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Books

The Ethics of the Climate Crisis by Robin Attfield

Lucy Weir thinks about climate ethics with Robin Attfield.

Robin Attfield, an Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at Cardiff University and a key figure in environmental ethics, begins The Ethics of the Climate Crisis (2024) by laying out in clear, quantitative detail why the climate, pollution, and biodiversity crises require our urgent attention. As he says, the IPCC has warned that we have only until 2025 – this year! – if we are to have a chance of keeping global temperatures to a 1.5°C rise. But the book’s central concern is how those responsible for the detrimental impacts of climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution can be held to account on the basis of an agreed set of ethical principles, for the benefit of present and future humans and other species.

Having laid the groundwork, we begin to see Attfield’s characteristically meticulous approach to detailed ethical questions swing into action. Reference to Kenneth Goodpaster’s classic essay, ‘On Being Morally Considerable’ is salutary. Relatedly, I was surprised Paul Taylor’s biocentric ethics in his book Respect for Nature (1981) did not merit a mention. But the only thing that really troubled me during the early chapters was the sometimes puzzlingly elementary language: do we really need to be told that the Earth is warmed by the Sun? In addition, separating greenhouse gases from pollution, and therefore pollution from either climate change or the biodiversity emergency is strained, given how closely the three are intertwined. I would also like to have seen more interconnections made at this stage between current attitudes in political and social systems and the escalating crises. Nevertheless, there is no doubt that Attfield brings together the central scientific arguments for a consensus that the climate and biodiversity crises are existential threats, and therefore require a global response, rooted in universally acceptable ethical principles.

One of the central topics of the book is how to weigh up the rights of future humans and other species in relation to the rights of those living now. This section is technical, detailed, and merits careful consideration. The recognition that future quality of life is affected by current decisions, whether at an individual level or a societal level, is at the hub of the argument. But while individual choices matter, decisions made on behalf of societies are the real game changers.

Attfield neatly punctures Bjorn Lomborg’s sceptical approach to expensive climate investment in the future, by pointing out that we are connected to the future through our (or other people’s) children and grandchildren, and that therefore focusing only on current crises, such as poverty, will not alleviate the longer-term looming crisis which threatens to undermine the wellbeing of all. (He also makes an interesting, if risky, reference to the benefits of colonialism – specifically in the shape of colonial era railways in India as benefitting both then and now.)

Abandoned bus in San Pedro de Atacama
Photo by Pablo Garcia Saldaña 2015 Public Domain

In discussing obligations to non-human species, Attfield does not concern himself with recent research into the increasingly blurred lines between individual organisms, species, and systems. Systems theory offers important contributions to the debate on the holistic nature of our interconnectedness, and therefore of our impacts, which we need to consider in relation to the climate crisis, and not to include that is a significant omission from the book. Having said that, the detailed discussion of needs versus preferences is a vitally important contribution to the debate.

The discussion on the Precautionary Principle – ‘If there is a significant risk, we need to take steps to mitigate it, even if the risk isn’t entirely proven or agreed upon’ – is treated with Attfield’s customary good sense. Application of this principle obviously requires some nuance, and that is left to the reader to consider; but raising the issue is worthwhile in the context of this discussion.

Although the focus is on current and future crises, given the book’s recognition that those most afflicted by the climate crisis are also those who have suffered the greatest wrongs of historical injustice, it is clear we’re also looking at a legacy crisis of social injustice. At least basic human rights are the grounds on which the ethics of the climate crisis need to be laid. Freedom from violence and torture, a means of subsistence, the right to life are mentioned as three of these rights (p.78). Inevitably, Israel, Gaza, Sudan, Syria, Ukraine, and Russia spring to mind. Attfield implies that the rights of other species are included for consideration on the basis of their sentience and being able to suffer. The lives of animals, domestic or wild, likewise have had little freedom from violence.

It may come as a surprise to you that, so far, ‘climate refugees’ is not a term legally recognised by the UN or any international body. Yet the International Organization for Migration estimates that there will be between 25 million and one billion people displaced by climate related disasters by 2050 (IOM Outlook on Migration, Environment and Climate Change, 2014). This ought to concentrate minds. Attfield suggests various mitigations of the harms that will be and are already being suffered by this huge cohort: refugee passports might be rolled out, allowing those who have been forced to flee their own countries an inalienable right to enter a safe country. There is also the possibility of redress, by for example offering alternative territory to those who have been displaced. Settling climate refugees in already overburdened states is unlikely to be popular, but points to the central issue of imposing any ethics: the solutions must be implementable. On a more hopeful note, Attfield mentions the recently adopted (at least on paper) Loss and Damage fund. He then considers an additional Climate Protection and Resettlement Fund, which would place further financial obligations on states. However, he also recognises that grassroots and community organisations, as well as innovative individuals, will be key to designing mitigation measures for groups that find themselves displaced, desperate, and in need of urgent solutions. It is to these groups that funding would most beneficially be directed.

A brief discussion of the shift from anthropocentrism to sentientism to biocentrism is given, although Paul Taylor, who is central to this discussion, is again omitted. Extending rights from humans to the more than human world, assumes humans are the standards by which the others are judged, which is like confusing the capacity to recognise something as beautiful with the claim of being beautiful oneself. An alternative way of thinking about cross-species ethics, is to consider the good of systems that are entirely enmeshed with one another. This is Tim Morton’s approach, and I would encourage any analytical climate philosophers reading this to explore his research.

Attfield allows that anthropocentric and non-anthropocentric stances can in the end generate the same policies, and with this I heartily agree. However, the claim that the very future of life on our planet is at stake as a result of the anthropogenic climate crisis has been debunked by the likes of Lynn Margulis, who so eloquently states that nature is a tough bitch.

Attfield references William MacAskill (What We Owe the Future, 2022) concluding that the lives of animals are barely worth living, given that they are significantly less insulated from potential harms than human lives, and therefore count for little in moral consideration. It would have been interesting to have seen some mention of the research into the intelligence of other species included in response to MacAskill’s stance here. Indeed, moral considerability is a necessary inclusion even in investigating the potential intelligence of plants.

Attfield also discusses what wealthy individuals and corporations might owe those people who require climate mitigation measures. This argument is well made. This is practical, pragmatic work which does Attfield (and the book) credit, and opens up options for further discussion along these lines. He also makes the excellent point that overseeing global justice would require a trustworthy international organisation, and that this simply does not exist.

In discussing ways to help the most vulnerable (the terminology slips between the ‘Global South’ and ‘developing countries’), Attfield does not mention China’s Belt and Road initiative, nor the problems of political and social interference caused by non-governmental actors – the Wagner Group, for instance. Nor does he deal with the geopolitical implications of intervention implying power exchanges; nor with the climate problems of corrupt governments. Still, the moves he suggests to deal with the realities of fallible humanity are useful. In their 2016 book Climate Justice, Roser and Seidel propose that if a country defaults on an agreement, the injured country should make up the shortfall. This seems at first like a get out of jail free card for the defaulter country, but in fact it reflects a nuanced understanding of game theory, which concludes that a good policy is that the first default in a reciprocal arrangement be absorbed as potential miscommunication (‘tit for tit for tat’).

Continuing with the non-idealistic theme, Attfield details some of the conniving that has gone into confusing attempts to address the climate crisis. He also looks at the practicalities of divesting from oil and gas, and at the possibilities for nuclear energy. He mentions the European Energy Charter set up in 1991, which allows companies to sue governments whose climate policies curtail profits. It is extraordinary that this charter still holds any water in 2024. Attfield does provide some hope for us, however, with the notion that some organisations, particularly NGOs like The Sierra Club, have unilaterally declared a Climate Peace Clause.

Moving on from social treaties, Attfield tackles technological proposals. Carbon Dioxide Reduction programmes that allow for the restoration of natural systems are certainly the most appealing: restoring peat bogs, seagrass planting, and reforestation are mentioned. As technical solutions move into civil engineering territory, though, they become progressively riskier. Attfield does not mention the law of unintended consequences, but he does give examples of how strong engineering could go badly wrong.

Undoubtedly, Attfield is right that we need laws that force us to pivot away from where we are presently heading. However, the considerations of international bodies have as yet had very little impact on the suffering of people on the ground in current conflicts, and greenwashing and eco-obfuscation continue apace. Attfield deals with the paralysing impacts of fear, among other emotions, as well as their motivating impetus. Characteristically, though, he leaves us with a note of hope. The Ethics of the Climate Crisis is itself a project to raise awareness, and to offer practical solutions that are grounded in firm philosophical foundations.

Lucy Weir received her PhD in Environmental Philosophy from University College Cork in 2014, and has published three books related to the ecological emergency.

• The Ethics of the Climate Crisis, by Robin Attfield, Polity Press, 2024, 176 pages, £14.99 pb