Climate change

Abstract

When we think of the issues surrounding climate change, its association with social inequality is not immediately clear. Climate change is a worldwide problem – the world is warming up, the world’s glaciers are melting – and this is something we need to solve in a practical way. But what does this have to do with social inequality? In this chapter, we will show that social inequality is closely intertwined with climate change. We live in a world full of differences, including when it comes to climate change: there is disparity in who will experience the most negative consequences of climate change (the poor countries and future generations), but also in who emits the most CO2 (see Figure 8), who has the most options when it comes to doing something about climate change, and who can most easily dodge their responsibilities (the richer countries; see Box 5.1). These different forms of social inequality imply that there is a moral dimension to the climate debate. As in the previous chapters, we will argue that this moral dimension is often sidestepped in favour of a more economic and instrumental approach to environmental issues. This is unfortunate, because it is precisely the moral approach to climate change that provides promising opportunities for tackling this issue together.