The Influence of Neocolonialism on Climate Policy

• In Event: Toward a more equitable world: Solidarity, discourse and climate justice.

Proposal

As the number of natural disasters around the world grows—typhoons, hurricanes and tsunamis; forest fires out of control; severe water shortages; extreme temperatures; along with pollution, rising greenhouse gas emissions and the impact these catastrophic climactic events are taking on people around the globe, it is becoming increasingly difficult to deny the reality of climate change and time to accept that the damage to our planet is man-made and counteractions must be taken if our world is to survive. The Doomsday Clock is ticking and moving perilously close to midnight. The United Nations has brought together member nations on several occasions to try to address the issue through Conventions on Climate Change such as the Kyoto Protocol of 1997, the Paris Accord of 2015 and the recent Glasgow Climate Summit in 2021. The intentions were praiseworthy, but so far not nearly enough has been accomplished because the world’s greatest polluters have either failed to sign on to the accords, or have neglected to honour the stipulations to mitigate climate change.
The young environmental activist, Greta Thunberg although only 19 years of age, has long tried to shame the great powers into taking actions to save our planet. She reminds us that although we are all subject to the natural disasters brought on by climate change, it is people in the developing world who are suffering the most. On January 13, 2022 she proclaimed:
You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words. And yet I’m one of the lucky ones. People are suffering.
She is drawing our attention to the fact that because of industrial activity controlled by the Northern corporations in developing countries, the environment of those areas has been particularly affected. I see this as an example of neocolonialism at play. It may appear that colonialism is past but actually it lives on through the economic control large corporations exert over developing nations. As Kwame Nkrumah stated:
The neo-colonialism of today represents imperialism in its final and perhaps its most dangerous stage (Nkrumah, 1965).
Large corporations and governments from imperial powers have exploited the lands in the developing world, where they do not have to follow environmental rules exacted in their own developed countries with devastating results. They can force developing nations into accepting policies that are ultimately extremely harmful to the local environment. One has only to think of examples like Bhopal in India, the disastrous policies on water in Bolivia or the mining controlled by Canadian corporations taking place in Mexico and South America.
In this paper I review the current effects globally of neocolonialism and its economic ramifications. I connect this to the issues of climate change being experienced worldwide and to the role of international educators and researchers in addressing how justice might be served to people globally and the role in this of responsible environmental education.

Author

• Suzanne Majhanovich, University of Western Ontario