Madame M,
On a large scale, capitalism in its so-called “pure” form has never been tried, but only hybrids of one sort or another. It may even be that no “pure” form is even possible on a large scale.
No, you can’t make someone honest or trustworthy (although the culture can foment), and more than one historian has remarked that the decline of a people’s character had more effect on their civilization’s downfall than anything else.
Legislation is usually worse than useless when it is reached for too much, as is it obviously is in our society.
“All that can be done is to make them pay after the damage is done.” I might agree with this for many things, but there are certain instances of the public good that are too critical for this philosophy to work. I don’t just mean oil wells, oil tankers, etc. and their now well demonstrated ability to catastrophically pollute, but things like nuclear power plants and the ability of megacorporations to completely destroy your economic way of life and all your personal financial health. Certain aspects of our highly technological and complicated society are so potentially damaging that this philosophy must have exceptions. While I agree that regulation can be and often is stiflingly and economically retarding and excessive, a complete lack of it is irresponsible given what can be at stake. The idea of self-interest and self-regulating can be a good one for many things, but we humans don’t always think through (and rarely completely) our actions, and sometimes self-interest is instead narrow selfishness. While we regulate far too many things (or at least, regulate excessively), and are too safety-obsessive, there are some things we need to regulate because individuals and corporations will either not think enough of the common good, or that the consequences of their failure to do so are too catastrophic.
Other potentially polluting companies ARE watching, and making cost calculations. I think the lesson they could be taking is how easy it is to escape TRUE responsibility and pain, especially of the personal accountability kind. Selfish disconnection, and a sense of who has the real power, seem the appropriate “lessons.”
Our regulatory inability to drill closer, which would be “safer?” This argument that is out there in the chattering class and media is a deflective one. The central problem is our addiction to a destructive substance, one as destructive to a society as tobacco or even heroin is to an individual. We attempt to deflect our addiction by making all sorts of compromises (filtered cigarettes anyone?) because we innately know it is irrational and destructive. We don’t want our ocean views spoiled, nor the teeming life in the relative shallows threatened, among other things, even though it is “safer” to drill in shallower water (although putting much stock in “safer,” given the oil industry’s often near-criminal disregard for safety measures that cost money, is irresponsible in itself). So we drill out of relative sight, in waters with less marine life, although it is a bit more dangerous and harder to rectify if something goes wrong. Yet the fundamental kraken in the water is that we are knowingly and willingly, as we have for so long, not facing up to and doing something about our self-destructive addiction. We are like the South American mine workers of old, who chewed coca leaves for the energy to keep working on, even though the dust and conditions were destroying their lungs and general health, and the coca leaves themselves burning up what little they had left, and with the reasons for mining so much being sheer greed and selfishness on the part of the “elites.”
What to do in the interim? We ADAPT. We LIVE within what is possible, not what is destructive illusion. Yes, we can do most or all the things outlined in 4.0, but the central point is that we first and foremost remember what matters: the continuity of life and the pact we make with future generations to be their good stewards and leave them at least as good a place and hopefully better. Right now, we are, except for a few notable things, leaving them a place that is not only not better, but markedly worse in many ways (including many non-environmental ones). That is selfishly irresponsible in the extreme. If I were our descendants, I would despise us so much that our memories would not even be honored. Our graves would be dug up, our embalmed bodies thrown into some common lime pit, and most traces of us erased in disgust.
We pamper ourselves with too much of “but we need, but we need,” both as individuals and society. We actually NEED a lot less than our endless WANTS would imply, and much of what we appear to need is what we have gotten used to, what we think we can’t do without, and the boxing trap of what has “always” been. Until we fix all what we have wrought, and bring ourselves back into sustainability, we should adapt and do without. Our grandparents and great grandparents, tested by the hard teachings of Depression and War, knew how to do that. “We have lost our way, Arthur.” [Excalibur]
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