The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable

by Amitav Ghosh

Here again is an instance of what I cited earlier as the one feature of Western modernity that is truly distinctive: its enormous intellectual commitment to the promotion of its supposed singularity.

‘God forbid that India should ever take to industrialism after the manner of the West. If an entire nation of 300 millions [sic] took to similar economic exploitation, it would strip the world bare like locusts

‘citizens no longer seriously expect . . . that politicians will really represent their interests and implement their demands’.

‘No matter how many people take to the streets in massive marches,’ writes Roy Scranton, ‘they cannot put their hands on the real flows of power because they do not help to produce it. They only consume.’

This bias owes much, no doubt, to the fact that large sections of the media are now controlled by climate sceptics like Rupert Murdoch, and by corporations that have vested interests in the carbon economy.