“COP26 is a performance. It’s an illusion constructed to salvage capitalist economy rooted in resource extraction & colonialism. I didn’t come here to fix the agenda, I came here to disrupt it. I’m not going to my coloniser for solutions” – Ta’Kaiya Blaney, 19, a member of Canada’s Tla’Amin First Nation

 “COP26 is a performance. It’s an illusion constructed to salvage capitalist economy rooted in resource extraction & colonialism. I didn’t come here to fix the agenda, I came here to disrupt it. I’m not going to my coloniser for solutions” – Ta’Kaiya Blaney, 19, a member of Canada’s Tla’Amin First Nation

 According to the most recent data, governments are planning to produce 57% more oil, 71% more gas and 240% more coal than is consistent with a 1.5°C target by 2030. 

To even have half a chance of keeping 1.5°C alive, at least 60% of oil and gas and 90% of coal must remain in the ground

 Graduates from poorer backgrounds earn half as much as their more privileged peers in their first job after university because they put themselves forward for fewer roles and lack the family connections and financial support to hunt for top jobs, a survey of 5,000 graduates suggested. 

Those whose parents held professional roles, including chief executives, doctors and teachers, earned an average of £23,457 in their first job after university, compared with just £11,595 among those whose parents held technical, manual or service jobs.

“The stark reality is where you grew up and what your parents did still has an impact on your opportunities and your earning potential,” said Sarah Atkinson, the chief executive of the Social Mobility Foundation. She said wealthier graduates tended to benefit from being able to “hold out for the job and salary” they wanted, as well as having the confidence to aim higher in job applications. They are also better at negotiating over salary, and able to leverage unpaid work experience to start at a higher level, she added.

 After university, poorer graduates applied for an average of six jobs compared with nine for their wealthier peers, the figures showed.

The report showed that more privileged graduates were 47% more likely to use family connections to find their first job. This was especially the case for top earners: of those who earned more than £50,000, 61% said family, friends or former colleagues had helped them to secure a job, compared with just 35% of people earning less than £50,000.

Privileged graduates were also twice as likely to receive financial support during the job-hunting process, enabling them to undertake more unpaid work experience placements. They were also more confident they would find a job they wanted (71% compared with 50%) and benefited from cultural advantages such as taking inspiration from their parents’ professions in their job search.

Willingness to move was also identified as a barrier in the report, with just 64% of poorer graduates open to relocating compared with 76% of their more privileged peers. Those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds tended to look for roles in the areas in which they grew up, where they often found a lack of jobs that matched their skill set. The report suggested this could be due to anxieties about the cost of moving to and living in bigger cities.

Disadvantaged graduates earn half as much as privileged peers in first job | Job hunting | The Guardian

 “…We see business leaders and investors flying into Cop on private jets. We see them making fancy speeches. We hear about new pledges and promises. We are drowning in promises. Promises will not stop the suffering of people. Only immediate and drastic action will pull us back from the abyss. It’s hard to believe business and finance leaders when they haven’t delivered before. We simply don’t believe it…” – Vanessa Nakate

“Despite the ever-increasing numbers of vaccines produced, both states and pharmaceutical companies are continuing to fail to guarantee fair access to lifesaving medicines for all,” Amnesty’s briefing explains. “Pfizer, one the largest and most profitable vaccine developers… has delivered in excess of 1.8 billion doses to date,” the publication continues. “Despite its many pledges—some misleadingly phrased—Pfizer… continues to reserve the bulk of its vaccines for higher-income countries.”

96% of people in low-income countries remain unvaccinated.

Pfizer expects to earn 36 billion dollars in vaccine sales this year alone, has distorted reality to benefit its corporate image. Pfizer claimed it is “committed to sharing our scientific tools and insights, development expertise, and manufacturing capacity,” yet the company has opposed sharing of intellectual property through the WHO’s Covid-19 Technology Access Pool (C-TAP). The company is still refusing to participate in technology sharing initiatives, such as the South African-based [World Health Organization] mRNA technology hub, and has lobbied vigorously against efforts to lift intellectual property restrictions, proposals put forward by India and South Africa to the World Trade Organization Council for Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) to suspend critical intellectual property provisions of the TRIPS Agreement, 

“Pfizer is still putting profits before people,” Amnesty charges.

Pfizer vaccines language is misleading.” The briefing asserts “Pfizer has amalgamated low, lower-middle, and upper-middle countries—over 84% of the global population—into one group and referred to them as ‘low and middle-income.’ Within this very broad category, the bulk of Pfizer’s doses have in fact been going to ‘upper-middle’ income countries such as Malaysia, Mexico, and Thailand.”

Pfizer said it had shipped two billion vaccine doses by the end of September, but only 154 million doses, or less than 8% of its total—had been sent to 42 low and lower-middle-income countries, and that less than 10% of those shots had gone to low-income countries.

Patrick Wilcken, Amnesty’s head of business and human rights, said in a statement Thursday that “Pfizer says it is committed to supplying doses to low- and middle-income countries, but the numbers just don’t bear this out. The fact is that this company is still putting profits first. As much as these companies might want to massage the facts, the numbers are crystal clear..”

Shame on those countries hoarding vaccines, shame on Big Pharma prioritizing profits over people. Shame on both for blocking attempts to increase vaccine production.

Pfizer Misleading World With False Claims of Equitable Vaccine Distribution: Amnesty (commondreams.org)

The new U.N. Refugee Agency, or UNHCR, report revealed that a rising number of people worldwide are fleeing violence, insecurity, and the effects of the climate emergency, with over 84 million relocating within and beyond their home countries during the first half of this year.

Internally displaced people (IDP) make up more than half of the agency’s total tally at 48 million. According to UNHCR, from January to June, there were also 26.6 million refugees as well as 4.4 million asylum-seekers and 3.9 million Venezuelans displaced abroad, which is its own category.

The actual number of stateless people in the world remains unknown due to a lack of accurate data. 

“The international community is failing to prevent violence, persecution, and human rights violations, which continue to drive people from their homes,” said Filippo Grandi, the U.N. high commissioner for refugees. “In addition, the effects of climate change are exacerbating existing vulnerabilities in many areas hosting the forcibly displaced.” He pointed out that “It is the communities and countries with the fewest resources that continue to shoulder the greatest burden in protecting and caring for the forcibly displaced.” 

Developing countries hosted 85% of refugees and Venezuelans displaced abroad;73% of refugees and displaced Venezuelans lived in neighboring countries;Asylum-seekers submitted 555,400 new claims, with the United States receiving the most applications—72,900;Turkey hosted the world’s largest refugee population at 3.7 million people;16,300 refugees were resettled during the first half of this year;1.1 million people returned to their areas or nations of origin; and68% of all refugees—including those from Venezuela—came from just five countries.

The countries from which the most people fled were Syria, Venezuela, Afghanistan, South Sudan, and Myanmar. Some of those nations also have large amounts of internal displacement.

More than a million people were newly displaced within both Congo and Ethiopia. 

Globally, the nations with the next highest new internal displacements were Afghanistan, Myanmar, Central African Republic, South Sudan, Nigeria, Syria, Mozambique, and Burkina Faso.

Africa witnessed the most new internal displacements as conflict and violence flared in several countries across the continent,” says the report, specifically noting the impact of Civil War on Ethiopia’s Tigray region, problems in Mozambique’s northern province of Cabo Delgado, and “a crisis of governance and instability in rural areas of Burkina Faso linked to the presence of armed insurgents.”

According to the report:

“At the end of June 2021, the number of pending individual asylum applications of all types stood at 4.4 million, nearly 7% more than the 4.1 million ending at the end of 2020. This trend is concerning, as lengthy backlogs heighten the risk that individuals with international protection needs will not be able to access protection and solutions in a timely and effective manner. If backlogs become protracted and asylum-seekers wait multiple years for a final determination of their claims without meaningful access to rights or certainty about their future, there will be negative consequences for everyone, including erosion of public confidence in the system, increased costs, and difficulties in returning rejected applicants.”

Over 84 Million People Forcibly Displaced by Climate Emergency, Insecurity, and Violence (commondreams.org)

To ensure a harmonious relationship with our environment only a coherent policy can abolish the gloom and uncertainty which has been made possible by insane and irrational policies which result from an unplanned and blind economic and social system, which is what capitalism is. Capitalism is different from all preceding class societies in that its driving force is accumulation for the sake of accumulation. Commodity production has become an end in itself under capitalism. Goods are produced for their exchange value, not their use-value.

Under capitalism, there are no limits to exploitation as each unit of capital has to compete with all the others. Surplus value in the form of profits is reinvested in the production process by each capitalist rather than consumed. The logic of capitalist competition forces each capitalist to obtain the maximum profit possible; otherwise, they will fall behind their competitors and go out of business. Production is therefore organised around the short term and the effect on nature, negative or otherwise is not a concern for the capitalist. Air pollution caused by a factory is not treated as a cost of production internal to that factory, rather it is viewed as an external cost to be borne by nature and society.

The fight against climate change and transition to renewable energy sources mean breaking with a capitalist economy based on the endless expansion of production no matter the cost. It’s time we made conscious and collective decisions. 

The World Socialist Movement clearly identifies the culprit: the capitalist system with its insatiable greed and irrepressible need for growth. If we want to save the world, we must dismantle capitalism itself. instead of manufacturing products for profit, we will produce to satisfy human needs with useful, durable, repairable, adaptable products, not throwaway consumer goods. A radical break with the capitalist system is required.

Socialism is all about planning at the local, regional, continental, and world levels with major decisions that could be made by the population or by committees composed of elected delegates. We replace the so-called “invisible hand” of the market with the very visible decision-making of the collective will of working people. Rather than argue against the usual environmentalist approach that focuses on individual choice and lifestyle consumption, the WSM suggests questioning the logic of capitalist production itself.

Businesses are compelled to produce more in order to sell more to maximise profits and it employs a vast elaborate advertising industry to ensure customers buy more and with built-in obsolescence, those customers are obliged to constantly re-purchase replacements. Capitalism is a hugely wasteful economy that would not be necessary with rationally organised production.

Given the urgency of the climate emergency, there couldn’t be an any better argument than a mass social revolution that changes the priorities of the system. A reformist approach that advocates piecemeal gradual change can not even begin to seriously solve the scale of the problem. The WSM envisages a future socialist society that would prioritise human needs instead of profit and restructure the economy and energy and transport usage in such a way that is sustainable and beneficial to both humanity and our surroundings. Frequently, the objection to all the practical measures to reduce global warming by mainstream economists is based on cost.

Such financial reasons will not apply inside socialism. Nor will population numbers which are often mistakenly viewed as a problem prove to be an obstacle. Each new life will not be treated as an extra mouth to feed but as an additional brain and pair of helping hands for the betterment of humanity and nature.