A New World Architecture

Global Warming Politics 

In essence, what we may call the Pacific-South American Political Plate has become a powerful tectonic force in its own right, and there is no way that this expanding Plate will, in the future, sub-duct meekly beneath the European and North American Political Plates. From sovereign funds to world production, the countries involved are beginning to gain an upper hand, and they will play that hand according to their own concerns, not according to those of Europe and America.

Above all, these states will agree to nothing that halts their growth to prosperity. The very idea that they will follow Europe on climate change is risible. Indeed, I find it increasingly embarrassing, for example, when naive folk in the UK oppose a new coal-fired plant at Kingsnorth in Kent [see: ‘Coal Surfaces Again In The UK’, January 3] on the grounds that “it will be setting a bad example to China and India.” The patronising attitude behind such sentiments is shaming. China, India, Indonesia, Brazil, Argentina, and the rest won’t even notice what we do in Kent. They couldn’t care less! We are no longer so important. Our days of neo-colonial posturing are long gone, and we had better pay heed to our own prosperity before we are swept aside on a tide of ineptitude, post-industrial lassitude, and innate arrogance.