An environmental and socially just climate mitigation pathway for a planet in peril
Climate change—a critical issue that many consider a major threat for life on Earth—is a symptom of ecological overshoot, long-term consumption and production patterns that lead to excessive and unsustainable environmental pressure. To address climate change, we must address these underlying causes and take steps towards sustainable living practices that prioritize the health of the biosphere and all its human and nonhuman inhabitants. Earlier compilations of anthropogenic environmental pressures have typically only considered the last few decades. Here, we put relevant variables into context for the last 500 years using a diverse and likely novel set of key data.
Our long-term graphical account illustrates how humanity's collective demand for natural resources is greatly accelerating on multiple fronts. Furthermore, we display and examine an ambitious and commonly used climate mitigation scenario, and propose a holistic, restorative scenario be considered, which is inspired by existing scenarios.
Our proposed ecologically-grounded and socially just scenario requires long-term comprehensive changes that could be implemented using short-term incremental steps (radical incrementalism). It illustrates how humanity can mitigate converging crises and realize diverse co-benefits, including potentially increasing global biodiversity and social equity. We argue that strong social outcomes and global justice, as in the proposed scenario, should be given greater consideration in climate scenarios.
Authors
Specifications
- Publication title
- An environmental and socially just climate mitigation pathway for a planet in peril
- Publication date
- 9 January 2024
- Publication type
- Article
- Publication language
- English
- Magazine
- Environmental Research Letters
- Issue
- Volume 19, Number 2
- Product number
- 5558
