Bishop Hill That German report
Jun 3, 2011 Climate: Parliament 
H/T to Patagon for pointing us to an English translation of the WGBU report and for making these excerpts from it.
Sustainable strategies and concepts must be developed for this in order to embed sustainable global development in transnational democratic structures, to formulate answers to the 21st century questions regarding global equity and distribution of resources, and, not least, to be able to claim world-wide legitimacy.
This means concrete academic search processes, for example by global governance theoreticians, international law experts, cosmopolitans, transnationalists and philosophers of justice to formulate legitimate and realisable norms, rules and procedures which, all together, could form the basis of an ideal global social contract. This would be something of a quantum leap for civilisation, on par for example with the transition of the feudal systems to constitutional states and democracy.
The WBGU views this structural transition as the start of a ‘Great Transformation’ into a sustainable society, which must inevitably proceed within the planetary guard rails of sustainability.
One key element of such a social contract is the ‘proactive state’, a state that actively sets priorities for the transformation, at the same time increasing the number of ways in which its citizens can participate, and offering the economy choices when it comes to acting with sustainability in mind. The social contract also encompasses new forms of global political will formation and cooperation. The establishment of a ‘UN Council for Sustainable Development’, on par with the UN Security Council, and the forming of international alliances of climate pioneers between states, international organisations, cities, corporations, science and civic organisations, would be examples of this.
The WBGU has developed the concept of a new social contract for the transformation towards sustainability – not so much on paper, but rather in people‘s consciousness
[Patagon comments: reeducation comes to mind]
The WBGU’s Transformation Strategy
The great transformations the human race has so far experienced were, for the most part, the uncontrolled results of evolutionary change. The challenge, unique in history, with regard to the upcoming transformation into a climate-friendly society is advancing a compre-hensive change for reasons of understanding, prudence and providence. The transformation must be anticipated, based on scientific insights regarding the risks of continuing on high-carbon development paths, in order to avoid the ‘standard historic reaction’, a change of direction in response to crises and disastersFor another, the transformation needs a powerful state, counterbalanced by extended participation on the part of its citizens.
must address four major challenges:
...
Traditional contract philosophy presupposed the fictitious belief that all members of a society are equal. Considering the disproportionate distribution of resources and capabilities in today‘s international community, we must have effective, fair global compensation mechanisms in place.The contract has to bring two important new protagonists into the equation: the self-organised civil society and the community of scientific experts.
The new social contract is an agreement to change: the global citizenship consents to expecting innovations that have a normative link to the sustainability postulate, and, in exchange, agrees to surrender the instinct to hang on to the established The guarantor in this virtual contract is a proactive state that involves its citizens in future decisions requisite to the agreement of sustainability targets.
It is by no means the case that the contract calls for a merely superficial or even resigned acceptance on the part of civil society: rather, the civil society is acknowledged as an active partner with shared responsibility for the success of the transformation process, and mobilised, thereby legitimising the process. The concept of a proactive state is therefore indelibly intertwined with the acknowledgment of civil society, and the innovative forces in the economy, in science and in administration.
A central element in a social contract for transformation is the proactive state with extended participation in a multilevel system of global cooperation. It entails two aspects, frequently thought of as separate or contradicting: on the one hand empowering the state, which actively determines priorities and underlines them with clear signals (for example with bonus/malus solutions), and on the other hand, giving citizens more extensive opportunities to have a voice, to get involved in decision-making and to take a more active role in politics. A powerful (eco-)state is often thought of as restricting the autonomy of the ‘man in the street’, whilst at the same time, any meddling on the part of the citizen is viewed with misgivings as a disturbance factor to political-administrative rationality and routines. A precondition for a successful transformation policy, though, is the simultaneous empowerment of state and citizens with regard to the common goal of sustainable policy objectives.
Reader Comments (66)
Mr. BBD
You will fit right in.
As others have noted, this is very much in the modern authoritarian / totalitarian / greater EU / UN world government mould.
I certainly don't think there is anything specially "German" about all this stuff (although it certainly smells of DDR) and one could imagine a bunch of French academics coming out with precisely the same thoughts but couched in more Gallic phrases. A little more charming and a touch more arrogant, if possible.
But don't imagine that the same kind of thought processes are not alive and well in England. It's just that our lot are less likely to see the need to make any kind of public statement about it.
But I can imagine Beddington and Oxburgh musing about these very thoughts whilst having an agreeable stiff one in their club.
One people, one world, one goal.
No need to panic. According to the ever-reliable Chris Huhne, it's Greenpeace in our time.
@ Bish...."All, I'm snipping any Nazi references."
I love the smell of burning books in the morning
[Snip]
I’m not convinced that deploying Godwins law itself as a tool to suppress debate is actually its intended function.
I would personally argue that the WGBU’s shockingly totalitarian paper is a poignant example of how German political thought has been significantly influenced by a deep green environmentalism that arose well before the onset of the [snipperty-snippers]. In this respect, parallels with and examples of, past ideological conflicts, [snipizm] and eco-[snippery] are legitimate and relevant as evidenced by the headline article at the GWPF, which manages at least 3 references to [snipizm] - a wholly decadent haul of snippable lexicon. Excitedly reading the title to this thread, in anticipation of reading the comments that might ensue, I feel as though I have been teased into thinking it, but not allowed to say it, rather like being blindfolded at a lap-dancing club on a stag night.
As Kenny Everett famously quipped: “All in the best pawssible tayste”. What fun!
"We can talk about the implications without discussing Second World War history."
What happened before the war is much more pertinent than what happened during the war. Once the war started, ecological goals dropped down the list of national priorities. The pre-war history, as documented in the Bruggemeier and Uekotter volumes is highly relevant to the report quoted above.
In advance: not specific German, just how "BAC" works.
no WWII, just history and review of it.
it is about theWBGU report
A German journalist Jan-Philipp Hein has had an interview with Wolfgang Wippermann. http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfgang_Wippermann
.........sorry, only German.
However he is one the few German historians being controversial to the general German reception of
Goldhagen.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Goldhagen
Original interview text here:
http://www.achgut.com/dadgdx/index.php/dadgd/article/fahrplan_zur_klimadiktatur/
Translation through Google, I did some repair but only some. Sorry, otherwise to much labor.
Road map to climate dictatorship
Nothing less than a "social contract for a Great Transformation" have now presented nine German professors. They form the "Scientific Advisory Council on Global Change and do the" fossil nuclear (metabolism) end of industrial society and create a "climate-friendly global community" (WBGU). Their strategies, they attest to themselves, "are different from the incremental (Editor's note: continuous, progressive) politics of short-term crisis management and the precedent is always compromise." In an interview with Jan-Philipp Hein says the historian Wolfgang Wippermann and totalitarianism researcher from the Free University of Berlin, why does he think of the plans and researchers as dangerous and undemocratic.
Professor Wippermann, in the text "changing world", the authors have made to name themselves as "Pioneers of Change", "blocking mechanism" to identify and they speak of "veto players" who "inhibit transformation". To what do you remember that?
They even speak of the "international alliance of pioneers of change". And that reminds me of the fascist or Communist International. Whether they want to go there, I do not know. But the language is terrible and that scares me. Who says so, acts as well. This is a negative utopia, a dystopia. And if utopians are at work, it is always dangerous.
What view on world and mankind is behind this text?
We are dealing with scientific fanatics who want to impose their ideas. I wonder why we talk about it because for the first time and how little was done in public before.
The WBGU Council is an advisory board of the Federal Government. Ofcourse scientists can give valuable advice to politicians. What relationship should have science and politics?
Caveat: The federal government should have been taken distance long ago. This is not real And proposals from scientists should cover the political value system that we have. In short: You can not just state another democracy, to another and different world order. It is not that easy.
But the authors think it is a good thing and seek a "fair new world order" or a "global social contract".
That's the bad thing: if you strive something good, bad usually comes. As a historian, I can say nothing to the future, but only to the past. The authors of this paper to say though, that they are based on templates in the early modern natural law, but in fact it is the "Contract Social" by Jean-Jacques Rousseau meant...
….being nothing less than a new "Contract Social" must be closed then, it says in the conclusion of the paper, yes ...
... and in this "Contract Social", there was no separation of powers and Rousseau also held that democracy is not an adequate form of government. If the authors of "changing world" orientate to it, then it is a focus on something undemocratic.
How can scientists, of which we believe that they are reflecting, to write such a thing?
I fear that this is not thoughtlessness. Because they do so on to say how they want to improve the world. About their diagnosis, I can not say anything. Just what the authors propose here, that's a dictatorship, climate, climate state. And although in a somewhat larger scale. They want to abolish such nation-states. This could not "be the sole basis of the contract," it says. It is about a super-state, a community with collective responsibility and inter-organizations. Historically, it is oriented so that the "Holy Alliance" of 1815. This merger would also improve the world. Alexander I of Russia, Frederick William III of Prussia and Franz I of Austria wanted to "draw steps to provide facilities for human life and rectify their imperfections." In fact, it came to suppression of liberal and national aspirations. There was intervention and coercion. They wanted something good and bad happened.
..Now, the founders invoked the "Holy Alliance" to God. "Changing World" by scientists, even leading scientists have written...
A science can become a religion or ideology. If they then also a transnational call for democracy - whatever that is - it is a dictatorship.
..The authors believe firmly in the tradition of liberal and constitutional democracy...
Yes, but at the same time "social renewal by awareness" is required. And what if someone is not aware? Violence? The authors demand on this view of “awareness”. This is not democracy as we have and what we mean by democracy. That's different. And what the authors to address the grievances ask is with the ways and means of modern democracy not compatible. From history we know enough people who wanted to improve the world after it predicted its demise and undemocratic systems are forced into their insights created. Another side note: Why have we already not only the destruction of German future, but to save the world again? Must always the German character recover the world? This need not to be so. What are the authors really to believe, as their arrogance, after the Germans riding along, to move the rest to follow, effect on other states?
What spirit breathes this guide to action?
The paper is in the unfortunate tradition of "revolutionary messianism," as has been analyzed by Norman Cohn. There is a line of "revolutionary messianism" from the Middle Ages to the modern totalitarian movements.
Aren't social scientists not more vulnerable to this than Natur-Scientist?
Natur-Scientists come more directly to the people. Think of what has been derived from the racial research. We historians are bothering in the past. These Natur-Scientists here can actually make policy.
Opastun
Many thanks for the translation.
It's not word-perfect - but I think the sense is clear.
I fear Green German politics is definitely heading (back) down the road towards Snipizm.
thnks Foxgoose
seems discussion has ended right here.
anyway: for some good mood:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIEeiDjdUuU
M4GW singing: Imagine There's No Global Warming
good luck to all.
Yes, Foxgoose we must be wary of Snipism. However, given the history of Russia (Soviet Union), North Korea, Cambodia, several countries in the Middle East, Africa, South America and several other localities, I agree with BBD that the issue is Totalitarianism.
There are many, many people, who believe that they have the "Truth" whatever it may be, and are willing to kill you for not agreeing with them. This is a political and religious issue. We have been killing each other in the name of God and Gaia for thousands of years. And it still goes on. At least the Greens are not wearing explosive vests, at least yet. That may change if what I see on Whale Wars on the tele is any indication.
This is already last year's rubbish. As these Utopians prattle, China and India are launched on enormous expansion of electrical generation based on thorium, and the Chinese specify that they will develop and possess the intellectual property involved in Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors (LFTR), a molten salt reactor incapable of melt down or nuclear proliferation, and which will reduce nuclear waste to 0.01% of uranium/plutonium generation, while consuming existing nuclear waste as fuel. Further, all LFTR generated nuclear waste will be totally benign in 300 years.
The Indians, who have vast quantities of thorium, third to Australia and the United States, appear to set on a path of using thorium to replace uranium, which is in short supply in India, using current light and heavy water technology, but it will probably only a matter of short time before India goes the LFTR route too.
Pity the Germans if they continue their no-nuclear path. And the British if they keep up their pursuit of diffuse and intermittent wind power. All of the UK's power generating needs could be satisfied by LFTR in less acreage than is needed for one (22% of capacity) wind farm. Needless to say, LFTR would not be visually polluting scenic vistas, attacking neighbors with noise, and killing birds and bats. LFTR would be reliably producing at well over 95% of capacity, and at a cost per kilowatt of 5% to 10% of wind, and 1% of solar.
An enlightening post Mr. Combs, thank you.
And, if China and India are on the road to thorium reactors [and I do not doubt your words Michael] then what need of Britain cutting it's CO2 emissions?
I've been banging on about Thorium for some time now and also, shale gas - we can have power and plentiful supplies thereof, all it needs some political policy sanity - cold, clear headed thinking [fat chance of that with eejits like Beddington advising and Huhne presiding].
Future generations of Britons, will [maybe] look back at this particular period in our history [if it is recorded - will the mullahs allow it? - post/back to the future 634(AD)] and wonder how stupid our [so called] leaders, actually were - and that we [realists] were right and how wrong they [the political claque] all were - but as Mac has said here, this is an agenda which has nought to do with reason or science.
What a desperate mess, our future is dark.
You're right, Athelstan, there is no need for Britain cutting its CO2 emissions - never has been, never will. Britain has the same need of all developed nations: divest itself of all the ponderous entitlements that will collapse from an aging population - not enough workers to support the explosion of retirees and nonworkers - by privatizing services. Belt tightening now, or strangulation later. By relieving the onerous tax burden, innovation and entrepreneurial activity will increase, giving Britain the means to compete in a world market against the twin disadvantages of developing nations with lower - but rising - labor costs, and soon an abundance of energy at lower costs. Britain and the United States can choose to follow the road to ruin by trying to compete against lower-cost producers by subsidies and tariffs, or can exploit intellectual capital and lead the way to the next great developments, rather than sink further in welfare state economics. The nanny state safety net is going to be shredded one way or the other; it might as well be by way of progress, not indolence.
"This means concrete academic search processes, for example by global governance theoreticians, international law experts, cosmopolitans, transnationalists and philosophers of justice to formulate legitimate and realisable norms, rules and procedures which, all together, could form the basis of an ideal global social contract. "
Sounds to me like they want to put us into a global socialist egalitarian hell...