Some environmentalists, in the face of the omnicrisis and existential threat to our civilisation, or (as some think) even our species, are drawn to consider whether the use of force could improve our chances, and hence whether an authoritarian politics would be the least worst way to reduce humanity’s destructive spree. In this article I consider an extreme version of this view – that of philosopher John Foster, who hopes or perhaps calls for a self-appointed ecological elite to seize power and shape a sustainable society by force if necessary. In his own words, this ‘vanguard elite’

would actually be the advance guard and standard-bearer [which] had never been seduced into commodity-addiction… knowing the hard truth of our situation and determined to live in it, [would] accept the accompanying grim responsibility of taking power by whatever means they can, without waiting for any sort of majority endorsement and even overriding strong majority reluctance, in order to prevent what horrors can still be prevented. But in thus acting out of and on behalf of human wholeness they stand in, at this desperate juncture and with a thoroughly non-quantified kind of representativeness, for the whole of humanity. That is their warrant and legitimation for wielding whatever institutional force they can command, and indeed whatever force beyond that turns out to be called for.

John Foster, GreenHouse Think Tank

Foster has said that much of the moral progess humanity has made will inevitably be rolled back as we enter an era of general regress. This means that things like human rights and legitimate governments are luxuries we can no longer afford.

Let’s be clear – this isn’t the Green movement you grew up with, calling for hair shirts and higher petrol taxes. An illegitimate government usually means crushing political opposition, disappearing activists, secret police; and a vanguard elite could have extreme policies like forced labour, letting certain demographics die off, deploying unproven technologies etc. Foster doesn’t shy away from the fact that it would involve many evils and that some courageous self-appointees would bear the responsibility for that. Reminds me of Madeleine Albright’s ‘courage’ when she literally said that the deaths of all those Iraqi children was ‘worth it’.

So before I invite you to ask if it is worth it, let us think a bit further ahead, about how all this could happen.

Foster describes the vanguard elite as a sort of disaffected but enlightened civil service cabal, and the transfer of power not too sudden and hopefully bloodless. He doesn’t offer any precedents for this or say which country might have such enlightened leaders in waiting. I guess a military coup would also count, as long as the leaders were enlightened. Better still if there was some popular support like the Russian or French Revolutions. Perhaps the CIA would lend a hand since one can hardly imagine a regime change these days without it. To have any meaningful climate impact, most of the world would need to come under the new government. Of course the world isn’t a single political jurisdiction, but maybe the US Deep State could coup or coerce much of the world into a new political/economic system – although I would observe that the US has already been working for decades to subordinate the rest of the world without success, and its power is now waning for all to see. Maybe a geopolitical expert would have a different opinion.

Having taken power, the new global government would meet a lot of resistance from capitalists (some of them very powerful), climate-change deniers, maybe factions of the military, and of course from democrats and people who selfishly prefer their own freedom over the long-term survival of the species. Occupying a country isn’t always easy, and all those new enemies are going to need coercion, and will hamper progress.

Third, this elite will lack legitimacy, but perhaps it will abound in wisdom, implementing the right kinds of policies. The problem of how to ensure good leadership hasn’t been solved, despite being discussed since Plato [Republic book IV]. The problem is that there are different schools of environmentalism, some bitterly opposed! Policies like the Green New Deal, mass ‘renewables’ and batterification, carbon capture and storage etc are held up as utopian by some while others criticise them as short-term fixes, technological fantasies, venture capital vehicles and neocolonial aggrandisement. Adaptation, which I think is a much more relevant approach at this stage, seems to be a marginalised discourse. Who knows which policy raft these new elites would land on?

Can we even trust ‘elites’? It depends who is writing the history.

Then, even with the best policies and draconian enforcement, nothing is guaranteed. Not only are we part of a complex system – the biosphere – but that system is believed to be entering into a phase shift – a chaotic state. The consequences of our actions can never be known; only after the event can we make educated guesses. Probably whatever we do, temperatures will be going up for several decades and will make life as we know it impossible except maybe for the super-rich. Political decisions might make it less bad, but can easily make it worse.

Finally it’s worth enquiring into history. What is the track record for grand schemes executed by small elites to inflict short-term public pain for long-term public gain? Maybe you can find more hopeful examples, but history is littered with warnings. Coming to my mind are: the last ten years of austerity culminating in a superpower standoff, economic shock therapy, Pol Pot.

For such a high cost to life and liberty of living people, and such a low chance of the plan being executed in a helpful way, there’s little doubt in my mind that this is a bad idea. It indicates to me that preservation of the civilisation, or perhaps the species, is the highest or only ethic, betraying the type of fanaticism that never delivers what it promises.

But by rejecting the authoritarian solution I’m not giving up. I’m not one of those people who waxes philosophical and diminishes the tragedy with platitudes like “Humanity (or at least capitalism) was a failed experiment and time heals all wounds”. I have accepted that in the future, just as in the past and the present, there will be avoidable suffering on a scale which I can barely confront. Tipping points are tipping. Capitalism still has its foot to the floor and is still baking in massive future damage to individuals, societies and species.

I hope and believe, and work towards ideas that I think would be less bad for people and planet than authoritarianism. I’m prepared to consider radical action, including certain kinds of force. I forgive Foster’s proposal for being fanciful, but what is harder to forgive is a learned person publishing narratives which can be picked up and weaponised by ANY usurping elite, like uranium circulating on the black market. The fact that he frames it as a suggestion and not a warning chills me.

How will Foster feel in ten or twenty years time when a handful of trillionaires is running the world from their climate-controlled New Zealand moated fortress, safeguarding the world’s mineral reserves behind high walls, pouring resources into overcoming death and terraforming other planets, while throughout the rest of the world, billions are roasting, starving, fighting over scraps. And the trillionaires tell them, “Your sacrifice and suffering is noble because it enables ‘us’ to Progress as a species. Our revered philosopher John Foster said it was the only way.”

This scenario doesn’t sound so dissimilar to today. Big Finance has already taken over the organs of government and is using it to funnel wealth into tax havens while paying more and more lip service to the green agenda. Similarly, I don’t think my consent was ever asked. I swore enmity against that elite long ago.

Hoping that a different and righteous elite will do something horrendous and still remain righteous, as Foster specified above, and still be successful is a dismal, desperate, passive kind of hoping – especially since it seems much more likely, at least to me, that a narcissistic and venal elite would be much more willing and capable to supplant democracy, if they haven’t already.

Foster is not alone in leaving weaponised narratives lying around for any elite, present or prospective, to use to enslave us. Unfortunately the Greenhouse Think Tank is giving oxygen to his arguments, presumably because no-one paying the piper is opposed to this policy direction?

The green movement in its desperation is compromising with nefarious interests, and arguably with those interests who have refused to take climate action for decades. Eco-authoritarianism is one strand; eco-modernism – in which we seek salvation through investment in infrastructure and other (usually) big tech – is another. It puts me in a bind because I can’t support any of the ecological policies on the table because they are all bundled with other agendas that I do not support – not because I’m selfish, but because in my analysis we could build the beautiful world our hearts know is possible if the incumbent elites would just take their boots off our faces. Not much to ask eh? In my analysis, more political freedom is just as likely to help reduce suffering than less. Specifically freedom to protest, freedom of speech, freedom to generate and move energy, freedom from advertising, freedom from debt & poverty, freedom from wage-slavery.

So, if you are an environmentalist despairing about the possiblity of societal change, feeling the loom of a vague and terrible catastrophe, I’m totally with you. But if you are secretly or openly hoping that the masses might be compelled into sustainable behaviour, then you need to think outside of your box. Eco-authoritarianism is not a panacea for anything. It’s first purpose will always be to enrich the elite. You might just as well turn the concept on its head and promote say, eco-libertarianism.

Many people who finally admit that the climate battle is lost still find ways to be positive, purposeful and impactful. Those people deserve your support, aspirations, attention much more than anyone who would voluntarily take responsibility for your impoverishment! The future is not yet written.