press.
Shaw, R.
(2025) David Seymour says Kiwis are too squeamish about privatisation –
history shows why they lost the appetite, The Conversation.
Available at:
http://theconversation.com/david-seymour-says-kiwis-are-too-squeamish-about-privatisation-history-shows-why-they-lost-the-appetite-248308
(Accessed: 25 February 2025).
Transparency
International (2024) New Zealand’s score slips 2023 Corruption Perceptions
Index, now ranked third. Available at:
https://www.transparency.org.nz/blog/new-zealands-score-slips-in-latest-corruption-perceptions-index-now-ranked-third
(Accessed: 25 February 2025).
Whyte, K.
(2017) ‘Way Beyond the Lifeboat: An Indigenous Allegory of Climate Justice’, in
D. Munshi et al. (eds) Climate Futures: Reimagining Global Climate Justice.
Los Angeles: University of California Press.
