Hurricane Sandy: A Moment for Eco-Socialism

Hurricane Sandy: A Moment for Eco-Socialism

by Billy Wharton

During an unusual moment of clarity in an otherwise vanilla stint as the Governor of New York State, Andrew Cuomo spoke frankly about the longer term ramifications of Hurricane Sandy.  Instability in weather patterns will require serious changes in the ways that New York City’s infrastructure is situated and protected.  The weather field, in Cuomo’s mind, is suddenly wide open, “there is no weather pattern that can shock me.”  The Governor’s moment of clarity is likely to fade, but the problems Sandy exposed will not go away.  They require a serious and rapid response that requires a shift from the ideas offered by mainstream politics.
The key here is to recognize the source of the instabilities in the weather patterns.  Hurricane Sandy was not a fluke event, a “once in a century” storm or a manifestation of God’s anger at humanity.  Sandy is the new normal that has been brought on by climate change.  It was appropriately described as a “Frankenstorm” in that climate instability allowed several different storm elements to coalesce together.  Sandy brought hurricane winds to New York City and snowfall to West Virginia.  Such combinations are likely continue into the future and bring with them the threat of crippling urban life on each Coast of the country.
The critical first step in dealing with this meteorological instability is to aggressively address climate change itself.  This will require re-establishing equilibrium between humanity and the natural world.  If the Presidential campaign is any indication, we are far away from such a goal.  Both Obama and Romney have sidestepped questions about Climate Change and their platforms offer little in the way of serious change. Only an eco-socialist perspective that seeks to combine ecology’s concern with balance in the natural world with socialism’s understanding of how economic power shapes social decisions will be able to ensure both safety in the present and ecological transformation in the future.
Here are a few of the areas where eco-socialism might work :http://dissidentvoice.org/2012/10/hurricane-sandy-a-moment-for-eco-socialism/