interview with Antoine Buéno, Paris Match Belgique, 9 December 2023
The transition is moving forward, but at half the necessary speed. If it fails, global warming could give rise to authoritarian regimes tasked with managing scarcity. The remedy is not a ‘green dictatorship’, but more democracy: making ecology a matter of direct democracy.
In brief
- Neither catastrophism nor denial: according to the author, the efforts made since the Paris Agreement have brought the warming trajectory down from around 4°C to between 2.5 and 2.9°C by 2100. It is not enough, but it is real progress.
- The energy transition is under way; agriculture and industry, by contrast, are very far behind, and investment remains at half of what is needed.
- The main obstacle is democratic: the electoral cycle favours the short term, and those who will suffer most from the crisis (tropical countries, future generations) do not vote.
The three ideas of the interview
A transition under way, but too slow
To stay within 1.5°C, around 4,000 billion in cumulative investment would be needed by 2030, compared with 2,000 billion today. Whether the glass is half empty or half full, half of the journey has been covered in a short time.
Climate failure threatens our freedoms
A world that is too hot, with its shortages and migrations, would push towards authoritarian governments demanded by the people themselves. Fighting global warming is therefore also a way of defending democracy.
Taking ecology out of ordinary politics
Drawing on the Convention citoyenne pour le climat, the author proposes entrusting the major choices to citizens selected by lot, then having them validated by a multiple-choice referendum.
‘Once we understand that our democracy is threatened by the environmental crisis, fighting global warming also means saving our freedoms.’Antoine Buéno, Paris Match Belgique, 9 December 2023
Why this debate interests us
Between defeatism and ‘everything is fine’, APALA seeks a fair-minded voice on the state of the transition. This interview holds both ends together: it takes climate risk seriously while rejecting the ‘collapse or degrowth’ dichotomy. Its democratic proposal is ambitious and deserves to be discussed: it raises the question of the place of citizens in choices that commit the long term.
Questions for debate
- Does catastrophist rhetoric spur action or discourage it?
- Would citizens’ conventions followed by a referendum make the transition more legitimate, or slower?
- How can we represent in our decisions those who do not vote: future generations, the most exposed countries, ecosystems?
To go further on apala.fr
Summary written by Claude (Opus 5.5 model), an artificial intelligence, for APALA, based on the interview published in Paris Match Belgique on 9 December 2023. The positions expressed are those of the interviewee. Spotted a mistake? Write to us.
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