Defunding the Police Is Good Climate Policy
Kate Aronoff June 4, 2020Late Thursday, California’s Air Resources Board announced the results of the most recent auction of carbon allowances from its cap-and-trade program. It was the first such auction since the coronavirus landed fully on American shores. It brought in just $25 million worth of revenue... As the state faces a pandemic-driven budget crisis... climate and environmental justice programs, investing in jobs and climate mitigation in black and brown communities—could now be at risk.
As more and more videos emerge of violent, chaotic police responses to largely peaceful demonstrators, more people are joining calls from black organizers for governments to defund police departments, reallocating budgets toward the types of things that promote genuine physical, economic, and other forms of security in communities of color. Climate experts and campaigners—especially those dismayed by California’s lackluster carbon auction results—would do well to listen...
As The New Republic’s Melissa Gira Grant explained over the weekend... the Movement for Black Lives has long pushed an “Invest-Divest” policy platform demanding “investments in Black communities, determined by Black communities, and divestment from exploitative forces including prisons, fossil fuels, police, surveillance and exploitative corporations.”...
If xenophobic governments in Europe offer any indication, the lines between carceral and climate policy will only get fuzzier as temperatures rise.
An ever-growing number of green groups have released statements expressing solidarity with protesters and denouncing police brutality, white supremacy, and the increasingly warlike rhetoric from the White House.,, there’s plenty of common cause to be found in calls to defund the police and invest in a more generous, democratic, and green public sphere, well beyond the scope of what any carbon-pricing measure can accomplish...
