Geoengineering and the Politics of Climate Change

• In Event: 046 - Section on Environment and Technology Roundtable Session (one-hour).
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 02. Risk and Risk Perception

Abstract

Reducing carbon emissions in response to climate change has faced massive resistance from interests entrenched in the ‘treadmill of production’ (Gould, Pellow and Schnaiberg 2008). The prospect of geoengineering is emblematic of ‘the politics of unsustainability’ (Blühdorn 2007) in relation to climate change. Within civil society, the idea of a potential techno-fix to climate change helps to suppress ontological insecurity and related existential dilemmas that might be expected if people were to seriously confront the risks associated with the continued trajectory of anthropogenic climate change. It represents a retreat from reflexive modernization and serves to discourage 'life politics' (Giddens 1990; 1994) which could otherwise challenge dominant lifestyle assumptions and the unquestionable status of economic growth. Furthermore, within the sphere of political economy, the concept of geoengineering facilitates the continuance of the carbon-intensive energy economy and constitutes the creation of a new market for high tech, high cost technological research and development (Mirowski 2012). Increasing scientific attention to geoengineering reorients climate change debate and opens up new scientific and technical uncertainties which can be exploited by political interests hostile to emission reduction. The dynamic, iterative process increases the possibility that Plan B becomes Plan A. The implementation of geoengineering projects would bring about new risks and uncertainties inherent in the pursuit of real-world experiments (Beck 2009; Hamilton 2013; Huesemann and Huesemann 2011; Macnaghten and Szerszynski 2013). Geoengineering reorients climate politics, re-establishes the instrumental approach to nature previously challenged by environmentalism, and provides temporary means for sustaining the unsustainability of industrial capitalism.

Authors

• Brynna A. Jacobson, University of California-San Diego

• Charles R. Thorpe, University of California-San Diego