Reviewed - the Global Justice Project's plan for a new world economy
An ambitious new paper builds basic components for a new global economic system - but stops short of replacing capitalism.
Left politics in the United States have, over the past decade, largely revolved around two general problems: economic inequality and climate change. Even seemingly tangential issues, the left has argued, are often downstream from these concerns. Economic inequality disempowers Americans who depend on welfare and empowers those who would prefer not to pay for it. Climate change is fueled in part by the US’s extraordinary consumption of meat, which is overwhelmingly provided by inhumane factory farming. Economic inequality fuels identitarian politics by encouraging workers to blame their immiseration on immigrants and minorities rather than the ruling class. Climate change is driven by our dependence on fossil fuels, which has in turn driven decade after decade of geopolitical conflict.
The left’s solution to this problem, launched during Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins’ campaign for governor in 2010, has been to call for a Green New Deal. Explicitly modeled after President Roosevelt’s New Deal in the early 20th century, GND proposals wedded the fight against climate change and economic inequality into an ambitious national agenda. In 2019 GND proposals went mainstream with a resolution championed by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Ed Markey. By the 2020 Democratic presidential primaries support for a GND was nearly mandatory for aspiring nominees. Only four of 22 candidates refused to endorse it – though one of them, notably, was Joe Biden.
Despite its ambitions, however, a fatal gap began to emerge between the GND and the problems it set out to solve. This was most evident in the challenges posed by international climate finance. Moving forward, it will be the developing world, not the United States, that accounts for the most growth in climate emissions. That’s why, in 2019, People’s Policy Project called for $2 trillion in annual funding from rich nations to the UN’s Green Climate Fund. Some electeds, like Sen. Corey Booker and Sen. Bernie Sanders, showed interest in the proposal; the latter incorporated many of its elements into his presidential platform. But overwhelmingly, Washington had a similar response to GND sponsors AOC and Markey: when asked for comment on the issue, they simply declined.
