Wrong, Grist, climate change is not causing the rise of authoritarianism – does Watt have anything to say about that?

from climaterealism

Author: Linny Luken

Grist recently published an article titled “Authoritarianism is on the Rise.” Is climate change to blame? Claims that climate change is creating conditions, such as more severe storms, droughts and wildfires, that are leading to the rise of authoritarian governments around the world. From a scientific and historical perspective, this is stupid. The situations listed are not getting worse, so they do not lead to any rise in authoritarianism. Likewise, authoritarian governments existed long before modern warming began and are indeed more common. There are fewer unelected authoritarian rulers now than at any time in history.

Grist cited several small studies to support this view, namely that of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro “Strongmen” such as, and most absurdly, former US President Donald Trump are becoming increasingly common as global warming prompts people to seek security in authoritarian candidates. “They are making progress as worsening storms, droughts and wildfires impact more and more people and climate change becomes increasingly obvious and harmful,” Grist claimed.

First, it should be noted that Grist refers to each leader as a “strongman,” meaning they are autocrats who are democratically elected. The people chose them, they did not seize power through violence, they did not use violence to enforce their rule, they did not use the military against the people, and when they were replaced in subsequent elections, they remained in power, so it was difficult Call them dictators, except perhaps in the minds of the article's author and Grist's editorial staff.

False labels aside, Grist cited a study in which “Economists in the United Kingdom and Australia devised an ingenious study to try to prove that storms like hurricanes actually reason Sliding toward Authoritarianism,” which compared the storm data to a sociological “dataset” that provides “democracy scores” for island nations. The study found that these democracy scores were lower on average in the year after the big storms About 4.25%. Like many similar politically “smart” studies, this is clearly an example of looking for hypotheses to draw conclusions. Grist even quoted the study's lead author as admitting they were “trying to fill in the gaps” in drawing a causal link between authoritarianism and natural disasters.

At a superficial level this may sound like a good or reasonable conclusion, and it is true that uncertainty and instability can lead to the rise of corrupt leadership, but the idea that climate change is creating these conditions is wrong.

For example, as the data shows, hurricanes have neither become more extreme nor more frequent over time. Previous climate realism Articles (only a very small sample here , here , and here ). That being the case, it's clear that changes in hurricane behavior don't actually lead to more authoritarianism.

Likewise, droughts are not becoming more common or severe, with the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reporting increased precipitation in mid-latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere and “lower” confidence in any negative global trends. Particularly in the United States, where Grist claims climate chaos may have affected popular support for Donald Trump, the proportion of the country experiencing “very dry” conditions in recent decades is well below levels seen in the mid-20th century.^th century. (see picture below)

Data from NASA's Earth Observatory shows that instead of getting worse, the number and size of wildfires are declining. Between 1998 and 2015, the global burned area decreased by 24%.

It’s not just the data that disagrees with Grist’s assumptions, any thinking person knows that history does too. suggesting that we see more dictators today than in previous centuries Ridiculous. According to Our World in Data, even though most non-democracies are now electoral dictatorships, more than a third of democracies are liberal democracies.

If anything, the world is now freer than ever, with fewer people ruled by dictators than at any time in history, regardless of how they came to power — and all this in the context of recent climate change Not a big time.

One could easily point to another set of conditions that might lead people to fall into the arms of a dictator. This can be caused by economic instability and lack of opportunity, such as over-regulation, mandated increases in renewable energy, and grid instability resulting from premature shutdowns of conventional power plants. Bans on the use of chemical fertilizers, pesticides and other agricultural tools have led to mass famine, as happened in Sri Lanka, and also created chaos and uncertainty. It should also be noted that climate alarmists often support autocratic and authoritarian approaches to eliminating the freedoms of individuals, limiting how they travel, how they drive, what they eat, how many days they take, all in the name of decarbonisation. For example, many climate alarmists have praised China's authoritarian government in the past.

Grist, like-minded organizations, and the policies and world leaders they support are far more threatening to individual freedoms than vague climate change, even though they don’t seem to look in the mirror often.