This is I hope a (respectful) critique of @MLiebreich 's thread about XR. It is in no way a defence of Roger Hallam, but it is an examination of XR’s politics and how they fit into the wider landscape of political action on climate change
First up I agree that Roger Hallam plays fast and loose with climate science. I agree that this is a problem. And that it does more harm than good. However I don't think that it’s Hallam's inaccurate doom mongering that has brought people out onto the streets for XR
Rather, XR provided an organisation and a platform for people who were already worried enough to take to the streets. Hallam's apocalyptic ramblings are not the driving force force behind their civil disobedience.
Instead a combination of other factors are behind the big turn out and appetite for arrest: Attenborough, IPCC reports, the school strikes, Greta. Plus a sense that other options (online petitions) aren't cutting it. XR are not Hallam's disciples (however much he'd like that)
I also think that it's worth thinking about XR as part of an eco system of organisations that share some goals but not others. The key question is whether XR’s presence has moved us closer to a safer climate and rapid decarbonization
My view is that it really doesn't matter whether XR say we should decarbonize by 2025 or 2045. In fact, I suspect most people who got arrested don't hold a view on this either. It matters even less that XR don't have a coherent policy plan for reducing emissions
And it matters even even less that they don't have a positive vision for a post carbon society. In fact all these are a huge advantage to anyone who does. They have opened up a space in the public debate for people who do have those ideas and policy proposals.
XR have forced the idea of rapid decarbonization into public sphere. Now anyone else who does have a proposal re how to do it has more space to put it forward. If you do have a policy proposal, you should be pleased that XR do not. In a funny way it is rather generous of them!
I suspect that XR leaders and founders are not going to be championing carbon trading and market solutions. But XR don't specifically oppose them either. In fact the messaging seems to be deliberately agnostic about the policies that bring about decarbonisation.
Far from being political zealots I think that they are rather politically ambiguous. The political system they desire appears to be about new forms of individual political representation. In that sense it is politically liberal - in the traditional sense of the word.
XR do not see political change as resulting from class struggle - which precludes it from being socialist revolution in the strict sense. Their model for change does not involve working people taking control of the means of production and bringing industry into public ownership
XR’s political ambiguity; liberal leanings; policy agnosticism and lack of class analysis make it more reformist than revolutionary. However its street tactics clearly have a revolutionary tone. This means that supporters and critics can see what they wish to in XR’s politics.
It’s a revolution if you want a revolution. It’s reformist if you want reform. It’s a party if you want a party.
In fact, these have been the key criticism of XR from the left: it doesn’t present a socialist policy platform like the green new deal, it doesn’t seem to have a place for organised labour in its theory of change, it doesn’t propose new models of ownership of key industries
The left critique of XR also holds that by declining to explicitly back socialists and anti capitalist answers to climate change - they have left the door open to various neoliberal answers to the climate crisis too.
My beef with Hallam is something else. His predictions about mass starvation are actually rather tone deaf. There are currently 820 million people living in hunger - mostly driven by conflict. For people living in those circumstances his predictions have been true for a while
There are also many millions of people who live in countries that do not have functioning governments or infrastructure. They already live in what Hallam characterises as a state of social collapse. For a lot of people these apocalyptic visions are already their daily lives
