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?”

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**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.

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)