How Neoliberalism Views Climate Change and Global Poverty

Neo-Liberalism

1. "Neo-liberalism is an ideology that serves the interests of the wealthy only, while sending the poor into even greater poverty. In fact, it could be argued that rather than representing an ideology, it is a euphemism for the sheer self- interest of the ultra-wealthy." Discuss in depth. Use objective indicators to evaluate the first sentence of the statement.

One the one hand, while it is true that the world’s richest people have gotten even richer in recent years (especially during and post-Covid 19 pandemic) and more than 700 million people still live on less than $2.00 per day (the UN’s international cutoff amount for extreme poverty), the fact remains that the vast majority of the nine billion humans alive today enjoy a quality of life that is far better than ever before in history (World poverty statistics, 2022).

This outcome means that while neo-liberalism is an ideology that serves the interests of the wealthy, it also serves the interests of much of the rest of the global population in lesser degrees along a continuum.

For instance, the most recent update from the World Bank (2022) indicates that the global poverty rate declined about 28 million people during the 2-year period from 2017 through 2018, and this decline has been sustained for multiple years. It should be noted, however, that the rate of decline in global poverty slowed somewhat during the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic and its corresponding negative effects on the global economy, but it continues to decline year-to-year (Aguilar et al., 2022). In addition, even impoverished people are living longer than ever before in history, albeit with significant differences between affluent and developing nations. For example, Roser et al. (2022) point out that, “Since 1900 the global average life expectancy has more than doubled and is now above 70 years. The inequality of life expectancy is still very large across and within countries. in 2019 the country with the lowest life expectancy is the Central African Republic with 53 years, in Japan life expectancy is 30 years longer” (para. 3).

On the other hand, though, neo-liberalism misses the mark by assigning the blame for those humans who remain impoverished today, suggesting that their expectations have been set too high in view of their circumstances. For instance, according to Dixon (2012), neo-liberalism “theorizes that poverty's causal explanation is grounded in the inappropriateness of the hopes, aspirations, and goals of those living in poverty” (p. 203). Likewise, neo-liberalism also holds that poor people either lack the work ethic and motivation that is required to succeed in the 21st century. In this regard, Dixon adds that neo-liberalism also “moralizes that the poor have a moral obligation to critically assess the consequences for themselves and others of their decisions not to work even when work is available, for which they should be held responsible” (p. 203).

The key to parsing these aspects of neo-liberalism is the term “even when work is available.” In many developing nations, there is either no meaningful work available or the work opportunity that are available are so hazardous that only the truly desperate pursue them. For example, according to LaDou et al. (2018), “Very few workers worldwide have access to occupational health services that provide for prevention of occupational risks, health surveillance, training in safe working methods, first aid, and consulting with employers on occupational health and safety” (p. 81). Moreover, it is an easy matter for privileged pundits comfortably ensconced in their ivory towers to tsk-tsk at the poor and blame them for their own dire predicament, but it is entirely another thing to apply this ideology to policies that are intended to help the poor. As Dixon (2012) concludes, “Neoliberalism is unable to speak with any certainty about the nature, causes, and consequences of poverty and its solution. The neoliberal poverty discourse is, essentially, a discourse on human nature [which] asserts that the poor can choose not to be poor” (p. 207).

Arguing that the poor can “choose not to be poor” is analogous to asserting that some short people choose to be short or that the tens of millions of unemployed during the Great Depression simply elected not to work because they were too lazy. This assertion also ignores the harsh reality that opportunities to improve people’s life condition are not distributed equally around the world and far too many people, especially in developing nations, remain on the social, political and economic fringes of their societies (Obeng-Odoom, 2012). In sum, neo-liberalism as an ideology maintains that a rising economic tide raises all boats, and this has been the case with the majority of the world’s population to date. The

3. "Globalization is a true disaster for the environment, with the political right oblivious to the damage created, while the political left is fully focused on issues of redistribution of wealth. As a result, the environment is utterly neglected across the board." Discuss critically and in depth, while providing a comprehensive examination of all the major facets defining the interaction between globalization and the environment.

Although it is completely accurate to claim that, “Globalization is a true disaster for the environment,” it is less accurate to assert that the political right is oblivious to the harm that is being done to the planet. To the contrary, the political right fully understands what is taking place but it simply does not care because there is money to be made and global warming threats serve as a useful tool to keep voters sufficiently anxious to reelect them. Likewise, the political left is also interested in wealth redistribution to be sure, but it is not “fully focused” on this goal. Indeed, it is reasonable to posit that any progress that has been made in mediating the adverse effects of climate change have been the result of the political left’s efforts despite the roadblocks set in their path by the political right.

This is not to say, of course, that all Republicans are anti-environment and that all Democrats are anti-business, but it is to say that firmly entrenched political ideologies and self-interests can prevent lawmakers from recognizing existential threats such as global warming even when they are imminent -- or at least pretend plausibly that they do not know. The grim predictions about global warming emanating from the scientific community notwithstanding, all humans – even politicians -- are less concerned about what happens in the future than they are about what will happen in their own lifetimes and it is little wonder that the best that politicians can do is wring their hands and lament the inevitability of the world’s end, as long as it occurs long after they are dead. This is not a new phenomenon and this reaction is simply part of the frail human condition which places a higher priority on satisfying self-interests to the exclusion of everything else.

In fact, the same forces that have driven globalization are largely responsible for this compartmentalization of responsibility for the global commons. If there were no national borders and everyone lived under a single world government (shudder), it would be a far easier matter to mobilize the political wherewithal that is needed to address the growing threats to the earth’s environment. Indeed, as former U.S. President Ronald Reagan once famously observed in a speech to the United Nations General Assembly in 1987, “Perhaps we need some outside universal threat to make us recognize this common bond. I occasionally think how quickly our differences worldwide would vanish if we were facing an alien threat from outside this world” (as cited in Koenig, 2018, para. 3).