Andrea Ackerman GLOB1-GC.1030-002 Professor Zindar 27 September 2014 Karl Marx and Thorstein Veblen in the Age of Climate Change The global challenge of climate change may very well be considered the most serious political-economic issue the world is currently facing. The consequences of capitalism and industrialization of the Western world hold long lasting implications that require immediate tangible transnational solutions. Just this week, the United Nations hosted the Climate Summit 2014 in hopes of engaging the public and mobilizing world leaders to generate awareness and form agreements to combat climate change. In a vastly unequal world, it is no question that those bearing the harshest burden of climate change are the poorest. Karl …show more content…
The problems he described of economic instability and the concentration of wealth and power without a doubt attribute to global poverty, which is still very much in existence. Those very problems are key to the issue of climate change and whom it directly affects. For example, the Pacific atoll, the Marshall Islands, is one of many low-lying lands that are suffering the consequences of climate change right now. The Al Jazeera article written by Renee Lewis, Pacific Island Nations to UN: Climate Action Can’t Wait, describes the divide between those who feel the affects of climate change and those who have caused it by eloquently stating: “While climate change remains an abstract concept for many living in the world’s top emitters, the Marshalls are already seeing the effects of rising sea levels, declaring a drought disaster in the north earlier this year.” Marx might argue that capitalists in the industrialized world, who are not yet bearing the burden of climate change, do not seek to change the status quo because they wish to continue to produce in their given industry as cheaply as possible, regardless of who or what resources they are exploiting in the process. Marx claimed that capitalism was born in pillage and murder and that its foundation is built upon the backs of those who will never reap its benefits. The industrialized world has abused the environment in order to achieve vast amounts of wealth without truly grasping the negative consequences of their actions, while the poorest countries continue to suffer with no end in sight. Considering climate change is one of the most extreme negative externalities of capitalism, it is possible that Marx would have even called for a revolution of some sort to combat its disastrous effects. Karl Marx also could have argued that if state-ownership of major industries existed, environmental regulations would