Award-winning British journalist, writer and activist George Monbiot, 58, considered one of the most influential voices on social media on the climate crisis, with 440 thousand non-Twitter followers, spares no words against the president of Brazil: “I see Jair Bolsonaro as a threat to human life. He is one of the most threatening forces on Earth.”
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In an interview with sheet, Monbiot describes Bolsonaro as a global threat because of its failure to protect not just the Amazon but also the cerrado. He regrets that there has not been much more international pressure to stop him.
With a good knowledge of Brazil, the activist presents his involvement with landless peasants in Maranhão in the 1990s as fundamental to his training.
The Briton points out as crucial and urgent the use of fewer natural resources for food production. This means stopping eating animal products. “They have an incredible hunger for land.”
He advocates much more mass mobilization to pressure governments to move quickly and drastically to prevent the collapse of the Earth’s many complex systems. This will require a radical transformation of democracy towards direct participation. “We don’t accept the principle of presumed consent in sex. Why should we accept it in politics?”
In the coming weeks, The Guardian columnist will headline a daily program on the recently launched COP26.TV. Next year, he releases “Regenesis: How to Feed the World Without Devouring the Planet” (Regenesis: How to Feed the World without Devouring the Planet), which includes a manifesto on the need to revolutionize the way we produce food to prevent worst impacts of climate change.
Why do we need to say climate collapse or chaos and stop using the term climate change?
Climate change is a ridiculously neutral term for what we face, humanity’s greatest crisis. We use words that sound very scientific, abstract and don’t tell people much.
This is considered a decisive decade to limit the impacts of the climate crisis. What should we prioritize now and for years to come?
The goals that governments have set, even the most progressive, are far from sufficient to return Earth’s systems to safety. The atmosphere is a complex system; the oceans another; the soils, another; the biosphere another. And they don’t behave in linear, incremental ways. They can absorb a lot of stress and maintain a balanced state, but they can suddenly collapse. We don’t know how much stress these systems can absorb before an upset. And unfortunately, governments have tried to address this by making small incremental changes each year when we need drastic and quick action.
Where should the money come from and where should it be invested?
There is a lot of money. We saw this with the pandemic. We need an effort on the scale of what the United States did when it entered World War II. During the war, the American budget was greater than all the expenditures they had made since Independence. Plus, governments can do all sorts of things you and I can’t to make the necessary money show up.
And where should we invest this money?
We need a massive economic transformation, and that means stopping the production of fossil fuels and investing massively in renewable energy. Furthermore, I believe that fourth generation nuclear power has an important role to play. It is also essential to protect and restore vast natural areas in the world and prevent deforestation and destruction.
This is not just a crisis. There are many crises at the same time: the mass extinction of species, the acidification of the oceans, the loss of soils, the loss of clean fresh water available on the planet.
We need a lot of government programs, something similar to the scale of what was done by some nations during the pandemic.
The UK government should push for an agreement between world leaders at COP26 to stop deforestation and forest degradation by 2030. What are your expectations of the Glasgow conference and the UK as host?
Unfortunately, the UK Prime Minister has a history of broken promises and we don’t take him very seriously in my country. But I think this is a very good objective and we should try to ensure that it is achieved. Doing so will be one of the first times this will happen.
In recent years, there have been several campaigns calling for international support to curb Bolsonaro and deforestation in the Amazon. Is there anything that could have been done that wasn’t done by those outside Brazil?
Much more diplomatic pressure. I see Jair Bolsonaro as a threat to human life. He is one of the most menacing forces on Earth. It poses a threat on many levels to Brazilians, but also a global threat because of its failure to protect not just the Amazon but also the cerrado.
The Amazon and the cerrado are closely linked and are absolutely crucial for the climate system.
The enormous damage being done by Jair Bolsonaro’s government could have implications for humanity.
What would a “new policy for an era of crisis” be, part of the title of one of your books?
We’re stuck in a 19th-century model of democracy. Almost everywhere, politicians are chosen every four, five years, and from that point on they can make as many decisions as they want, as long as they can get Congress to approve them, without directing them. not once more to the population.
We do not accept the principle of presumed consent in sex. Why should we accept it into politics?
In politics, we are in the era of the quill pen, horse and carriage, and that is nonsense in the digital age.
You are a supporter of the Extinction Rebellion movement. What has been the learning experience of interacting with people on the streets, having to speak in a more accessible and engaging language and responding to criticisms such as that movement is a factor of disturbance, more than anything else?
When I went to Brazil, I was a journalist, and when I left the country, I was an activist. And that came from working with the landless movements.
Most of the peasants I worked with were illiterate, but they had a sense of political theory that made me ashamed.
I left Brazil a person committed to activism and understanding the power of people who unite and fight for a common goal, using civil disobedience, the democratic tools at their disposal. And I found in Extinction Rebellion the same kind of spirit, strength and courage that I saw in Brazil.
Some people say we need to avoid doomsday narratives and be more positive to involve more people in climate solutions. You can sound apocalyptic and at the same time optimistic and remind us of the Parisian slogan of May 1968: “Be realistic, demand the impossible”.
I’ll change the slogan a little: “Be scientifically realistic. Demand the politically impossible.” What we call political realism is completely unrealistic in terms of preventing catastrophic environmental change.
The plans of the governments that will meet in Glasgow are unrealistic.
You can trade with political realism, but not scientific realism.
Political change can happen with extraordinary speed, and things that people believed were impossible become possible.
And what urgent actions are most needed to get there?
The only way this can happen is through mass mobilizations on an unprecedented scale.
Next year, his new book, “Regenesis” will be released. Can you tell us a little about a possible new future for food and the planet?
I learned a lot about a subject that most people believe they are familiar with, which is food, how it’s produced, where it comes from, and what we should be doing. Almost everything we think about the subject is wrong.
A crucial and urgent environmental task is to use less land for food production. This is a determining factor for the Earth’s ecosystems, species, systems to survive. And that means stopping eating animal products, because they have an incredible hunger for land.
There are very interesting technologies that can help us to abandon animal protein and, at the same time, maintain very good diets. There are also many ways to grow grains, fruits and vegetables, some coming from vast traditional knowledge, some from new knowledge.
I tried to incorporate it all and create a manifesto about how we should eat.
George Monbiot, 58
British journalist, writer and activist. After studying zoology at Oxford University, he started working at the BBC in the field of natural history. He is now a columnist for The Guardian newspaper.
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