Wanted: A government that cares about the wellbeing of the planet and future generations

Posted on by Dr. Trevor Hancock

(Published as  “We need a government that cares about the well-being of the planet”)

Somehow we have to get the next provincial government to take a long-term and less-partisan view, for the good of the whole province and for future generations.

Dr. Trevor Hancock

7 October 2024

702 words

Last month Planetary Boundaries Science, an international partnership of Earth scientists based out of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, published the first of what will be an annual Planetary Health Check. It makes for grim, if unsurprising, reading.

The Planetary Boundaries framework used in the report “identifies the nine Earth system processes essential for maintaining global stability, resilience and life-support functions.” Unfortunately, while “staying within these boundaries helps ensure that the Earth system remains stable and capable of supporting life and human development”, we are failing to do so; planetary health is declining.

In fact, the report notes, we have crossed six of the nine boundaries and are on the verge of crossing a seventh – ocean acidification. Even more concerning, all seven systems are trending in the wrong direction, “suggesting further transgression in the near future.”

Which is why I have been discussing with some of my colleagues ways in which we can ensure our political leaders pay much more attention to this critical issue.

One approach we are exploring is to persuade the Senate of Canada to take up the issue of declining planetary health and the need for Canada to become a wellbeing society, which must be the societal response to this and other profound challenges, such as growing inequality. 

The Senate could and should have an important role over and above its role as a place of ‘sober second thought’. It seems to me the Senate has two distinct advantages over the House of Commons. First, under the new system put in place by Justin Trudeau it is largely non-partisan, so much less driven by narrow party-political interests. Second, it does not face an election every 4 – 5 years, enabling it to take a long-term view.

So I would be happy to see the Senate become a sort of futures think tank, focused on the long-range needs of Canada as a whole. Two tasks in particular come to mind: First, an enquiry into the long-term implications for Canada (and for the rest of the world) of declining planetary health; second an investigation into the implications of a wellbeing society for Canada, with a particular view to the wellbeing of future generations.

But useful though that would be, it is not enough; ultimately, this needs to be the role of the elected government, even though the government is disadvantaged by its short term and narrow partisan perspective, which makes it difficult to develop holistic long-term policies and programs.

Which brings me to the upcoming B.C. election. Somehow we have to get the next provincial government – which does not have the equivalent of a Senate – to take a long-term and less partisan view, for the good of the whole province and for future generations.

A friend at the Victoria Secular Humanist Association sent me their list of questions to candidates, which do a good job of focusing on the necessary provincial response to declining planetary health. They include asking the parties to:

  • Commit to B.C. citizens that they will combat climate change by maintaining the ‘carbon tax’;
  • Bring an end to all clearcut and old growth logging in B.C. within 60 days of taking office;
  • Significantly expand provincial Ecological Reserves, with migratory corridors for wildlife, to secure their continued survival;
  • Enact a B.C. Endangered Species Act for terrestrial and marine life by the end of 2025; and
  • Honour the Tripartite Agreement between Canada, British Columbia and the First Nations Leadership Council to protect and conserve 30% of British Columbia’s natural ecosystems by year 2030.

As a way of ensuring that action is actually taken, for each of these questions they ask the parties to describe which measurable goals and timelines will be used to achieve successful outcomes. To this I would add a demand that they commit to enacting a Wellbeing of Future Generations Act and creating the position of a Future Generations Commissioner, as the Welsh National Assembly has done.

Any party that does not take seriously declining planetary health and the need for a wellbeing society, and does not answer in the affirmative to all these questions, clearly does not have at heart the long-term interests of current and future generations and does not deserve your vote.

© Trevor Hancock, 2024

thancock@uvic.ca

Dr. Trevor Hancock is a retired professor and senior scholar at the

University of Victoria’s School of Public Health and Social Policy

Our ‘ignore-ant’ elites blindly adhere to ‘business as usual’

Posted on by Dr. Trevor Hancock

Many of our so-called leaders don’t want to change because they get so much benefit — wealth, power, status — from the way things are

Dr. Trevor Hancock

21 May 2024

700 words

My colleague Paul Kershaw is a Professor of Public Health at UBC and founder of Generation Squeeze, a “Think and Change Tank” that promotes wellbeing for all generations. It does so “by turning evidence into action and rejuvenating democracy to protect what is sacred for younger and future generations: a healthy childhood, home and planet.” He has been very effective in raising issues of concern and getting public policy changed.

Recently we have been discussing the content of a session we are planning on planetary health and a wellbeing society at the Victoria Forum this August. In the process of that discussion, Paul wrote:

“I doubt we need a session that makes the case we have crossed planetary boundaries, or that wellbeing frameworks matter, or that Indigenous knowledge is critical to thinking sustainably over generations.” 

A reasonable point; one would like to think these issues are already well understood, at least in principle. But he then made the case that – sadly – we do indeed need such a session, by adding: “Except that the governments and corporations that drive our economies and societies are not behaving as if they have heard or understand this.”

Now this is from someone who is well steeped in public policy and well connected to the policy-making process and to policy-makers. So when he says that our government and corporate leadership is not paying attention to these important issues, it worries me.

What they are not hearing or understanding is really very simple: We only have one planet, and its natural ecosystems are the source of all life – not just humanity but every single living thing. And yet our demands considerably exceed the biocapacity and resources of the Earth.

We behave as if we have and can use the resources of several planets. Indeed, the more bizarrely delusional of us actually seem to believe we can and should move to another planet – presumably so we can repeat the process there!

But back here on Earth, where we actually live, we have crossed six of nine suggested planetary boundaries and are approaching two others, one of which is climate change.

Now it’s hard to believe that governments and corporations are not hearing or understanding this; indeed, I am sure they are. But what Paul is saying is that they are not behaving as if they have heard or understood what is going on. They are practising what Elizabeth Ellsworth, in a 1997 book, called ‘ignore-ance’ – “an active dynamic of negation, an active refusal of information”.

I can imagine several reasons that lead to this inability to face reality and act accordingly. In responding to Paul I suggested possible reasons for this ignore-ance: It may be that many of our leaders – and indeed many people in general – don’t believe it is really that bad, or can’t easily face the implications. Or perhaps people believe that somehow someone, somewhere, will come up with a technological fix that will allow us to carry on much as we are.

But I suspect that for many of our so-called leaders, they don’t want to change because they get so much benefit – wealth, power, status – from the way things are. And therein lies the nub of our problem; self-interested blind adherence to ‘business as usual’, to an economic system and underlying core values that plainly work against our long-term interests.

The result is an inability or unwillingness to play a leadership role in the massive and rapid transformation needed to stave off ecological decline, even collapse. And when ecosystems decline or collapse, so too do the communities and societies embedded within them, and the economies they create.

As the old adage has it, if you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem. And since this government and corporate elite has shown itself unwilling to or incapable of addressing the problem, it clearly IS the problem.

But it is not just the behaviour of our elites, the problem is more profound than that. They are merely reflecting and acting upon a set of deep cultural values that are unfit for purpose in the 21st century, as I start to discuss next week.

© Trevor Hancock, 2024

thancock@uvic.ca

Dr. Trevor Hancock is a retired professor and senior scholar at the

University of Victoria’s School of Public Health and Social Policy