“But there is hope, right?”

Posted on 29/09/2026 by nathanjonross

When people learn that my career is about tackling climate change and advancing ecological sustainability, I am sometimes asked, with an agonising, sheepish look, “But there is hope, right?”

(Continues below the photo)

**Hatchlings, Conflict Islands, Papua New Guinea © Nathan Ross**
The Conflict Islands comprise a privately-owned marine conservation park, managed by marine biologists and rangers who have increased the survival rate of hatchlings from roughly 5% to roughly 95% by looking after the nests and releasing the hatchlings to the sea when predators aren’t around.

The question of hope is asked as if, were I to say “No,” then I would be failing in some moral way; not someone else. The question feels loaded, as if I am responsible for their sense of hope, and if I don’t give it to them, then I am being heartless.

Whether we succeed or not in preventing the climate and nature crisis from deepening and causing even greater catastrophes, is that my personal moral failure? Reasonable people could differ on whether I’ve led a moral life, but I think I do okay in that respect.

By contrast, I agree that the deepening crisis is symbolic of my profession’s failure.

To-date, everyone who works on sustainability has, to put it bluntly, failed, since the climate and nature crisis has worsened. Brilliant people have helped make important gains, they’ve designed and delivered great projects, and they continue to do so, and all of that has definitely slowed the deteriorating situation. Nevertheless, the combined impact of all this great work has not been anywhere near enough to prevent the disasters that are now unfolding.

In our defence, sustainability professionals bare only the tiniest responsibility.

Our main failure has been that we did not develop and—crucially—socialise a series of pragmatic policy proposals to tackle the root cause of non-sustainability: the rapacious, extractive economic system that is embedded completely into our collective psychology and political cultures, and which makes it virtually impossible to live sustainably.

Doughnut Economics is a brilliant attempt at a practical policy tool, but despite its brilliance, its adoption has been unfortunately limited. All power to the Doughnut Economics Action Lab in growing their influence and impact.

Since that rapacious extractive economic system still flourishes, that brings me back to the question, Is there hope?

Even without the moral overtones, the question of hope is complicated. It’s presented as a yes or no question, but the climate and nature crisis is nowhere near that simple.

There are reasons for profound anxiety. Many of the best sustainability professionals I know lose sleep, literally, because of the stress caused by having intimate knowledge of all the problems and, therefore, being a voyeur on the end of the world as we know it. Terrible things are now locked in and unpreventable.

An important part of why this is so stressful is that, as well as understanding the problems, sustainability professionals also know that the climate and nature crisis was entirely preventable; that we could stop the harmful things humanity is doing; that we could turn the ship around; but also that the extractive economic system is too big and too powerful, and it is bolstered by people, values and cultures that do not understand, or refuse to understand, or don’t care about the calamities being created by the system they support.

The public is increasingly aware that the economic system is failing them, but more and more are going down the rabbit hole presented by populists, instead of looking for genuinely effective solutions. The populists are a useful vent for anger—and people should be angry with the cheerleaders for flailing and destructive economics—but nothing else. Certainly, when it comes to scientific literacy, populists are, at best, ignorant and, at worst, environmental despots, making our futures less safe and less prosperous. Populists have no answers for the climate and nature crisis that aren’t moronic.

And so, with growing support for populists who want to dump the Paris Agreement and Net Zero goals (which are, in any case, only a piss-weak target; far short of what’s needed for public safety), we sustainability professionals see our communities sliding further away from solving the climate and nature crisis.

The frustration is that the economic, technological, policy and behavioural solutions already exist.

Read that again.

The economic, technological, policy and behavioural solutions already exist.

So, what are we waiting for? Why aren’t they being rolled-out and the necessary speed and scale to stop and reverse the crisis?

The Social Licence Crisis

The fundamental problem is that there is still—a staggering 130 years after the first peer-reviewed scientific paper on anthropogenic global warming—the social licence crisis.

The social licence crisis is this situation now, where we have a continuing and generous social licence for environmental bads, like fossil fuels, and insufficient social licence and, indeed, demand for truly ambitious and effective environmental and economic reforms.

Hope will only exist if we are tackling the social licence crisis; if we can invert that ratio; if we can deprive environmental bads of public acceptance, and if we can create a public insistence for ambitious, rapid environmental and economic reforms.

If someone’s approach to sustainability is just ‘hope’ and leaving it to others, then that someone is accepting (perhaps unknowingly) that there just isn’t enough of us to create the necessary momentum for reform.

If, on the other hand, you’re prepared to act, if you are part of inverting the social licence ratio and helping build massive public pressure for reform, then there is hope that things will be less bad. But you have to decide to take action, at home, at work, and in your community. And it has to be one of, if not the highest priority with your local member(s) of parliament, and when you’re in the ballot box, since it’s the politicians who create the laws that make the future or not.

Climate change is a direct threat to security, not simply a “threat multiplier”

Posted on 12/07/2017 by nathanjonross

The Leaders of the Pacific Small Island Developing States (PSIDS) have issued a statement calling for the UN to take action on climate change as a security matter.

Following a recent Climate Action Partnership event in Suva, Fiji, the PSIDS Leaders have asked UN Secretary-General António Guterres to appoint a Special Representative on Climate Change and Security.

The PSIDS Leaders also called for the UN Security Council to have climate change and security as a permanent agenda item.

Why does this matter?

Marshall Islands resident is surrounded by a high tide energised by a storm surge that damaged a number of homes across Majuro, the capital city, on 3 March 2015. [Source: Al Jazeera]

Rather than simply describing the security implications as a “threat”, climate change is generally referred to as a “threat multiplier“.[1]

Although the UN and the Security Council can look at “any questions relating to…security”, the dampening effect of the qualifying term, multiplier, could be problematic.

The rationale is that “the risk emanates not from climate change per se, but from how climate change interacts with other environmental, economic, social and political factors”.[2]

It has already been shown that climate change has exacerbated pre-existing problems in certain conflict situations.[3] For such reasons, the Security Council President has said that the “possible adverse effects of climate change may, in the long run, aggravate certain existing threats to international peace and security”.[4]

There are two problems with this assessment.

First, risks to human security do not arise solely from conflict, but also from other dangers, including pandemics and environmental degradation. We need to hold on to this wider understanding of “security”.

Secondly, the Security Council President is wrong in their use of qualifiers – “possible”, “may”, and “in the long run” – in the general sense in which they are stated. There are and will be adverse effects, now and in the short- and long-term, and they will aggravate many existing threats to human security, and will create new threats.

Where there are no security risks arising from political, economic or other factors, then the impacts of climate change are a threat to human security per se.

Where there are suboptimal conditions that would be stable or improving except for climate change, then climate change is again a threat to human security per se.

The low-lying States are the paradigmatic exemplar of climate change as a direct threat to security, not merely a threat multiplier.

Although the low-lying States are all developing States with other domestic challenges, those challenges are not existential threats, unlike the physical, environmental changes being wrought by climate change. It is too simplistic to suggest that climate change only exacerbates existing issues when the unprecedented phenomenon creates unprecedented threats to humans and human systems, and to essential natural systems.

Thus, for low-lying States and their nations, climate change is a direct threat to human security per se; not merely a threat multiplier. Their issues should not be clouded by looking at climate change as a generalised phenomenon, or by limiting the issue to conflict-related security situations.

[1] Climate change and its possible security implications; Report of the Secretary-General A/74/350 (2009); Michael B Gerrard The Role of Climate Change as a Threat Multiplier for Global Security (Security Council Open Arria Formula Meeting, 30 June 2015); and Briefing Book for a New Administration: Recommended Policies and Practices for Addressing the Security Risks of a Changing Climate (The Climate and Security Advisory Group, Washington DC, 14 September 2016).

[2] Caitlin E Werrell and Francesco Femia Climate Change as Threat Multiplier: Understanding the Broader Nature of the Risk (The Center for Climate & Security, Briefer no. 25, 12 February 2015) at 2.

[3] Carl-Friedrich Schleussner and others “Armed-conflict risks enhanced by climate-related disasters in ethnically fractionalized countries” (2016) 113(33) PNAS 9216; and Peter H Gleick “Water, Drought, Climate Change, and Conflict in Syria” (2014) 6 Weather, Climate and Security 331.

[4] Statement by the President of the Security Council S/PRST/2011/15* (2011).

On Environmental Guilt

Posted on 01/01/2017 by nathanjonross

Christmas carols are loathed by many, but I love them. It’s got nothing to do with any musical or religious values. Instead, like the smell of sunscreen, these songs signal the end of the year’s labours: functional, intellectual, social and emotional. No matter how good or awful, Bing Crosby, Band Aid, Michael Bublé and Wham all bring a sense of delightful nothingness; sincere relaxation.

(Reading by Henri Roger Viollet)

Stress-free time with family and friends deepens this feeling, as do new books and CDs, board games, old episodes of QI, the long summer days, and briefly ignoring my paunch.

In spite of what critics say—including my inner, righteous voice (the only part of me that can still appear youthful)—Christmas sales shopping is fun, too.

Those of us who understand environmental non-sustainability are often prohibited from such simple pleasures by our own knowledge and principles. But I’m far less imprisoned by these things nowadays.

Logic and ethics are clearly against gratuitous consumerism, but there’s no escaping the fact that it feels nice to buy books and CDs, and to have new clothes and household items, even when we have ample selections already.

How do we reconcile these pleasures against our desire to act in accordance with nature?

Individual Action

There’s a lot going on when we’re implored to make environmentally-conscious spending decisions. We know it’s right and hence we feel empowered when we act consistently with ecological facts. We control certain environmental outcomes, and this satisfies our desires to be persons of ethical integrity and to show our peers that we’re intelligent and principled.

We should remind ourselves of these positive feelings so we can decide in a rigorous way whether or not to mine non-essential goods from the open-cast shops.

Unfortunately for nature and those who are most affected by non-sustainability, those positive feelings of integrity may not be as strong as the pleasures we derive from buying stuff like The Beatles’ back catalogue, as I did on Boxing Day.

Collective Action

However, feeling guilty when we make ecologically impure decisions is counter-productive.

When we claim ownership of environmental problems as individuals, we are at the same time removing responsibility from those who have the greatest powers for minimising the impacts of human beings’ naturally-inclined behaviours: governments and industry.

The decline of all environmental indicators over the 50+ years since Silent Spring* proves that our decisions are doing very little to solve the biodiversity, water and climate crises. They are assisted, slowed down and delayed, but clearly not stopped or reversed.

The potential benefits of centralised decision-making eclipses that of individuals’ collective actions.

Take transport, for example. At a recent meeting of a climate change-focused NGO, a participant suggested that the organisation should look at making everyone use bicycles. I asked, “And how will I get my daughter’s rowing team to regattas?” and the well-meaning young chap slumped back into his chair and said, “I guess I didn’t think of that.”

Whilst walking, cycling and public transport are critical parts of the overall puzzle of sustainable transport, the problems are systemic, not individual. An ethical government could quite easily implement a suite of policies aimed at making our cars—technologies that are absolutely essential for 21st Century urban life—run on sustainable energy, whether renewable electricity (electric cars), renewable liquid fuels (biofuels), or both.

Take electricity as a second example. I’ve written previously on how solar energy does nothing in New Zealand to reduce a home-owner’s carbon footprint and might, in fact, increase the global carbon footprint. The idea of generating your own renewable electricity sounds powerful, but you’re only avoiding the use of centralised renewables—hydro, wind and geothermal—and therefore saving no greenhouse gas emissions. If New Zealand decides to progress from its current 80 percent renewable electricity to 90 or 100 percent then, again, an ethical government could quite easily implement a suite of policies that make that happen.

In these examples of sustainable transport and electricity, the benefits of individuals’ actions are negligible, at best, and pale in comparison to the potential of government intervention.

That’s not to say that our individual decisions don’t matter. They absolutely do. As much as I enjoy V8 cars, I would never buy one because they are plainly unethical. As much as I enjoy hamburgers, eating beef is plainly unethical. Our individual decisions have some effect on the demand for non-sustainable goods; they satisfy our sense of self; and they help educate the people around us. We should continue to make ethical individual decisions.

At the same time, however, we should be alert to the fact that most causes of our non-sustainability are systemic and, critically, could be solved by the ordinary machinery of government policy-making. Quite easily, in many instances.

For example, the decision to subsidise insulation has led to, in just 7 years, nearly 300,000 homes (about 20 percent of all New Zealand households) being warmer and healthier, and demanding less electricity. The impact of this large-scale programme has included reducing New Zealand’s demand for electrcity at peak times (morning and evening), thereby removing any need for new large-scale generation. Without that government intervention, perhaps a few thousand households would have done this on their own accord. Instead, the centralised policy decision created these enormous private and public benefits.

Collective Responsibility, Not Individual Guilt

Instead of feeling guilty about hopping into your car and zipping into town to replace the coffee table you’ve had since you were a student, remember that the question of ecological integrity rests with government and industry far more than it rests with us because of the simple matter of their powers compared to ours.

Balancing our needs for global responsibility and personal pleasure in an informed and ethical way helps us live with integrity, but more happily. And it reminds us that, ultimately, we need to put the onus on governments to intervene scientifically in environmental stewardship.

Dreaming or October by Maxfield Parrish 1928.jpg

Living in harmony with nature is fulfilling as an individual, but essential for the collective powers of governments and industry. (Dreaming of October by Maxfield Parish, 1928)

Migration = Assimilation

Posted on 08/11/2016 by nathanjonross

A great deal of the discussion about relocating people from low-lying atoll countries focuses on migration; a flexible but particular legal mechanism for managing the movement of individuals between countries.

But migration does not need to be the only way of moving from one territory to another. New ways are entirely possible. Ways that keep communities functioning together.

Migration as Assimilation and Colonisation

But the migration paradigm is deeply set. A new report, Tuvalu: Climate Change and Migration, is the latest example. It directly acknowledges the risks posed by migration, saying that:

“A previous study found that many Tuvaluans will not consider migration … as it will lead to a loss of sovereignty and cultural identity.” [p 64]

In spite of these concerns, the authors specifically recommend that:

“migration … should be promoted” [p 64]

The authors attempt to appease the Tuvaluans’ concerns, saying that their “perspectives need to be acknowledged in order to facilitate dignified migration”. [p 64]

First of all, it’s not a mere “perspective”. It is culture, and culture is life.

As the President of the Marshall Islands, Hilde Heine, recently said:

“Marshallese people, culture and land have a symbiotic relationship – one that can’t exist without the other. That’s why moving is not a viable option. As a nation facing cultural extinction due to climate change, we plead to stronger and major polluting countries to spare us the eminent fate of being climate refugees.”

Similarly, in an outstanding case study of the Carteret Islanders’ relocation, Sophie Pascoe found that:

“Leaving the islands is very traumatic for the Carteret Islanders because it means leaving their livelihoods, values, culture and ancestors behind.”

Migration with dignity is a noble idea. But given the scale of loss facing low-lying islanders, the forced relocation of peoples with deep cultural, spiritual and ancestral ties to land and sea is a catastrophic result of carbon pollution, no matter how well their movement is planned and managed.

Forced migration is nothing like lifestyle migration, and it should not be equated with it or confused with it.

Think of it as a kind of inverse colonisation. Instead of the coloniser coming to a peoples and forcing them to assimilate into the coloniser’s culture, they’re now forcing the peoples to come to them and integrate into wider society.

Culture is not a static phenomenon, so cultures change. Also, the people will enjoy a nominal measure of protection in their new country. (For example, in the New Zealand Bill of Rights, minorities have a right to enjoy their culture.) However, within just a couple of generations, the changes for migrant people and families in a new, dominant culture will be massive and inevitable. This is the risk that President Heine is referring to in her comments above.

Relocation: A Long-Term Enterprise with Self-Determination at its Very Core

Woman on Funafuti, 1900 (source: Wikipedia)

Discussion on migration – despite its good intentions – almost never addresses the fact that Tuvaluans, as a peoples, have a collective right of self-determination in international law. In the new report about Tuvalu and migration, the term “self-determination” does not even appear.

Self-determination is far more than mere dignity, or simply the acknowledgement of a perspective. It is a right to autonomy, governance, and – indeed – continuity of statehood.

The collective right of self-determination is international law of jus cogens* and erga omnes* character and status. It is one of the most fundamental aspects of international law, critical to achieving all other human rights, and a basis for international peace and security.

But relocation discourse rarely entertains the concept and this must change. Focusing on migration is a massive breach of the right of self-determination, and the concomitant right for these sovereign States to continue, and to continue to give effect to the values, cultures and aspirations of their peoples.

Ensuring continued enjoyment of self-determination in the territory of another State is a challenge. But it just requires some innovating thinking.

At the most basic level, the lexicon must change from “migration”, “displaced persons” and “refugee”, to “relocation” or “human mobility”: words and phrases which don’t have particular legal meanings or any existing political baggage, to ensure our minds are open to a more creative range of solutions.

For the nations, cultures, languages, traditions, customs and – therefore – the peoples of low-lying States, relocation must then be considered as an extremely long-term enterprise, that has their collective right of self-determination at its core, along with all the substantive and procedural rights that follow.

Given that low-lying islanders bear absolutely no responsibility for climate change, this is the least we can do. If not, then we’re hitting them twice: once in the territory; once in the nation.