Allow me to tell you a small story that I hope you can relate to the main topic. This is the story of young María, an 18-year-old girl from a small country ready to start her studies on environmental policies in a prestigious university, or so is what her father (a recognized ambassador who was involved in many important decisions) wants for María. She also has two older brothers, a famous congressman with behavior issues and a successful businessman with a not-so-green-friendly company, both tarnished the name of the family because of their decisions. Knowing this and considering the father’s experience, he chose the path of María, one that will clean the image created by her brothers and will bring enough income to have a decent life. Sounds like a good plan. But, what does María think about the situation? She respect and trust her father, and care about the family image, but the natural doubts about a life-changing decision are there in her mind. Will she follow what her father says and continue with a career that may not clean the image of the family or bring her the future she expects? Or can she choose another path, more close to her desires, and lose focus of her family situation? There is even the question if she can help with the family issue. So, how can a young girl decide with such uncertainty ahead of her?
Now, if we change María to a developing country and consider the family situation as the climate change problem we will find the following situation: should the developing country listen to what other countries claim about climate change and follow their suggestions? Or is it better for the country to focus on its development to ensure a viable future? Here the situation is more complex compared to María’s case, the decision is not so easy to take because of three reasons. 1) The decisions at the country level are more delicate since you are dealing with the life of thousands or millions of people. Climate change is a problem for sure, but so is poverty, lack of jobs, infrastructure, or even political instability, just to mention some of them. Is it good to put resources in a global problem, or is it better to solve your problems first? 2) We all have some responsibility towards our current situation with the climate, but it is also true that some countries are the main thread for the climate. Then, how much help can provide a country which barely figures in the charts of emissions gases against climate change issue whereas other countries should do more? 3) Lastly, the future is not settled, we can keep improving technologies and putting more effort to find ways to understand better what will happen, but the future is still uncertain, we do not even know if we will be able to solve the climate change problem. So why should a small country invest (or gamble) in something that is not sure that will happen, or invest in something that may not be solved?
It would be very pretentious for us to talk about the first two issues, but we can help with the last one as scientists or communicators. We must convince politicians from developing countries that, despite the unknown, we are walking on a very dangerous path. By being humble and acknowledging our lack of understanding of climate, we can gain the trust of decision-makers. Once trust is built, we need to reinforce the hard future we are sure is going to happen and offer a set of options for these developing countries to fight against it without compromising their development. Imposing our ideal solution will only show how little we cared about the situation of someone without much resources.
Going back to María’s case, instead of just forcing her to choose what her father thinks is a better future, it will be more useful to give her a set of possibilities, each one with its benefits, risks, and unknowns. María is too young to know what is the best, and for sure she will make mistakes on the way. But as long as she is aware of what the situation is, what are the compromises and that someone is guiding her, she will find a future for herself and her family. Once she is older, we would not like to see her become like one of her brothers, right?
Very nice post, Dante! I enjoyed the analogy you made between María’s family and the countries of the world. It explains well why wealthier Western nations should avoid to impose their will on other nations when it comes to plans for economic development and do not automatically know everything better just because they already went through the process which is imminent for the developing countries. Thanks for this nice little story 🙂
interesting 😀
Thanks for the nice blog post, Dante. Just wanted to add to the discussion that there was an article published by The Economist that said how covid-19 pandemic has exacerbated the problems in the developing countries. The economies of Brazil, Russia, India and China were once expected to match the G6 by 2040 but the pandemic has stalled this progress. In times like this we need to remind the local and global leaders that despite the uncertainties we need climate action. More often so, it is the developing countries that are in dire need of help and support. The ecological breakdown has already started in many places. In this case, as you mentioned, we need to communicate all the knowledge we have in a humble manner.