Climate change and the nation-state curse

Résumé

t: Climate change is an uncontainable phenomenon which cannot recognise national, class, ethnic, gender or geographical boundaries and hence cannot be tackled, or even comprehended, within the limits of a nationalist worldview. Yet, the international system is dominated by nation-states which are in turn imbued by the ideology of nationalism. Despite this, the relationship between climate change and nationalism has been largely unstudied until 2020. This presentation first identifies the key political obstacles to global climate action. For years, the pressures exerted by the fossil fuel lobbies hampered action by the main Western governments. While there is a vast literature analysing these lobbies, this presentation explores a scarcely identified set of obstacles caused by the current division of the world into nation-states, powered by their own ideology – nationalism. Nationalism has become the dominant ideology of the contemporary world in tandem with the expansion of capitalism. It is therefore an ideology that it is impossible to ignore, nor we can pretend that it does not exist. But we must understand its limits, ----which will also help us to understand the apparently escapeless situation we may soon face. This new approach begins with a question: if nationalism is the core ideology around which contemporary political relations turn, is it possible to involve it in the fight against climate change? I explore the possibility of emerging forms of green nationalism largely related to “non-stateless nations” where the environmental dimension has been accompanied by climate mobilisations. But it also relates it to a few “exemplary nationstates” where sustainability pervades political and social relations. The examples of these pathbreaking, trendsetting nation-states should, however, be placed against their major opponents, the “top polluting nation-states”. In conclusion, while riding the wave of nationalism may appear counterintuitive, it may only make sense if non-national solutions are simultaneously considered.