his book Fool’s rules suggest that the
predominant attitude towards climate
change action is what’s in it for me hi
I’m Rebecca Braden and welcome to
watchmojo.com and today we’re speaking
with investigative journalist and author
william marsden about the politics of
climate change tell us about fools rule
inside the failed politics of climate
change well fools real concentrates
mostly on the politics that has been
going on an international level around
the world I travel to all of their
meetings over the last three years and
what it tries to show is basically why
it’s been such a failure what what is
actually happening in these meetings you
get 192 countries all of which are
bringing their own vested interest to
the table they’re not really negotiating
climate change negotiating a trade
agreement so Canada for instance doesn’t
want to harm its its oil sands China
wants to keep its growth that the
highest level of can India also did oh
all the emerging countries such as
Brazil South Africa etc the United
States wants deep its superpower status
they want to make sure that its economy
continues to grow also dinner Europe all
of these things are brought to the table
of a climate change agreement but the
trouble is that climate change doesn’t
care about your oil sands it doesn’t
care about your need for jobs it doesn’t
care whether the oil sands are ethical
or not and it doesn’t care about you
know Australia’s need to sell coal all
it cares about is how many co 2 s and
other greenhouse gases are you putting
up into the atmosphere and when you put
up so much the two mods or a certain
level of it then it dictates to you how
much you have to decrease in order to
basically save your species it demands a
complete revolution a social revolution
political revolution how we do politics
how we do geopolitics our international
politics putting our our personal
interests aside as human beings and as
nations etc to tackle this really vital
problem we’re not doing any of that we
just want to continue with business as
usual just like as individuals
we want to continue with our normal
lives nobody wants to sacrifice anything
are you suggesting that the government’s
are corrupted and if so why what in
parallel to the rise of concern over
climate change there has been and almost
takeover of our democracy by the
corporate world which is desperate to
protect its interests I’m talking about
big oil and gas pipeline companies
refinery companies the utility companies
all of which are the engines of our
industry and have been the engines of
industry for the last 200 years these
companies have succeeded particularly in
the United States but very much in
Canada also in getting their man into
office and getting their views across
climate change undeniably challenges the
view the world view of the right wing
that everybody is an individual and and
should make his own life it should have
the freedom to do just that it
challenges that it says you can’t do
that anymore so you have a very powerful
reaction from the right wing in against
any action to curb emissions or any
action to even recognize that climate
change man-made climate change exists so
that is it is a huge hurdle so you’ve
mentioned a lot of countries that are
doing very little but what countries are
doing the most towards climate change
well i would say that Europe seems to be
doing the most but you can’t take Europe
as a block there’s particular countries
in Europe that have been very
intelligent about this Germany is one of
them Germany has created a very exciting
clean energy industry which is now a
billion-dollar industry and employs tens
of thousands of people in Germany
Denmark is the same at the same time the
growing our economy so they have proved
that you can you can actually expand
your economy through clean energy do you
think we will make the necessary changes
before it’s too late well some people
think it is already too late but we have
to ignore that we have to think in
future generations if you took all the
cars off the road
today you’re not going to change
anything and your turn you will change a
great deal in the long term the key
thing here is instead of to argue about
our different interests in the world etc
is to every country has to sit down and
chart out a path for itself in every
industrial sector every city re social
sector etc to to bring in all the
experts of these fields just like they
do you know before the Second World War
during the Second World War use all of
that talent to try and chart and plan a
clean energy future that’s where the
energy has to be and we’re not doing
that thank you very much you’re welcome
thank you for inviting me
predominant attitude towards climate
change action is what’s in it for me hi
I’m Rebecca Braden and welcome to
watchmojo.com and today we’re speaking
with investigative journalist and author
william marsden about the politics of
climate change tell us about fools rule
inside the failed politics of climate
change well fools real concentrates
mostly on the politics that has been
going on an international level around
the world I travel to all of their
meetings over the last three years and
what it tries to show is basically why
it’s been such a failure what what is
actually happening in these meetings you
get 192 countries all of which are
bringing their own vested interest to
the table they’re not really negotiating
climate change negotiating a trade
agreement so Canada for instance doesn’t
want to harm its its oil sands China
wants to keep its growth that the
highest level of can India also did oh
all the emerging countries such as
Brazil South Africa etc the United
States wants deep its superpower status
they want to make sure that its economy
continues to grow also dinner Europe all
of these things are brought to the table
of a climate change agreement but the
trouble is that climate change doesn’t
care about your oil sands it doesn’t
care about your need for jobs it doesn’t
care whether the oil sands are ethical
or not and it doesn’t care about you
know Australia’s need to sell coal all
it cares about is how many co 2 s and
other greenhouse gases are you putting
up into the atmosphere and when you put
up so much the two mods or a certain
level of it then it dictates to you how
much you have to decrease in order to
basically save your species it demands a
complete revolution a social revolution
political revolution how we do politics
how we do geopolitics our international
politics putting our our personal
interests aside as human beings and as
nations etc to tackle this really vital
problem we’re not doing any of that we
just want to continue with business as
usual just like as individuals
we want to continue with our normal
lives nobody wants to sacrifice anything
are you suggesting that the government’s
are corrupted and if so why what in
parallel to the rise of concern over
climate change there has been and almost
takeover of our democracy by the
corporate world which is desperate to
protect its interests I’m talking about
big oil and gas pipeline companies
refinery companies the utility companies
all of which are the engines of our
industry and have been the engines of
industry for the last 200 years these
companies have succeeded particularly in
the United States but very much in
Canada also in getting their man into
office and getting their views across
climate change undeniably challenges the
view the world view of the right wing
that everybody is an individual and and
should make his own life it should have
the freedom to do just that it
challenges that it says you can’t do
that anymore so you have a very powerful
reaction from the right wing in against
any action to curb emissions or any
action to even recognize that climate
change man-made climate change exists so
that is it is a huge hurdle so you’ve
mentioned a lot of countries that are
doing very little but what countries are
doing the most towards climate change
well i would say that Europe seems to be
doing the most but you can’t take Europe
as a block there’s particular countries
in Europe that have been very
intelligent about this Germany is one of
them Germany has created a very exciting
clean energy industry which is now a
billion-dollar industry and employs tens
of thousands of people in Germany
Denmark is the same at the same time the
growing our economy so they have proved
that you can you can actually expand
your economy through clean energy do you
think we will make the necessary changes
before it’s too late well some people
think it is already too late but we have
to ignore that we have to think in
future generations if you took all the
cars off the road
today you’re not going to change
anything and your turn you will change a
great deal in the long term the key
thing here is instead of to argue about
our different interests in the world etc
is to every country has to sit down and
chart out a path for itself in every
industrial sector every city re social
sector etc to to bring in all the
experts of these fields just like they
do you know before the Second World War
during the Second World War use all of
that talent to try and chart and plan a
clean energy future that’s where the
energy has to be and we’re not doing
that thank you very much you’re welcome
thank you for inviting me
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