Scientists Call for Civil Disobedience To Drive Government Action in Climate Change Mitigation, Adaptation

From Reuters in London:

Almost 400 scientists have endorsed a civil disobedience campaign aimed at forcing governments to take rapid action to tackle climate change, warning that failure could inflict “incalculable human suffering.” In a joint declaration, climate scientists, physicists, biologists, engineers and others from at least 20 countries broke with the caution traditionally associated with academia to side with peaceful protesters courting arrest from Amsterdam to Melbourne.

Wearing white laboratory coats to symbolize their research credentials, a group of about 20 of the signatories gathered on Saturday to read out the text outside London’s century-old Science Museum in the city’s upmarket Kensington district. “We believe that the continued governmental inaction over the climate and ecological crisis now justifies peaceful and non-violent protest and direct action, even if this goes beyond the bounds of the current law,” said Emily Grossman, a science broadcaster with a PhD in molecular biology. She read the declaration on behalf of the group.

Needless to say, this really is a historic moment; it’s a huge shift from the mild-mannered college professors we encountered on campus in our salad days.  But is it a surprise?  Anyone who’s ever listened to a climate scientist knows that this isn’t simply an academic issue, like the discovery of a new subatomic particle or a new species of frog.

My first such experience was the interview I conducted in 2009 with Dr. V. Ramanathan of the Scripps Institute, an organization whose mission is to “seek, teach, and communicate scientific understanding of the oceans, atmosphere, Earth, and other planets for the benefit of society and the environment.”  When I spoke to “Ram” (as he likes to be called–pictured above), in preparation for my first book, Renewable Energy–Facts and Fantasies, I happened to ask him, “Don’t you find it frustrating that the worlds’ governments are doing so little on a topic as crucial to our survival as a civilization?”  He smiled politely, and then replied, “Please don’t worry about me.  There 7.5 billion people on this planet, every one of whom will be deeply impacted.  I’m just one of them.  We all have to work together to minimize the damage.”

As I was packing up me stuff to leave, I overheard part of a conversation he was having with a colleague.  They were talking about the upcoming COP (Conference of Parties–Climate Summit) meeting in Copenhagen, and the aggressive strategy they were planning to take in the all-too-likely event that an insufficient level of agreement was reached to limit greenhouse gas emissions.  I couldn’t get the details, but it was clear that he takes this stuff seriously.

Here it is ten years later. Whether he’d be in favor of civil disobedience at this point I can’t say, but it seems probable given his level of passion and the bitter disappointments that have ensued over the last decade.