Learning Outcomes:
By the end of this course, you will be able to:
Explain key ideas and concepts in contemporary climate and environmental philosophy, especially on climate justice, climate emotions, environmental duties, and the philosophical challenges arising from climate change.
Critically understand, analyse and engage with concepts and positions within contemporary climate and environmental philosophy.
Justify and explain your own views and ideas on climate and environmental philosophy.
Indicative Module Content:
Week 1: The Scale of the Climate Crisis: A Perfect Moral Storm
In our first session, we start to take stock on what the scale of the climate crisis is, and why acting upon it has been so difficult.
Main Reading:
Stephen Gardiner: A Perfect Moral Storm: Climate Change, Intergenerational Ethics and the Problem of Moral Corruption (13 pages)
Kim Stanley Johnson: The Ministry for the Future, Chapter 1 and 4 (8 pages)
Week 2: The Scale of the Climate Crisis: Global Climate Justice
In our second session, we will continue our stocktake on the climate crisis, and discuss whether it is a special problem, or just a continuation of colonialism and global injustice.
Main Reading:
Henry Shue: Subsistence Emissions and Luxury Emissions (20 pages)
Agarwal, Anil and Sunita Narain: Global Warming in an Unequal World: A Case of Environmental Colonialism (11 pages)
Week 3: The Scale of the Climate Crisis: Fossil Capitalism
Our third session on the scale of the climate crisis will expand on the mode of production that has created the climate crisis, and discuss whether it goes beyond what classical marxist theories can make sense of.
Main Reading:
Andreas Malm: Fossil Capitalism, Chapter 13 (26 pages)
Week 4: The Scale of the Climate Crisis: Is it too late?
Our forth session will discuss whether, given the scale of the climate crisis, it is too late for climate justice in any meaningful sense. We will discuss the question from the perspective of those most vulnerable to the climate crisis, such as indigenous peoples, and contrast this with a science perspective that urges us to consider what difference even small increments of change can do to the climate.
Main Reading:
Kyle White: Too late for indigenous climate justice: Ecological and relational tipping points
Thomas Nicholas, Galen Hall, Colleen Schmid: The Faulty Science, Doomism and Flawed Conclusions of Deep Adaptation: , https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/oureconomy/faulty-science-doomism-and-flawed-conclusions-deep-adaptation/
Week 5: Is it my fault? - Ethical Consumerism and Making a Difference
We all agree that urgent action to stop climate breakdown is needed, but sometimes our individual contributions seem to be dwarfed by the scale of the problem to the extent that we feel it doesn’t matter at all what we do as individuals. We will start discussing individual action and making a difference here.
Main Reading:
Walter Sinnot Armstrong: It’s not my fault (13 pages)
Julia Nefsky: How you can help, without making a difference (25 pages)
Week 6: Do We have a Duty to be Climate Activists?
Individual action on climate change does not only mean ethical consumerism, but might also mean a variety of other duties. Do we have an obligation to be climate activists?
Main Reading:
Elizabeth Cripps: Mimicking Duties (Chapter 5 of Climate Change and the Moral Agent) (19 pages)
Elizabeth Cripps: Promotional and Direct Duties (Chapter 6 of Climate Change and the Moral Agent) (20 pages)
Week 7: Civil Disobedience
Traditional protest has its limits: many climate activists now use civil disobedience to challenge governments and corporations to act on the climate crisis. This week, we take a general overview on civil disobedience, how it is justified, and whether it is undemocratic and coercive.
Main Reading:
Martin Luther King: Letter from Birmingham Jail (10 pages)
Francisco Garcia-Gibson: Undemocratic Climate Protests (15 pages)
Week 8: Sabotage
Civil disobedience can also be objected to from the other end: some feel that it doesn’t go far enough to deal with the climate crisis. This session will dive into the question of sabotage and property damage, and whether we should go beyond being civil to stop the climate crisis.
Main Reading:
Andreas Malm: How to Blow Up a Pipeline, Chapter 1 (25 pages)
Jennifer Welchman: Is Ecosabotage Civil Disobedience (10 pages)
Week 9: Violence
While this is not openly discussed in academia or the climate movement, this session will go beyond sabotage: In the face of catastrophic climate breakdown, are we justified in using violence (threats, kidnapping, assassinations) against people in positions of power as a way to stop the climate crisis?
Main reading:
Andreas Malm: How to Blow Up a Pipeline, Chapter 2 (21 pages)
Kim Stanley Johnson: The Ministry for the Future, Chapter 23, 25, 33, 39, 51 (15 pages)
Week 10: Climate Emotions: Anger, Anxiety, Fear and Guilt
Recent reports indicate that virtually every young person feels climate anxiety to some extent (The Lancet 2022). We will discuss here the rationality of climate emotions, and how we can deal with the intense feelings we have when facing climate breakdown.
Main Reading:
Amia Srinivasan: The Aptness of Anger (21 pages)
Julia Mosquera & Kirsti M. Jylhä: How to Feel About Climate Change? An Analysis of the Normativity of Climate Emotions (19 pages)
Week 11: Climate Emotions: Despair and Hope
We will continue our exploration of climate emotions with an outlook on despair and hope in the face of climate breakdown, and whether we have good reason to rid ourselves of despair that we might feel when looking at the scale of the climate crisis.
Main Reading:
Catriona MacKinnon: Against Despair
Andreas Malm: How to Blow Up a Pipeline, Chapter 3 (9 pages)
Week 12: Optimism and Pessimism about the Climate Crisis
Closing both our journey through climate emotions as well as the class as a whole, we will explore the philosophical traditions of optimism and pessimism, what they have to say about hope and despair, and what our moral outlook on the climate crisis should be.
Main Reading:
Mara van der Lugt: Hopeful Pessimism