In the author’s new documentary, the climate crisis is tied to our rotten economic system.

By Whitney Mallett @whitneymallett

Last year, Naomi Klein’s book This Changes Everything laid bare the capitalist economic system’s dependence on environmental devastation. We can’t fight climate change until we properly understand capitalism’s culpability, she argued. And with her characteristic brand of activist-oriented problem solving, Klein suggested we could seize this moment of climate crisis to revamp our addled global economy. A documentary of the same name, directed by Klein’s husband Avi Lewis, was conceived as a parallel project to Klein’s book and had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival last month. It trumpets the same battle cry: that fighting global warming effectively means overturning capitalism. As politicians keep bickering over absurdly modest measures like cap-and-trade programs and scientists continue to announce startling figures of shrinking glaciers, Lewis and Klein’s message feels as urgent as ever. Klein is really good at making radical arguments like this one terrifically accessible. This Changes Everything is the third book in Klein’s anti-globalization trilogy, following 1999’s No Logo, which criticized brand-oriented consumer culture, and 2007’s The Shock Doctrine, which chronicled how corporations take advantage of disasters to implement free-market policies designed to enrich a small elite. The film This Changes Everything marks the second time that Klein and Lewis have collaborated on a documentary. Eleven years ago, the pair made The Take, a movie that followed a group of autoworkers in Argentina who took over their factory and turned it into a cooperative. Lewis and Klein’s new film is similar in its aim to promote grassroots anti-capitalist action.

“A book can’t help you from feeling isolated and alone. A film, I think, can,” said Klein when I caught up with her and Lewis in Toronto to talk about the documentary. This Friday, it will be released in select theaters in New York, and will roll out in Los Angeles and Canada soon afterward. In the film, Klein’s thesis—that the climate crisis is inextricably tied to our rotten economic system—is woven together with portraits of activists fighting against mining and energy projects everywhere from Canada to Greece to South India. Like the book, the film succeeds in making a rigorous argument intelligible to a wide audience. By mixing essayistic filmmaking with vérité documentary techniques that showcase the stories of regular people turned activists, This Changes Everything also communicates an emotional urgency perhaps best suited to the cinematic medium. The documentary connects the past and the present, historicizing the activist battle against new coal plants and oil wells.

Klein traces the ideological infrastructure our current petrochemical economy is founded on back to the Enlightenment period. “It’s a moment in history where you have the Scientific Revolution and you also have the colonial project overlapping temporarily. The idea of infinite growth begins and there’s the birth of the machine,” she said. “These are all happening in the very same century.” She thinks drawing attention to when and where these concepts came from is intrinsic to developing alternatives to them. “Calling it human nature erases that it comes from a place. There are other ideas and other ways of relating to the world.”

From the indigenous tribes affected by Tar Sands development in Alberta to the South Indian villagers protesting a proposed coal plant, the documentary shows communities that practice non-capitalist ways of relating to nature. They’re all suspicious of the narrow post-Enlightenment idea of progress that fossil-fuel development promises. They don’t see the industrial extraction of resources as a necessary pit-stop on the way to an advanced society, but are rather see polluting resources like water which sustain human life as backward.

Klein uses these communities as examples of alternative ways of relating to the environment. She refutes the idea that we are doomed because it’s human nature to live in an environmentally destructive manner. A tendency to generalize “human impact” is embedded in terms like the anthropocene, Klein noted, which is the scientific designation for our era—it refers to the epoch in which human activity from industrial farming to resource extraction has irreversibly changed the planet. Basically, you can read our impact in the rocks of Earth itself. “It being ‘the age of man’ diagnoses the problem as being something essential in humans and glosses over the fact it’s not all humans,” Klein said, noting an essay on the subject by Andreas Malm from Jacobin magazine. “[Malm] makes the argument that it’s only a very small subset of humans that came up with the idea of burning fossil fuels on an industrial scale, and it’s still a minority of humans who do so.” For example, the average American consumes 500 times more energy than the average person living in a country like Ethiopia or Afghanistan. And even within the U.S., there are inequalities.

Environmental issues are inextricable from issues of economic and racial justice. “Being in New York the week after Sandy, there were powerful and disturbing flashbacks to being in New Orleans a week after Katrina happened,” said Lewis. For them, they said, the 10-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina this year connected the racial justice movement and the climate movement for many. “I think that because Black Lives Matter has united that conversation in the U.S., and then having the Katrina anniversary, for a lot of people it was a bit of an ‘oh yeah’ moment,” Klein said. “If you have a system in which black lives are treated as if they don’t matter, when you layer climate change on top of that then you see the issue on the mass scale.”

Environmental issues are inextricable from issues of economic and racial justice.

While Lewis and Klein’s documentary doesn’t focus on Hurricane Katrina or the intersection of American racial justice and climate change in particular, it does outline how the current economic system values some lives more than others. Klein’s narration returns over and over again to the idea of “sacrifice zones”: A resource economy depends on certain areas being disproportionately ravaged by extraction and processing—these places and the people in them are seen as worth sacrificing for some nebulous concept of the greater good. Populations in sacrifice zones have often been disproportionately poor and people of color, but in the film, we see that as the zones keep expanding middle-class white people from Montana to Greece are realizing they’re new targets of exploitation.

The emotional core of the film comes from individuals battling against being seen as disposable. Though as filmmakers Lewis and Klein unpack troubling realities, their film is cautiously optimistic, and focuses on the power and potential of these grassroots movements. We need a new system, in their view.

While the film concentrates its attention on citizen-driven actions, Klein also spearheaded the policy-focused Leap Manifesto, which was just released in mid-September in advance of the Canadian election, which takes place on October 19. “It’s basically a roadmap for Canada to get off fossil fuels,” explained Klein. Its signatories include public figures like environmentalist David Suzuki and folk-rock icon Neil Young.

Though Lewis and Klein are hopeful, they’re also realistic. Talking to them about the most recent price shocks—which happened since they wrapped shooting, and which have caused the price of oil from the Alberta Tar Sands to fall to historic lows—Lewis notes that “it is not affecting oil company profits as much as you might think it is.” He continued. “There are projects that have been suspended, but there’s thousands of barrels of new capacity that’s going ahead in Alberta each day. It’s not expanding as fast as they want it to, but it’s still expanding.”

Still, Klein explained the price shock is an opportunity. “Here is a pause in the frenetic energy. That kind of money makes it really hard to think. It’s hard to think with oil at $100 a barrel,” she said. “But now we have a moment where we can look in the mirror, and ask is this the best way to run the economy?” Her answer? No.

Da Redação | 28/09/2015, 09h39 – ATUALIZADO EM 28/09/2015, 17h07 Blairo Maggi, autor da PEC: “não há garantia explícita de participação dos índios nos resultados da implantação de hidrelétricas em suas terras”. Jefferson Rudy/Agência Senado

Proposta que altera a Constituição Federal para assegurar aos indígenas participação nos resultados do aproveitamento de recursos hídricos em suas terras (PEC 76/2011) está na pauta da reunião de quarta-feira (30) da Comissão de Constituição, Justiça e Cidadania (CCJ).

Hoje já são reconhecidos aos índios os direitos de posse permanente das terras que ocupam e de usufruto exclusivo das riquezas do solo, dos rios e dos lagos nelas existentes. Quanto à participação na exploração dos recursos, a Constituição garante apenas o direito a resultados obtidos com as riquezas minerais.

O autor da PEC, senador Blairo Maggi (PR-MT), explica que, no caso da implantação de hidrelétricas em terras indígenas, por exemplo, “não há garantia explícita da participação dos índios nos resultados de tal exploração”.

Ele acrescenta que essa lacuna tem gerado divergências na interpretação da norma constitucional e insegurança jurídica para as comunidades. Para o parlamentar, se a Constituição concede aos índios usufruto exclusivo das riquezas dos rios e dos lagos existentes em suas terras, é justo que haja compensação caso sejam privados do livre acesso a essas águas.

O relator, senador Valdir Raupp (PMDB-RO), apoia a proposta e questiona: “se as comunidades têm direito à participação no resultado da lavra mineral, por que também não teriam esse direito em relação ao aproveitamento dos recursos hídricos? Ambas as atividades podem impactar fortemente as comunidades”, observa.

A PEC 76/2011 prevê, para o aproveitamento dos recursos hídricos, a mesma exigência constitucional já estabelecida para exploração de riquezas minerais em terras indígenas, ou seja, autorização do Congresso Nacional, ouvidas as comunidades afetadas.

Após análise na CCJ, a PEC segue para dois turnos de votação em Plenário.

Outros projetos

A pauta da reunião inclui outros 33 projetos, entre eles, proposta de emenda à Constituição (PEC 62/2015), da senadora Gleisi Hoffmann (PT-PR), que acaba com a vinculação automática entre vencimentos mensais recebidos por agentes públicos, como parlamentares e ministros dos tribunais superiores. O fim do chamado “efeito cascata” no reajuste dessas remunerações recebeu relatório favorável do senador Randolfe Rodrigues (PSOL-AP).

Agência Senado

Saiba mais

Proposições legislativas

By Neela Banerjee, Lisa Song and David Hasemyer

Sep 16, 2015 Irreversible and Catastrophic The Certainty of Uncertainty

Nevertheless, he recommended publication.

Business Imperatives

Paying the Price

Releasing animals into the wild is in vogue—with unwelcome consequences

Sep 12th 2015  | SHANGHAI The Huangpu: hardly loach heaven

EVERY Saturday morning hundreds of devotees gather by Shanghai’s Huangpu river to liberate fish. Over three hours some 2,000 loach are tipped into the murky waters to the sound of chants.

This is fang sheng, or “animal release”, an East Asian Buddhist ritual in which captive creatures are freed. The point is to demonstrate compassion and earn merit. The practice is ancient, though along with everything else, it was condemned as so much superstition under Mao Zedong. Today fang sheng is making a comeback, especially among the young and well-off. Officials estimate around 200m fish, snakes, turtles, birds and even ants are released each year—though no one really has a clue.

Fang sheng associations can rake in around 1m yuan ($157,000) in annual donations. For some monks it has become a racket. The greatest price, however, is paid by the animals themselves and the ecosystems from which they come and into which they go.

A vast and mainly illegal wildlife trade caters to the demand for animals. Figures are hard to come by, but one paper estimated that in Hong Kong two markets sold over 630,000 birds a year, most destined for fang sheng. Many animals—perhaps half of all the birds—die during capture or transit from stress, disease or mishandling.

Nor does using reared or exotic species help. They create havoc in local ecosystems. Zhou Zhuocheng, chairman of China’s main body on aquatic ecology, cites the case of the mosquito fish from North America, a popular fish for fang sheng. It feeds on the eggs of the native Japanese rice fish, causing the latter to disappear completely in some areas. To add to the grimness, many animals, once released, are hoovered up and sold again to fresh devotees. Animals that do not survive the trauma are often sold as food.

Wang Tianbao, a 26-year-old programmer and evangelical Buddhist, admits that paying for animals that have only recently been released is “a waste of money”. Yet still he is prepared to spend oodles on fang sheng, through whose associations he can disseminate Buddhist information and reach new followers. He says he first practised fang sheng as a student, releasing two turtles that cost him 98 yuan, his food budget for three weeks. Today he spends 5,000-7,000 yuan, or about 5% of his annual salary. There may just be better ways to earn merit. These six shifts will transform markets over the next 25 years

by Tom Randall

June 23, 2015 — 7:00 AM EDT

1. Solar Prices Keep Crashing

2. Solar Billions Become Solar Trillions

3. The Revolution Will Be Decentralized

$2.2 Trillion Goes to Rooftops by 2040

4. Global Demand Slows

The Beauty of Efficiency

5. Natural Gas Burns Briefly

6. The Climate Is Still Screwed China’s rise has come at a horrific social and environmental cost.

I. China Self-Destructs

“Fast fashion” is speeding the disposal of the planet.

A. Consuming the Planet to Support Unsustainable Growth

The Disposables Revolution and “The Great Acceleration” of Global Consumption

Scenes of Planetary Destruction From the 12th Five-Year Plan

Scene 2: The Roads Not Taken

Scene 3: Half-Empty Trains and Subways

Scene 6: Tofu Construction

“Twenty More Years of Roaring Growth”?

B. Airpocalypse Now

Cooking the Planet to Produce Junk No One Needs

Coal-to-Gas Bases Will Doom the Climate

C. Undrinkable Water, Poisoned Soils, Toxic Food

Mass Production of “Cancer Villages”

The Damage Done

The Bad Earth and Toxic Foods

What’s Going on Here?

II. A Political Economy

“Get Rich and You’ll Get Audited”

A. Beijing’s Game of Thrones

Markets and the Mother of All Moral Hazards

Getting the Loot Out of China

C. Implications, Tendencies, Consequences

III. Braking the Drive to Collapse

As China Goes, So Goes the World

Revolution or Collapse?

54.No Ancient Wisdom, p. 2

57. McGregor, No Ancient Wisdom, p. 59.

90.China Airborne, p. 99.

94. “China’s selective crackdown,” 17 January 2015.

Copyright, Truthout. May not be reprinted without permission.

JC, 5201, 22 de junho de 2015

A crise da água em São Paulo ainda não acabou

Reservatório principal

Queda das ações

(Revista Exame)

Juliana Guarexick

The social sciences and humanities will be critical in helping us understand what the sciences will become in the future DISMANTLING THE OLD:“There is an urgent need to initiate a generational change in India’s university leadership.” Picture shows graduation day in the University of Hyderabad.— PHOTO: MOHAMMED YOUSUF

Common sense has defeated the social sciences and humanities in India. As the rush for college seats begin, parents worry if there are any viable options outside of medicine, engineering, management or studying abroad. What good would a B.A. in history or sociology do other than a roll-of-the-dice chance at the civil services? As a historian, I have often faced blunt questions: what can a job prospect possibly be if you spend three/four years learning the causes of Mughal decline or the Permanent Settlement of 1793? This ably describes why most people see the social sciences, with the exception of economics, as a losing proposition. But has the tide begun to turn?

One of the most significant bursts of funding in the social sciences and the humanities occurred during the Cold War years. The United States, keen as it was then to establish spheres of influence, invested heavily to learn about how societies understood themselves and which ideology appealed to what individual. The money ran into hundreds of millions of dollars with the Ford Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation of New York pulling funds from deep pockets. The Social Science Research Council and the American Council of Learned Societies were other key players who helped sponsor innumerable workshops, conferences and academic seminars. These efforts resulted not only in a vast number of publications, but helped develop many enduring concepts which arguably continue to explain the world we live in. Scores of scholars, research communities and university departments, in being caught up in strategic concerns, ended up harnessing the social sciences and humanities to understand how nations and societies dealt with authority, ideologies, politics and power. Hardly the ‘soft sciences’!

With the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union, funding for the Area Studies expectedly dried up. On the other hand, academic explorations under the rubrics of nation-making, democracy, globalisation and multiculturalism could hardly wield the previous heft.

In a study published in Research Trends (2013), Gali Halevi and Judit Bar-Ilanit point out that globally the financing for humanities sharply fell between 2009 and 2012. In part, while the 2008 financial crisis could be blamed for the sudden yanking of the proverbial rug, the loss in the lustre of the social sciences had already begun by the mid-1990s following the steady commercialisation of education. Unsurprisingly, student debt and education loans fell harder on those in the social sciences, arts and humanities than they did on those pursuing vocational skills such as engineering. At heart, however, this big turn against the ‘soft sciences’ was what Bill Reading described, in his classic The University in Ruins (1996), as the sustained attempt to transform the university from previously serving as an “ideological arm of the nation-state” to instead now being redesigned as a “consumer oriented corporation”. By morphing the citizen-student into a consumer-student (weighed in by debt), the actual rout of the social sciences was announced.

Reduced funding

It is amidst the aftershocks of this change in the meaning of education that we should make sense of Ella Delany’s startling report in The New York Times (December, 2013) in which she catalogues a growing disquiet against the humanities and social sciences. In 2012, a task force convened by Governor Rick Scott of Florida recommended that students majoring in liberal arts and social science subjects be made to pay higher tuition fees as they were in “nonstrategic disciplines”. Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott in 2013 “reprioritised” 103 million Australian dollars from research in the humanities into medical research. In Britain, Robin Jackson, chief executive of the British Academy for the humanities and social sciences, in 2011 announced that direct government funding for humanities had been withdrawn and was to be replaced by tuition fees “backed up by government loans”.

Is this total defeat? Ironically, just as the social sciences and the humanities are being written off in many countries, there have emerged vigorous calls for resituating its importance. Notably, climate change research and global environmental change programmes the world over are stridently advocating for what they term as the urgent need for “integrated analyses”. It is imperative, they argue, that the natural sciences be drawn into productive dialogues with the social sciences in order to explore critical themes such as global sustainability and green development.

One of the most significant international science initiatives in recent times called the Future Earth has, in fact, in their ‘Strategic Research Agenda’ (2014) urged for initiating a new generation in interdisciplinary and integrated research which can grapple with the realities of a warming planet. The initiative, however, is not entirely novel. For decades now, interdisciplinary efforts such as science studies, environmental history and full-fledged post graduate programmes under the rubric of science-technology-environment-medicine (STEM) have successfully broken down the hard divides between the natural sciences, social sciences and the humanities. These interdisciplinary initiatives have also compellingly revealed that the natural sciences are ideologically driven and are often oriented by political practice. In effect, the social sciences and humanities will be critical to help us understand what the sciences will become in the future. Significantly, given that an entirely new script for economic behaviour is being drafted in the context of climate change, these conversations have acquired pressing strategic consequences for the developing world.

The Indian scenario

The university system in India is, unfortunately, ill-prepared to take up these challenges. In part, it has put all its research and teaching eggs on the vice-chancellor system for administering higher education. The vice-chancellorship, as an organisational logic, is an ailing legacy and remains a bad marriage between the Mughal Jagirdari system and the rigidity of the British colonial bureaucracy. The higher you go up the administrative ladder, there is less transparency, accountability and intellectual oxygen.

There is an urgent need to initiate a generational change in our university leadership, with fresh blood and new ideas brought in with rigorous metrics to judge the performance and contributions at the very top of the administrative chain. If the social sciences and the humanities in India are to be cutting edge by providing knowledge for the future, then the old has to be entirely dismantled.

(Rohan D’Souza is associate professor at the Graduate School of Asian and African Area Studies, Kyoto University.)

The natural sciences should be drawn into dialogues with the social sciences to explore critical themes such as global sustainability

John Vidal

Saturday 13 June 2015 07.44 EDTLast modified on Tuesday 16 June 2015 06.22 EDT

Pope Francis will call for an ethical and economic revolution to prevent catastrophic climate change and growing inequality in a letter to the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics on Thursday.

However, it is certain to anger sections of Republican opinion in America by endorsing the warnings of climate scientists and admonishing rich elites, say cardinals and scientists who have advised the Vatican.

The Ghanaian cardinal, Peter Turkson, president of the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace and a close ally of the pope, will launch the encyclical. He has said it will address the root causes of poverty and the threats facing nature, or “creation”.

In a recent speech widely regarded as a curtain-raiser to the encyclical, Turkson said: “Much of the world remains in poverty, despite abundant resources, while a privileged global elite controls the bulk of the world’s wealth and consumes the bulk of its resources.”

The Argentinian pontiff is expected to repeat calls for a change in attitudes to poverty and nature. “An economic system centred on the god of money needs to plunder nature to sustain the frenetic rhythm of consumption that is inherent to it,” he told a meeting of social movements last year. “I think a question that we are not asking ourselves is: isn’t humanity committing suicide with this indiscriminate and tyrannical use of nature? Safeguard creation because, if we destroy it, it will destroy us. Never forget this.”

The encyclical will go much further than strictly environmental concerns, say Vatican insiders. “Pope Francis has repeatedly stated that the environment is not only an economic or political issue, but is an anthropological and ethical matter,” said another of the pope’s advisers, Archbishop Pedro Barreto Jimeno of Peru.

“It will address the issue of inequality in the distribution of resources and topics such as the wasting of food and the irresponsible exploitation of nature and the consequences for people’s life and health,” Barreto Jimeno told the Catholic News Service.

He was echoed by Cardinal Oscar Rodríguez Maradiaga of Honduras, who coordinates the Vatican’s inner council of cardinals and is thought to reflect the pope’s political thinking . “The ideology surrounding environmental issues is too tied to a capitalism that doesn’t want to stop ruining the environment because they don’t want to give up their profits,” Rodríguez Maradiaga said.

“Pope Francis is personally committed to this [climate] issue like no other pope before him. The encyclical will have a major impact. It will speak to the moral imperative of addressing climate change in a timely fashion in order to protect the most vulnerable,” said Christiana Figueres, the UN’s climate chief, in Bonn this week for negotiations.

Francis, the first Latin American pope, is increasingly seen as the voice of the global south and a catalyst for change in global bodies. In September, he will seek to add impetus and moral authority to UN negotiations in New York to adopt new development goals and lay out a 15-year global plan to tackle hunger, extreme poverty and health. He will address the UN general assembly on 23 September as countries finalise their commitments.

However, Francis’s radicalism is attracting resistance from Vatican conservatives and in rightwing church circles, particularly in the US – where Catholic climate sceptics also include John Boehner, Republican leader of the House of Representatives, and Rick Santorum, a Republican presidential candidate.

Earlier this year Stephen Moore, a Catholic economist, called the pope a “complete disaster”, saying he was part of “a radical green movement that is at its core anti-Christian, anti-people and anti-progress”.

Moore was backed this month by scientists and engineers from the powerful evangelical Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation, who have written an open letter to Francis. “Today many prominent voices call humanity a scourge on our planet, saying that man is the problem, not the solution. Such attitudes too often contaminate their assessment of man’s effects on nature,” it says.

But the encyclical will be well received in developing countries, where most Catholics live. “Francis has always put the poor at the centre of everything he has said. The developing countries will hear their voice in the encyclical,” said Neil Thorns, director of advocacy at the Catholic development agency, Cafod. “I expect it to challenge the way we think. The message that we cannot just treat the Earth as a tool for exploitation will be a message that many will not want to hear.”

The pope is “aiming at a change of heart. What will save us is not technology or science. What will save us is the ethical transformation of our society,” said Carmelite Father Eduardo Agosta Scarel, a climate scientist who teaches at the Pontifical Catholic University of Argentina in Buenos Aires.

Earlier popes, including Benedict XVI and John Paul II, addressed environmental issues and “creation”, but neither mentioned climate change or devoted an entire encyclical to the links between poverty, economics and ecological destruction. Francis’s only previous encyclical concerned the nature of religious faith.

The pontiff, who is playing an increasing role on the world stage, will visit Cuba ahead of travelling to the US. He was cited by Obama as having helped to thaw relations between the two countries, and last week met the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, to discuss the crisis in Ukraine and the threat to minority Christians in the Middle East.

The pope chose Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of animals, as his namesake at the start of his papacy in 2011, saying the saint’s values reflected his own.

By Paul B. Farrell

Published: June 16, 2015 10:16 a.m. ET

June 18 treatise from Pope Francis will get the ball rolling on an anticapitalist revolution Reuters. Pope Francis hugs children during a meeting at the University of Santo Tomas in Manila.

Mark your calendar: June 18. That’s launch day for Pope Francis’s historic anticapitalist revolution, a multitargeted global revolution against out-of-control free-market capitalism driven by consumerism, against destruction of the planet’s environment, climate and natural resources for personal profits and against the greediest science deniers.

Translated bluntly, stripped of all the euphemisms and his charm, that will be the loud-and-clear message of Pope Francis’ historic encyclical coming on June 18. Pope Francis has a grand mission here on Earth, and he gives no quarter, hammering home a very simple message with no wiggle room for compromise of his principles: ‘If we destroy God’s Creation, it will destroy us,” our human civilization here on Planet Earth.

The fact is the pontiff is already building an army of billions, in the same spirit as Gandhi, King and Marx. These are revolutionary times. Deny it all you want, but the global zeitgeist has thrust the pope in front of a global movement, focusing, inspiring, leading billions. Future historians will call Pope Francis the “Great 21st Century Revolutionary.”

Yes, our upbeat, ever-smiling Pope Francis. As a former boxer, he loves a good match. And he’s going to get one. He is encouraging rebellion against super-rich capitalists, against fossil-fuel power-players, conservative politicians and the 67 billionaires who already own more than half the assets of the planet.

That’s the biggest reason Pope Francis is scaring the hell out of the GOP, Big Oil, the Koch Empire, Massey Coal, every other fossil-fuel billionaire and more than a hundred million climate-denying capitalists and conservatives. Their biggest fear: They’re deeply afraid the pope has started the ball rolling and they can’t stop it.

They had hoped the pope would just go away. But he is not going away. And after June 18 his power will only accelerate, as his revolutionary encyclical will challenge everything on the GOP’s free-market capitalist agenda, exposing every one of the anti-environment, antipoor, antiscience, obstructionist policies in the conservative agenda.

Just watch the conservative media explode with intense anger after June 18, screaming bloody murder, viciously attacking the pope on moral, scientific, economic and political grounds, anything. But most of all, remember, under all their anger, the pope’s opponents really are living in fear of what’s coming next. What’s dead ahead.

Here are eight of the pope’s key warning punches edited in the Catholic Climate Covenant, from his “Apostolic Exhortation,” and in London’s Guardian and other news sources, warnings on the dangerous acceleration of global-warming risks to our civilization and the environment, along with our responsibility to “safeguard Creation, for we are the custodians of Creation. If we destroy Creation, Creation will destroy us.”

For Pope Francis, there’s no room for compromise, and his enemies know it. Listen for his warnings to be expanded in his encyclical on June 18:

1. Capitalism is threatening the survival of human civilization

A “threat to peace arises from the greedy exploitation of environmental resources. Monopolizing of lands, deforestation, the appropriation of water, inadequate agro-toxics are some of the evils that tear man from the land of his birth. Climate change, the loss of biodiversity and deforestation are already showing their devastating effects in the great cataclysms we witness.”

2. Capitalism is destroying nonrenewable resources for personal gain

“Genesis tells us that God created man and woman entrusting them with the task of filling the earth and subduing it, which does not mean exploiting it, but nurturing and protecting it, caring for it through their work.”

3. Capitalism has lost its ethical code, has no moral compass

“We are experiencing a moment of crisis; we see it in the environment, but mostly we see it in man. The human being is at stake: here is the urgency of human ecology! And the danger is serious because the cause of the problem is not superficial, but profound: it’s not just a matter of economics, but of ethics.”

4. Capitalists worship the golden calf of a money god

“We have created new idols. The worship of the ancient golden calf has returned in a new and ruthless guise in the idolatry of money” … Francis warns that “trickle-down economics is a failed theory” … the “invisible hand” of capitalism cannot be trusted … “excessive consumerism is killing our culture, values and ethics” … and “the conservative ideal of individualism is undermining the common good.”

5. Capitalists pursuit of personal wealth destroys the common good

Without a moral code, “it is no longer man who commands, but money. Cash commands. Greed is the motivation … An economic system centered on the god of money needs to plunder nature to sustain the frenetic rhythm of consumption that is inherent to it.” Instead, the pope calls for a “radical new financial and economic system to avoid human inequality and ecological devastation.”

6. Capitalism has no respect for Earth’s natural environment

“This task entrusted to us by God the Creator requires us to grasp the rhythm and logic of Creation. But we are often driven by pride of domination, of possessions, manipulation, of exploitation; we do not care for Creation, we do not respect it.”

7. Capitalists only see the working class as consumers and machine tools

“Nurturing and cherishing Creation is a command God gives not only at the beginning of history, but to each of us. It is part of his plan; it means causing the world to grow responsibly, transforming it so that it may be a garden, a habitable place for everyone.” Everyone.

8. Capitalism is killing our planet, our civilization and the people

Pope Francis warns that capitalism is the “root cause” of all the world’s problems: “As long as the problems of the poor are not radically resolved by rejecting the absolute autonomy of markets and financial speculation and by attacking the structural causes of inequality, no solution will be found for the world’s problems or, for that matter, to any problems,” as environmental damage does trickle down most on the world’s poor.

Pope Francis’ historic anti-capitalism revolution is divinely inspired

Imagine Pope Francis addressing a hostile GOP controlled joint session of the U.S. Congress in September. There’s no chance of changing the minds of those hard-right politicians, all heavily dependent on fossil-fuel special-interest donations. But he’s clearly laying the groundwork for a global revolution, and his enemies know it.

And watch the ripple effect, how his historic “Climate Change Encyclical” adds fuel to the revolution after Pope Francis addresses the UN General Assembly … how the revolution picks up steam after the UN’s Paris Climate Change Conference announces a new international treaty approved by the leaders of America, China and two hundred nations worldwide … how the revolution kicks into high-gear after the pope’s message has been translated into more than a thousand languages … and broadcast to seven billion worldwide, billions who are already directly experiencing the climate change “evils that tear man from the land of his birth.”

Bottom line: Given the global reach of his encyclical, Pope Francis’ revolution will accelerate. So the GOP’s 169 climate deniers, Big Oil, the Koch Empire and all hard-right conservatives better be prepared for a powerful backlash to their resistance.

Pope Francis’s 2015 war cry is to lead a global anticapitalist revolution, a revolution leading billions to take back their planet from a fossil-fuel industry that’s lost its moral compass to the “golden calf” and is destroying its own civilization on Planet Earth. VANCOUVER — The Globe and Mail

Video: Can Petronas overcome the opposition to its LNG project?

Zeynep Tufekci on May 7, 2015

Today, three researchers at Facebook published an article in Science on how Facebook’s newsfeed algorithm suppresses the amount of “cross-cutting” (i.e. likely to cause disagreement) news articles a person sees. I read a lot of academic research, and usually, the researchers are at a pains to highlight their findings. This one buries them as deep as it could, using a mix of convoluted language and irrelevant comparisons. So, first order of business is spelling out what they found. Also, for another important evaluation — with some overlap to this one — go read this post by University of Michigan professor Christian Sandvig.

The most important finding, if you ask me, is buried in an appendix. Here’s the chart showing that the higher an item is in the newsfeed, the more likely it is clicked on.

Notice how steep the curve is. The higher the link, more (a lot more) likely it will be clicked on. You live and die by placement, determined by the newsfeed algorithm. (The effect, as Sean J. Taylor correctly notes, is a combination of placement, and the fact that the algorithm is guessing what you would like). This was already known, mostly, but it’s great to have it confirmed by Facebook researchers (the study was solely authored by Facebook employees).

The most important caveat that is buried is that this study is not about all of Facebook users, despite language at the end that’s quite misleading. The researchers end their paper with: “Finally, we conclusively establish that on average in the context of Facebook…” No. The research was conducted on a small, skewed subset of Facebook users who chose to self-identify their political affiliation on Facebook and regularly log on to Facebook, about ~4% of the population available for the study. This is super important because this sampling confounds the dependent variable.

The gold standard of sampling is random, where every unit has equal chance of selection, which allows us to do amazing things like predict elections with tiny samples of thousands. Sometimes, researchers use convenience samples — whomever they can find easily — and those can be okay, or not, depending on how typical the sample ends up being compared to the universe. Sometimes, in cases like this, the sampling affects behavior: people who self-identify their politics are almost certainly going to behave quite differently, on average, than people who do not, when it comes to the behavior in question which is sharing and clicking through ideologically challenging content. So, everything in this study applies only to that small subsample of unusual people. (Here’s a post by the always excellent Eszter Hargittai unpacking the sampling issue further.) The study is still interesting, and important, but it is not a study that can generalize to Facebook users. Hopefully that can be a future study.

What does the study actually say?

Are you with me? One novel finding is that the newsfeed algorithm (modestly) suppresses diverse content, and another crucial and also novel finding is that placement in the feed is (strongly) influential of click-through rates.

Researchers then replicate and confirm a well-known, uncontested and long-established finding which is that people have a tendency to avoid content that challenges their beliefs. Then, confusingly, the researchers compare whether algorithm suppression effect size is stronger than people choosing what to click, and have a lot of language that leads Christian Sandvig to call this the “it’s not our fault” study. I cannot remember a worse apples to oranges comparison I’ve seen recently, especially since these two dynamics, algorithmic suppression and individual choice, have cumulative effects.

Comparing the individual choice to algorithmic suppression is like asking about the amount of trans fatty acids in french fries, a newly-added ingredient to the menu, and being told that hamburgers, which have long been on the menu, also have trans-fatty acids — an undisputed, scientifically uncontested and non-controversial fact. Individual self-selection in news sources long predates the Internet, and is a well-known, long-identified and well-studied phenomenon. Its scientific standing has never been in question. However, the role of Facebook’s algorithm in this process is a new — and important — issue. Just as the medical profession would be concerned about the amount of trans-fatty acids in the new item, french fries, as well as in the existing hamburgers, researchers should obviously be interested in algorithmic effects in suppressing diversity, in addition to long-standing research on individual choice, since the effects are cumulative. An addition, not a comparison, is warranted.

Imagine this (imperfect) analogy where many people were complaining, say, a washing machine has a faulty mechanism that sometimes destroys clothes. Now imagine washing machine company research paper which finds this claim is correct for a small subsample of these washing machines, and quantifies that effect, but also looks into how many people throw out their clothes before they are totally worn out, a well-established, undisputed fact in the scientific literature. The correct headline would not be “people throwing out used clothes damages more dresses than the the faulty washing machine mechanism.” And if this subsample was drawn from one small factory located everywhere else than all the other factories that manufacture the same brand, and produced only 4% of the devices, the headline would not refer to all washing machines, and the paper would not (should not) conclude with a claim about the average washing machine.

Also, in passing the paper’s conclusion appears misstated. Even though the comparison between personal choice and algorithmic effects is not very relevant, the result is mixed, rather than “conclusively establish[ing] that on average in the context of Facebook individual choices more than algorithms limit exposure to attitude-challenging content”. For self-identified liberals, the algorithm was a stronger suppressor of diversity (8% vs. 6%) while for self-identified conservatives, it was a weaker one (5% vs 17%).)

Also, as Christian Sandvig states in this post, and Nathan Jurgenson in this important post here, and David Lazer in the introduction to the piece in Science explore deeply, the Facebook researchers are not studying some neutral phenomenon that exists outside of Facebook’s control. The algorithm is designed by Facebook, and is occasionally re-arranged, sometimes to the devastation of groups who cannot pay-to-play for that all important positioning. I’m glad that Facebook is choosing to publish such findings, but I cannot but shake my head about how the real findings are buried, and irrelevant comparisons take up the conclusion. Overall, from all aspects, this study confirms that for this slice of politically-engaged sub-population, Facebook’s algorithm is a modest suppressor of diversity of content people see on Facebook, and that newsfeed placement is a profoundly powerful gatekeeper for click-through rates. This, not all the roundabout conversation about people’s choices, is the news.

Late Addition: Contrary to some people’s impressions, I am not arguing against all uses of algorithms in making choices in what we see online. The questions that concern me are how these algorithms work, what their effects are, who controls them, and what are the values that go into the design choices. At a personal level, I’d love to have the choice to set my newsfeed algorithm to “please show me more content I’d likely disagree with” — something the researchers prove that Facebook is able to do.

MAR. 27, 2014, 4:22 PM ReD Associates. A Red Associates staffer consults with a client

At a time when we’re debating the value of majoring in the humanities, major companies are increasingly hiring anthropologists.

Google, for example, hired an ethnographer to ferret out the meaning of mobile. Intel has an in-house cultural anthropologist, and Microsoft is reportedly the second-largest employer of anthropologists in the world.

So the question becomes: Why are giant corporations now seeking cultural expertise?

While most execs are masters of analyzing spreadsheets, creating processes, and pitching products, anthropologists — and other practitioners of applied social science — can arrive at customer insights that big data tends to gloss over, especially around the role that products play in people’s lives.

That information is more valuable than you might think. What customers want from a product and what companies think they want can be totally different, but it can take an anthropological lens to learn why.

Take Adidas, for example. The brand has always been associated with elite performance: Jesse Owens, Muhammad Ali, and Zinedine Zidane all wore the brand. Founded by cobbler and athlete Adi Dassler in 1948, the assumption within the company had been that people bought athletic gear to gain a competitive edge. But in the early 2000s VP James Carnes noticed something strange: He kept running into people who were jogging around the city, headed to the gym, or on their way to yoga.

While they led the active lives of potential customers, these people weren’t training for a competition. “Is yoga a sport?” Carnes asked in an offsite meeting in 2003.

Trying to figure out the disconnect, he brought in a consultancy called Red Associates, which has a client list that includes Intel, Samsung, and Carlsberg, the European beer giant. Unlike elite consulting firms such as McKinsey, Red isn’t in the business of big data and management science. Instead, it focuses on arriving at insights that can only be found through the applied liberal arts, or what it calls “the human sciences,” a strategy that is detailed in its new book “Moment of Clarity: Using the Human Sciences To Solve Your Toughest Business Problems.” That’s why most of the Red’s 70-some employees aren’t MBAs; they come from disciplines like philosophy, sociology, and anthropology.

When Red collaborated with Adidas, it trained members of Adidas’s design team in conducting anthropological research. Design staffers spent 24 hours straight with customers, eating breakfast with them, joining them on runs, and asking them why they worked out. As detailed in the Economist, a Red staffer sent disposable cameras to customers, asking them to take a picture of the reason they exercised. Thirty women responded, and 25 of them sent a picture of a little black dress.

A little black dress is quite different than a marathon finish line or gold trophy.

To use a favorite word of Red partner Christian Madsbjerg, the little black dress shows an “asymmetry.” The traditional thinking at Adidas was that people bought their gear to help them win. But after observing their behavior through the lens of anthropology, it became clear that customers wanted products to help them lead healthy lifestyles, not win competitions. Christian Madsbjerg, a Red Associates partner

How had Adidas misunderstood its customers for so long? Because Adidas executives thought they understood their customers’ motivations and lives, but they had never observed them closely enough.

Running, mountain biking, hitting the gym, going to yoga — people did these things to live healthier lives. But these “urban sports” weren’t like the traditional competitions that the company was originally organized around.

That was Carnes’s realization: His consumer’s definition of “sport” had changed, and his company had to change along with it. As described in “Moment of Clarity”:

If urban sports are on par with basketball or soccer, Adidas must then deliver on products with functionality, aesthetics, and quality. Adidas must lead, not copy in this whole new category of lifestyle sport …

The company went from being a sports brand exclusively for athletes … to becoming an inclusive brand inviting all of us to join a movement of living a healthier and better life. It went from creating corporate credos aimed at high-performance sports aficionados, such as “Impossible is nothing,” to sending democratic, yet aspirational message like “All In.”

With the help of Red, Adidas was able to understand the world of its customers. Interestingly, it’s the human sciences — literature, arts, anthropology — that allow for understanding the unique worlds that people live in. By observing people’s daily lives and the ways in which they interact with products, consultancies like Red are able to discern what products mean to customers in a way that big data can’t determine.

Why literature helps you understand customers

“If you look at launches of a new product, most of them fail,” Madsbjerg says. “That’s because people don’t understand the worlds in which we operate.”

The problem with standard corporate research, Madsbjerg says, is that it’s incredibly difficult to get around your own preconceptions. Even if your analytics are fresh, you’ll read old assumptions into them. By applying the humanities, however, you can get around them.

Say, for instance, you read an epic novel by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. In doing so, you’re not just processing words on a page, you’re beginning to understand a character’s world in Russia in a specific place, specific time, and from a specific perspective. To hear Red tell it, making an empathetic understanding of a character in a novel is very much like trying to understand a customer — Ford, after all, would be immensely interested in the world of someone buying a car.

It’s anthropological research, like Red helped the Adidas design team with, that allows for understanding the customer’s world.

This is different from the approach of most corporations, which rely on measures like surveys and focus groups. The problem with those is that people have a terrible time reporting their own preferences, Madsbjerg says. In one Swedish study, for instance, everyone reported that they were an exceptional driver, which is obviously impossible. By the same token, asking customers to tell you why they like a particular vodka doesn’t necessarily reveal their motivations.

That’s why Red emphasizes ethnographic interviewing, where you interview a subject again and again and observe them in a range of environments, looking for patterns of behavior. The long-form, in-depth research helps to reveal the worlds that people live in and their real motivations. Major insights follow — that little black dress told Adidas way more about their customers’ world than a survey ever could.

Finding an industry’s need

In another case, Red consulted for a leading pharmaceutical company specializing in diabetes. Back in the day, it was common practice for sales reps to use a “frequency and reach” strategy, talking to as many doctors as possible and pushing a brand message. The sales reps would get the time with doctors by giving them free flights and concert tickets. But then the law changed, and giving swag to doctors was made illegal. All of a sudden what was once a long courtship turned into a 90-second phone call.

In order to sell drugs in this new situation, they needed to recalibrate the conversation.

During the course of interviewing physicians, Red discovered a major concern that most doctors shared: “How do I get my patients to understand their conditions? How do I change their lifestyles?” Medication, it turned out, was the third most important aspect of treating diabetes — diet and exercise were much more vital.

As a result, Red’s associates worked with doctors to find different ways to help people change their diets, and they worked with sales reps to present that info to doctors. Since so many of the diabetes patients didn’t know how to cook, basic meal preparation became part of the sales material. Correspondingly, the pharmaceutical company became way more resonant: By understanding the world of the doctor, the brand saw a 15% increase in key indicators, like doctors’ trust.

The secret was to understand the world of the physicians and to give them what they needed, even if they didn’t consciously realize it yet.

Read more:  http://www.businessinsider.com/heres-why-companies-aredesperateto-hireanthropologists-2014-3#ixzz3Ux42Y7ks

[If economists and agronomists read sociological and anthropological assessments of development programs, this would not be a novelty to them]

Date: January 28, 2015

Summary: Although you might expect that providing aid to impoverished villages in the Philippines could only bring them relief, a study found that the villages that qualified for some forms of aid actually saw an increase in violent conflict.

Although you might expect that providing aid to impoverished villages in the Philippines could only bring them relief, a University of Illinois study found that the villages that qualified for some forms of aid actually saw an increase in violent conflict.

“Interestingly, those municipalities that were eligible to receive aid but didn’t accept it saw the largest increase in violence,” said U of I economist Ben Crost. “During what’s called the social preparation phase, it becomes known that the village is eligible for aid. Insurgent forces from the communist New People’s Army or a Muslim separatist group attack and then the village drops out of the program because they are intimidated. That’s why the places that didn’t participate saw the most violence.”

Between 2003 and 2008, more than 4,000 villages received aid through a flagship community-driven development program in the Philippines. The program used an arbitrary threshold of 25 percent to determine the poverty level at which communities qualified to receive aid.

“Only the 25 percent of the poorest municipalities qualified to receive aid,” Crost explained. “Those above the threshold are barely too rich to get it, and the others are just poor enough to get it. That means that these places should be comparable in all respects with the one exception that these slightly poorer places were much more likely to receive aid than the slightly richer places. So they were almost the same in poverty levels and in background levels of violence.” The same, until they became eligible for aid, that is.

“The way they targeted it with this arbitrary 25 percent cutoff allowed us to compare places that were just below the cutoff to places that were just above it,” Crost said.

Aid data from the World Bank were analyzed with data on conflict in the Philippines that was provided by his co-author from Stanford University, Joe Felter.

Ironically, projects anticipated to be most appreciated by the people receiving them may place them at a higher risk of being attacked. “We think that one mechanism that explains our results is that the insurgents actually tried to derail the project,” Crost said. “They didn’t want it to succeed. The insurgents had an incentive to strike and try to sabotage the program before it ever took off because its success would weaken their support in the population. We know that some of the municipalities actually dropped out of the program for this reason — because they were worried about insurgent attacks.”

Crost’s recent research is looking for ways to provide aid to those who need it that doesn’t also make them visible targets that are easy to attack. He said that because of the very public participation component in the community-driven development program, it was easier to derail.

“The aid in this case was given for improvements in infrastructure,” Crost said. “We need to find a more hidden way to give aid. One program we’re looking at now is conditional cash transfers, in which poor families get money if they do things like send their kids to school or have them vaccinated. These programs are popular in many developing countries. We have found some suggestive evidence that this kind of aid led to a decrease in violence — or at least we don’t find any evidence that it leads to an increase like we saw in this study.”

Crost said that, unfortunately, most of the evidence that has come out since this paper was published points in the same direction. “There’s evidence on U.S. food aid and on the national rural employment guarantee scheme in India, which is a huge anti-poverty program. Both of these studies found the same effect — that conflict increases in the places that get aid.”

“Aid Under Fire: Development Projects and Civil Conflict” was published in a recent issue of American Economic Review and written by Benjamin Crost, Joseph Felter, and Patrick Johnston.

Journal Reference:

26 de janeiro de 2015

Especialistas acreditam que medidas tomadas pela Sabesp e pelo governo do estado são insuficientes para resolver o problema do abastecimento, além de mascararem uma escassez que existe em diversas regiões do estado

Texto: Guilherme Franco e Vinicius Gomes da Revista Fórum

Fotos: Mídia NINJA

Na primeira segunda-feira (5) do ano, a Companhia de Saneamento Básico do Estado de São Paulo (Sabesp) lançou mais uma de suas ações para combater a crise de saneamento de água: a distribuição de dispositivos de torneira para economizar água, com o mote “Se usar bem, ninguém fica sem”.

Como se ainda estivesse em 2014, a estratégia adotada para contornar o problema hídrico continuou sendo a mesma. Apelar para a boa vontade da população, atribuindo a ela, de forma direta ou indireta, parte da culpa pela crise. Há exatamente um ano, diversas cidades do litoral sul de São Paulo ficaram sem água próximo à época do Reveillon e, na ocasião, o governador de São Paulo Geraldo Alckmin (PSDB) afirmou que a falta d´água havia ocorrido por conta de um “consumo inesperado” dos turistas que desceram a serra para as festas. Afinal, por que alguém esperaria aumento de consumo em períodos de forte calor, não é mesmo?

Ao longo de todo o ano passado, enquanto os paulistas incluíam as palavras “Sistema Cantareira” e “volume morto” em seu vocabulário diário, cada vez mais regiões da capital e do interior paulista passavam a sofrer com a falta sistemática de água. A cidade de Itu, na região metropolitana de Sorocaba, foi um dos casos mais simbólicos (Veja o vídeo).

Mesmo assim, o governador sempre foi resoluto em afirmar que não faltava água no estado. No último debate entre os postulantes ao governo paulista, no início de outubro passado, Alckmin, ainda candidato à reeleição, foi taxativo: “Não falta e nem vai faltar água em São Paulo”. Porém, neste novo ano que começa a notícia é velha. Para evitar o caos no abastecimento de água, o governo tucano decidiu impor uma sobretaxa para forçar a redução do consumo da população.

Se usar bem, ninguém fica sem?

“É importante que fique claro que a responsabilidade pela crise d´água não é da população”, afirma Edson Aparecido da Silva, sociólogo e coordenador da Frente Nacional pelo Saneamento Ambiental.

O especialista é um dos muitos que não possuem dúvida alguma de que o verdadeiro motivo para a crise hídrica em São Paulo não é a falta de consciência da população no uso d’água — que de fato existe — , mas sim porque os sucessivos governadores que passaram pelo Palácio dos Bandeirantes não tomaram as medidas necessárias. “Estamos enfrentando essa crise porque o governo não fez no tempo certo as obras que deveriam ter sido feitas. Ele não iniciou uma campanha de redução de consumo com a antecedência devida”, acrescenta. Dona Rute, moradora do Jardim Umuarama, vive um racionamento não oficializado pelo governo, que pode durar até 9 dias sem água na torneira. Foto: Sarah Pabst

Na mesma linha de Aparecido, o diretor de base do Sindicato dos Trabalhadores em Água, Esgoto e Meio Ambiente do Estado de São Paulo (Sintaema), José Mairton, afirma que o cenário atual poderia ser outro, caso o governador de São Paulo tivesse decretado o racionamento no início de 2014. “A estiagem prolongada previu a falta de água. Hoje poderíamos ter uma situação menos preocupante. A coordenação da campanha eleitoral do atual governador do PSDB não queria passar uma falha gravíssima de sua gestão anterior, sendo assim, persistiram em um erro que considero um dos maiores golpes políticos já visto”, avalia.

Mas, na contramão dos fatos, Alckmin nunca assumiu a necessidade de decretar racionamento, pelo menos assim o fez durante todo o ano de 2014 — um ano eleitoral.

De acordo com Edson Aparecido, apesar de o racionamento não ter sido decretado oficialmente, ele já existe desde que a Sabesp começou a fazer redução na pressão da rede durante o período noturno. “Quando uma pessoa chega em casa do trabalho, vai tomar banho, abre a torneira e descobre que a água só virá no dia seguinte, é um racionamento.”

Relembre 5 momentos em que Alckmin disse que não faltaria água – SPressoSP
Ao longo de todo o ano, apesar de todas as denúncias de rodízio e falta d’água e diversos pontos da capital e região…spressosp.com.br

Depoimentos que desmentem o discurso do governador são abundantes. “Aqui falta água faz tempo já, não é verdade que não tem racionamento em São Paulo”, relata o poeta Binho, fundador do Sarau que leva seu nome e morador do Campo Limpo, vizinho ao terminal de ônibus da região. “A gente tem que ficar de plantão o dia inteiro, esperando a água chegar. Aí corre pra encher balde, panela e guardar tudo”, conta a carroceira Dona Rute de Carvalho na favela Godoi, Jardim Umuarama — ambos na capital paulista.

Com o nível do segundo volume morte ora se estabilizando ora caindo, mas raramente subindo significativamente, e com o período de chuvas se aproximando do seu final, existe algum motivo para que o governador não decrete o racionamento? Primeira solução para a crise: assumir que há uma crise

Pode parecer óbvio para muitos que, para se resolver um problema, precisa-se, primeiro, reconhecer que ele existe. Mas nem sempre o óbvio é assim tão evidente. “Em momentos de crise como esse, o governo estadual deveria fazer duas coisas — além de decretar oficialmente o racionamento : apresentar um “pacotão” de medidas — um plano de contingência para enfrentar essa crise que tende a se aprofundar ao fim do período de chuvas (final de março), e que esse pacote fosse precedido de um diálogo com as prefeituras diretamente envolvidas com a crise”, afirma Aparecido que cita as prefeituras das regiões metropolitanas da capital paulista e de Campinas, junto com os comitês de bacias hidrográficas do Alto Tietê e do PCJ (Piracicapa-Capivari-Jundiaí). “[Mas] o governo do Estado continua em uma linha de ação individual, autoritária, sem transparência e isso tem sido péssimo”, lamenta. Fluxo de água na primeira cota do Volume Morto, inaugurado pelo governador Geraldo Alckmin. Foto: Mídia NINJA

Para ele, era necessária uma conversa com todas as prefeituras — com a ajuda do governo do estado e da Sabesp — para desenvolver um plano para a redução do consumo excessivo de água, além da adoção de algumas das medidas como: mapear todas as possibilidades de poços artesianos nas regiões e requisitar que o DAEE (Departamento de Águas e Energia Elétrica de São Paulo), que é o responsável pela outorga de utilização de poços, apresentasse, com as respectivas prefeituras envolvidas, uma lista com tais possibilidades, tendo como prioridade o abastecimento humano.

Outras medidas deveriam envolver também dois grandes consumidores de água no estado: os setores agrícola e industrial. Aparecido entende que o governo deveria negociar com ambos a busca por novas tecnologias para utilizar menos água em suas produções, inclusive com incentivos fiscais. “Partindo do princípio que a água tem que usar usada prioritariamente para o abastecimento humano, o governo também tinha que chamar a Fiesp [Federação das Indústrias de São Paulo] e fazer um plano de redução de consumo desse setor”, sugere o especialista.

Continuar pedindo o sacrifício da população é insuficiente

Perguntado se um, até o momento, hipotético decreto de racionamento residencial seria suficiente para aplacar a crise, Aparecido Silva é direto: não.

Segundo dados oficiais do DAEE, o setor industrial utiliza 40% de toda água disponível para abastecimento em rios, poços e reservatórios da Grande São Paulo e Baixada Santista e, como afirmou o geógrafo Wagner Ribeiro, professor titular da Universidade de São Paulo (USP), outras medidas futuras podem começar a ser discutidas, como a presença de indústrias nas regiões metropolitanas, que são áreas de escassez hídrica. “É fundamental reavaliar a conveniência de manter indústrias funcionando aqui”, acredita.

E quanto aos empregos na área industrial? O estudo mais recente da Federação das Indústrias do Estado de São Paulo, feito entre os dias 12 e 26 de maio de 2014 com 229 empresas de micro e pequeno porte (até 99 empregados), 140 de médio porte (de 100 a 499 empregados) e 44 de grande porte (500 ou mais empregados), revelou que já foram fechados mais de 3 mil postos de trabalho devido à falta de água. As demissões decorrem da redução do ritmo da produção e da queda da produtividade das indústrias pela falta do recurso hídrico. A tendência, segundo a Fiesp, é que o quadro se agrave nos próximos meses.

“A situação já estava muito ruim no que diz respeito ao crescimento econômico”, declarou Anicia Pio, gerente de meio ambiente da Fiesp. “Naturalmente, que a falta d’água teve uma parcela importante nessas demissões. A escassez de água está levando à redução da produtividade e toda vez que isso acontece é necessário cortar custos, ou seja, demitir o funcionário. A nossa perspectiva é que a nova equipe que vai assumir decrete medidas amargas, mas necessárias para que cause o mínimo de sofrimento a todos os setores”, ponderou.

O estudo ainda apontou que, em cada três empresas, duas estão preocupadas com a possível interrupção no fornecimento de água na região. A possibilidade de racionamento ainda neste ano é um fator de preocupação para 67,6% das 413 indústrias entrevistadas pelo Departamento de Pesquisas e Estudos Econômicos (Depecon) da Fiesp.

Calamidade Privada — A crise da água em Itu from A conta da Agua on Vimeo.

Anicia defende que o racionamento deveria ser decretado em todos os setores, inclusive para as empresas. “O correto é que a redução seja para todo mundo. As indústrias têm feito a lição de casa nesse sentido. Desde 2007, as empresas que captam água direto dos mananciais tiveram uma redução de mais de 50%. O setor industrial, na região metropolitana, responde por 10,6% de toda a água utilizada em termos de uso direto (rios, águas subterrâneas)”, afirma.

Além do plano de contingência, ela sugere incentivos fiscais para empresas que atuam no segmento de produtos químicos. “Quanto menos água, mais caro fica o tratamento. O governo poderia diminuir ou dar incentivo para a redução dos impostos de produtos químicos, evitando assim que a população seja obrigada a pagar mais caro pela água”, conclui.

De acordo com Aparecido, o governo do estado deveria enviar à Assembleia Legislativa de São Paulo uma lei reduzindo ou isentando de impostos da esfera estadual, como ICMS, equipamentos hidráulicos que possam reduzir o consumo de água para incentivar a indústria e o comércio — com os usuários domésticos substituindo seus equipamentos por outros de baixo consumo.

Outras medidas sugeridas pelo especialista seriam revisão de calendário de eventos nesses períodos de muito calor, onde se consome muita água; rever o calendário escolar — como campeonatos esportivos, feiras, congressos, a extensão do período de férias de verão e o cancelamento das férias de inverno, além de um controle maior para que todas as administrações, tanto estadual quanto municipal, reduzissem o uso de água na lavagem de equipamentos públicos e rega de jardins, por exemplo.

E a Sabesp?

Em 1994, a Companhia de Saneamento Básico do Estado de São Paulo (Sabesp) se tornou uma empresa de capital misto com o argumento de que vendendo parte de suas ações seria possível arrecadar mais recursos para investir na sua função: saneamento básico e abastecimento de água.

Passados 20 anos, a empresa viu seu faturamento saltar de R$ 6 bilhões para R$ 17,1 bilhões entre 2002 e 2012. A quantia nada modesta seria mais do que o suficiente para a ampliar a rede de captação e saneamento, evitando assim qualquer problema relacionado à escassez de água. Enquanto parte da população da região metropolitana vê as torneiras secas há meses, os acionistas da Sabesp têm um faturamento nada escasso. Festa em Nova York, seca em São Paulo: ao som de “Oh Happy Day”, diretores da Sabeps comemoraram o lucro de R$ 4,3 bilhões em 2012 Foto: Sabesp

Diante da lógica da maximização dos lucros, a companhia não tomou as medidas necessárias para conter a crise já em 2013, quando o nível dos reservatórios estava baixando. Políticas de racionamento, com penalização de quem desperdiçasse água, e de informação não foram feitas, como explica Anderson Guahy, técnico em gestão da Sabesp e diretor de formação do Sintaema.

“Em vez da empresa buscar a universalização do saneamento, levar saneamento e saúde para toda a população do estado, ter feito a manutenção das redes de água, ela vem atuando no sentido de garantir lucros cada vez maiores para seus acionistas. No que diz respeito à Sabesp, a responsabilidade pela crise deve ser direcionada à alta gestão e não aos trabalhadores concursados que vêm sendo perseguidos nos últimos meses”, diz Guahy.

Seguindo uma linha de raciocínio semelhante, Anicia Pio sugere que dois blocos de ações que deveriam ter sido executados mas não foram: obras e transparência. “Desde 2004 o governo sabia da necessidade de investir no sistema de abastecimento da Grande São Paulo, mas nada foi feito. Ao mesmo tempo, faltou autoridade e competência para chegar na população através da mídia e explicar a gravidade da situação”, afirma. O caso de 2004 a qual ela se refere é a outorga que autorizava a Sabesp a retirar água do Sistema Cantareira e fornecê-la para oito milhões de pessoas na capital paulista e na região metropolitana, ação que já constava entre as diretrizes para reduzir a demanda, pois o sistema poderia não suportar uma situação como a atual.

“E a Sabesp ainda não apresentou nenhum plano para a redução da perda de água, quer dizer continua perdendo um terço da água ainda na distribuição”, argumenta Aparecido. O especialista afirma que seria importante que ela interrompesse o pagamento de dividendos ou de juros sobre o capital próprio para os seus acionistas.

Em meio a pior crise enfrentada pelo Estado mais rico do Brasil, que possui a maior cidade da América Latina em um país que diferente de muitos outros, foi “abençoado” por inúmeros recursos hídricos disponíveis em seu território, os acionistas podem comemorar o ano que passou: somente em 2014, a Sabesp captou aproximadamente R$ 800 milhões. A população paga a conta.

JAN 21 2015   3:00PM From De Ethica, Michel Bourban (Lausanne): Climate Change, Human Rights and the Problem of Motivation; Robert Heeger (Utrecht): Climate Change and Responsibility to Future Generations: Reflections on the Normative Questions; Casey Rentmeester (Finlandia): Do No Harm: A Cross-Disciplinary, Cross-Cultural Climate Ethics; and Norbert Campagna (Luxembourg): Climate Migration and the State’s Duty to Protect. Harvard’s David Keith knows how to dial down the Earth’s thermostat — is it time to try? Renzo Taddei (UNIFESP): Alter Geoengineering. Tobias Boes and Kate Marshall on writing the Anthropocene. People don’t work as hard on hot days — or on a warming planet. James West on 2014 was the year we finally started to do something about climate change. How much is climate change going to cost us? David Roberts investigates. Is a climate disaster inevitable? Adam Frank on what astrobiology can tell us about the fate of the planet. If we’re all headed for extinction anyway—AND WE ARE—won’t it be a lot more enjoyable to run out the clock with everyone looking a little more pleasant? Welcome to the latest exciting opportunity in the sights of investors: the collapse of planet Earth. You can download Tropic of Chaos: Climate Change and the New Geography of Violence by Christian Parenti (2011). You can download Minimal Ethics for the Anthropocene by Joanna Zylinska (2014).

[Emphasis added]

19/1/2015 – 09h33

por Redação da Carta Capital A redução da pobreza é um dos eixos da agenda de desenvolvimento pós-2015. Crianças na favela de Kallayanpur, uma das favelas urbanas em Daca, Bangladesh. Foto: ONU/Kibae Park

ONG britânica divulga dados sobre a desigualdade social no mundo para tentar guiar as discussões do Fórum Econômico Mundial

Um estudo divulgado nesta segunda-feira 19 pela ONG britânica Oxfam afirma que, em 2016, as 37 milhões de pessoas que compõem o 1% mais rico da população mundial terão mais dinheiro do que os outros 99% juntos. O relatório tem o objetivo de influenciar as discussões a serem travadas no Fórum Econômico Mundial (FEM), que reúne os ricos e poderosos no resort suíço de Davos entre 21 e 24 de janeiro.

O estudo da Oxfam é baseado no relatório anual sobre a riqueza mundial que o banco Credit Suisse divulga anualmente desde 2010. Na versão mais recente, divulgada em outubro 2014, o Credit Suisse mostrou que o 1% mais rico (com bens de 800 mil dólares no mínimo) detinha 48,2% da riqueza mundial, enquanto os outros 99% ficavam com os 51,8%. No grupo dos 99%, também há uma significativa desigualdade: quase toda a riqueza está nas mãos dos 20% mais ricos, enquanto as outras pessoas dividem 5,5% do patrimônio.

No estudo divulgado nesta segunda, a Oxfam extrapolou os dados para o futuro e indica que em 2016 o 1% mais rico terá mais de 50% dos bens e patrimônios existentes no mundo. “Nós realmente queremos viver em um mundo no qual o 1% tem mais do que nós todos juntos?”, questionou Winnie Byanyima, diretora-executiva da Oxfam e co-presidente do Fórum Econômico Mundial. Em artigo publicado no site do FEM, Byanyima afirma que o fórum tem em 2015 o duplo desafio de conciliar a desigualdade social e as mudanças climáticas. “Tanto nos países ricos quanto nos pobres, essa desigualdade alimenta o conflito, corroendo as democracias e prejudicando o próprio crescimento”, afirma Byanyima.

A diretora da Oxfam lembra que há algum tempo os que se preocupavam com a desigualdade eram acusados de ter “inveja”, mas que apenas em 2014 algumas personalidades como o papa Francisco, o presidente dos Estados Unidos, Barack Obama, e a diretora do Fundo Monetário Internacional (FMI), Christine Lagarde, manifestaram preocupação com a desigualdade social. “O crescente consenso: se não controlada, a desigualdade econômica vai fazer regredir a luta contra a pobreza e ameaçará a estabilidade global”, afirma.

A Oxfam mostra que a riqueza do 1% é derivada de atividades em poucos setores, sendo os de finanças e seguros os principais e os de serviços médicos e indústria farmacêutica dois com grande crescimento em 2013 e 2014. A Oxfam lembra que as companhias mais ricas do mundo usam seu dinheiro, entre outras coisas, para influenciar os governos por meio de lobbies, favorecendo seus setores. No caso particular dos Estados Unidos, que concentra junto com a Europa a maior parte dos integrantes do 1% mais rico, o lobby é particularmente prolífico, afirma a Oxfam, para mexer no orçamento e nos impostos do país, destinando a poucos recursos que “deveriam ser direcionados em benefícios de toda a população”.

Para a Oxfam, a desigualdade social não deve ser tratada como algo inevitável. A ONG lista uma série de medidas para colocar a diferença entre ricos e pobres sob controle, como fazer os governos trabalharem para seus cidadãos e terem a redução da desigualdade como objetivo; a promoção dos direitos e a igualdade econômica das mulheres; o pagamento de salários mínimos e a contenção dos salários de executivos; e o objetivo de o mundo todo ter serviços gratuitos de saúde e educação.

* Publicado originalmente no site Carta Capital.

Posição da Diretoria da Associação Brasileira de Engenharia Sanitária e Ambiental – Seção São Paulo (ABES-SP) sobre a crise hídrica, apresentada no seminário “A Crise de Escassez Hídrica no Brasil e seu Gerenciamento no Estado de São Paulo”, realizado no dia 02 de dezembro de 2014, no auditório do CREA-SP:

Diretoria da ABES-SP.

Date: November 18, 2014

Source: International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis

Summary: Developing adaptable systems for finance and international relations could help reduce the risk of major systemic collapses such as the 2008 financial crisis, according to a new analysis.

The increasing complexity and interconnection of socioeconomic and environmental systems leaves them more vulnerable to seemingly small risks that can spiral out of control, according to the new study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The study examines risks are perceived as extremely unlikely or small, but because of interconnections or changes in systems, can lead to major collapses or crises. These risks, which the researchers term “femtorisks,” can include individuals such as terrorists, dissidents, or rogue traders, or factors like climate change, technologies, or globalization.

“A femtorisk is a seemingly small-scale event that can trigger, often through complex chains of events, consequences at much higher levels of organization,” says Princeton University professor and IIASA Distinguished Visiting Fellow Simon Levin, who adopted the term (originally suggested by co-organizer Joshua Ramo) together with an international group of experts during a 2011 IIASA conference on risk modeling in complex adaptive systems.

Levin explains, “A complex adaptive system is a system made up of individual agents that interact locally, with consequences at much higher levels of organization, which feed back in turn to affect individual behaviors. The individual agents can be anything from cells and molecules, to birds in a flock, to traders in a market, to each and every one of us in the global environment.”

The complexity of such systems makes it difficult or even impossible to model the outcomes of specific changes or risks, particularly very small or seemingly insignificant ones. The study examines several examples of such femtorisks that set off major crises, including the credit default swaps that led to the 2008 financial crisis, the recent protests in the Middle East and Ukraine that led to the broad upheavals in both regions’ political systems, and the warming temperatures in the Arctic that have led to massive international interest in the region for mining and economic development.

Risk management for an unpredictable world

In light of such unpredictable risks, the researchers say, the most resilient management systems are those that can adapt to sudden threats that have not been explicitly foreseen. In particular, the researchers suggest a model drawing on biological systems such as the vertebrate immune system, which have evolved to respond to unpredictable threats and adapt to new situations.

“In practice it is generally impossible to identify which of these risks will end up being the important ones,” says Levin. “That is why flexible and adaptive governance is essential.”

The general principles of such management include: effective surveillance, generalized and immediate initial responses, learning and adaptive responses, and memory, say the researchers. Levin says, “We need to design systems to automatically limit the potential for catastrophic contagious spread of damage, and to complement that with effective and flexible adaptive responses.”
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