May 3, 2008
In the era of global warming, we must focus first on what is necessary, rather than only on what is possible.
No Solo Acts“A philosophy which concentrates on what is necessary is more realistic than one that takes account only of what is possible.”
By Pat Ford
These words are Jean Monnet’s. From the black wreck of World War Two, he more than any single man led building of the civic footings and institutions for a united Europe.Among those he worked with in his war-formed life was Winston Churchill. From 1938 to 1940, as Churchill (with help) led England in less-than-straight steps to the policy that Hitler must be stopped, achieving that policy was not possible. The economic, technical and military means to stop Hitler did not exist, nor did England have any partner to count on. Stopping Hitler was not possible. But it was necessary. So England staked herself to that policy, not from idealism but from realism.
After the war, in shambles, exhaustion, and shame, a united Europe was not possible. But it was necessary. On that necessity Monnet and others concentrated their realism, and by step by step the necessary became possible.
Is there a lesson here for us, with global warming? The twin task of stopping warming, and bringing what we cherish through it, is perhaps not possible. But, whether we know yet how to make it possible, is it necessary?
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We have made a trouble for ourselves that passes our understanding. It may be wise to seek outside our selves for guidance. In his story as told to Frank Linderman, Crow chief Plenty Coups goes off alone when he is nine, in the last days of his people’s old way in what is now Montana. He cuts off part of a finger and is given a dream. He returns and is told what it means: the Crow’s old way will be destroyed utterly; they will survive; how they will survive is unknowable because the way they will find does not yet exist; they must follow the chickadee – whatever that might come to mean.
Is this where we also are with warming – though unlike the Crow we have made our whirlwind? And perhaps in the pacific states we should change the adaptable chickadee for another animal that in millennial coupling with its waters has become adaptive master at finding ways that don’t yet exist.
For me there is no choice: I will come at warming as I’ve learned to come at much else, through salmon. We shall need guides to lead us through what we have caused – guides older and less double-edged than science, policy, -isms, tools of our self-regard that seem to seed and solve problems in rough proportion. (I don’t doubt the worth these tools give us; I doubt the place we often give them.) Of all guides, I am surest of the light in the river, the pattern that connects, we call salmon. It is a joy, and also wise, to follow salmon flashing through water, water where we must find the paths through warming. It is sin, and also folly, to lose that light if salmon flash round the turn into extinction at our hands.
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My hope for Light in the River is to generate dialogue that is useful. Let me use a Christian Science Monitor headline from November 2007 to explore this: “Clean energy vs. whales: how to choose.” Five prominent orca scientists urged removal of the lower Snake River dams, so Puget Sound’s endangered killer whales can have restored during their southerly winter migrations some of the bountiful salmon they once had, and need again, to eat. But dam defenders said the electricity thus lost would worsen global warming, and so must be kept.
The headline warns of hard choices, given global warming, that may come. So, how to choose?
First, following Jean Monnet, establish first principles. Clean energy and healthy waters and wild salmon and healthy food - and stop more global warming. What is most necessary as a first principle: to choose among them, or to choose them all? These, plus others you might add, are our goods, not trade goods. They are what matter to people. They are why people will determine, if we do, to stop more warming. That determination is not yet made, in the Northwest, nation or world; I doubt that law or policy can be effective until it is.
I have an instinct that to achieve either we must achieve both – that stopping warming, and shepherding ourselves and earth through it, must be inextricable in our actions and policies because they are so in our lives. I don’t think this is a truism. Neither among global warming warriors nor citizens generally nor lawmakers do I detect a rooted awareness of this inter-weaving, so as to generate well-woven action. Perhaps I am wrong, in my instinct or detection; I’d like to know how others see it.
Then, second, from those principles carve scrupulously the particulars of any choice. “Clean energy vs. whales” is useless as stated. Can energy whose generation is causing extinctions – I mean that from the lower Snake dams, not all dams - be “clean”? Has specific scientific and technical analysis been done to explore whether that “versus”, or my “and”, or some mix, are most probable under current policies and alterable by different policies? Is the choice for now, or the future; inevitable, or avoidable by other choices; stark, or nuanced by detail; numerically daunting, or manageable? I’d like to help generate some fine grain on this and similar choices in the age of warming.
Then, third, back to principles and who holds them. Who is posing the choice and who assessing it: someone who cares for both clean energy and Puget Sound’s ancient orcas, or someone whose intentions lie elsewhere? To be concrete: King County led by Ron Sims, who on behalf of those he serves wishes for both clean energy and orcas; or the Bush Administration, whose feckless energy and wildlife policies wish nor care for either? Since that administration is ending, and since federal energy/water/salmon policy is so fundamental in the West and Northwest, I’d like to see if building some agreement on first principles for the warming era might be of use to a new national government of either party that, for a change, wants to serve people.
I invoke Ron Sims not to imply his blessing for this project. But I want to close with his words a few months ago, when he welcomed a small group to Seattle for a day of talking about global warming. It is the best motto I have heard, not just for what to do about global warming, but also for how. And thus, like salmon and Jean Monnet, a light to follow.
In the age of global warming, there are no solo acts
(Pat Ford is executive director of the Save Our wild Salmon Coalition, and a founding as well as current board member of the NW Energy Coalition. He lives in Boise, Idaho.)