SquareState - public policy

Call for Climate Change-Policy Paradigm Shift

WeatherDem — Sun, 09 Sep 2012 17:45:32 GMT

Nature Climate Change's most recent issue included a paper by Kevin Anderson and Alice Bows entitled, "A new paradigm for climate change" [subs. req'd]. Kevin works at the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, School of Mechanical Civil and Aerospace Engineering and Alice works at the Sustainable Consumption Institute, School of Mechanical Civil and Aerospace Engineering, University of Manchester. The discussion and arguments in the paper aren't exactly novel if you've paid attention to the policy side of the climate change topic but bears examination as much as other works on the climate-policy interface, in which I am very interested.

I think the paper has some serious flaws in its assumptions, which detracts from the policy prescriptions offered. Prime among the flaws is this:

We urgently need to acknowledge that the development needs of many countries leave the rich western nations with little choice but to immediately and severely curb their greenhouse gas emissions

The latter part of this statement simply will not happen, barring additional severe economic distress. The first part represents progress from the scientific community: developing nations want and deserve higher living standards, of which energy is a primary input. But developed nations cannot and will not "immediately and severely curb their greenhouse gas emissions". There is a choice that these nations make every day: their own economies will grow and they will do so with the cheapest energy possible.
The U.S. recently achieved something through price signals that scientists and environmentalists have failed to achieve via policy for a generation: a significant reduction in overall CO2 emissions: 7.7% since 2006, the largest reduction of all countries or regions. This is after Congress failed to get a climate-energy bill passed in 2010. Why did the decrease occur? Because old coal-fired plants (the most polluting type) grew much more uneconomical to operate in the past few years compared to natural gas-fired plants. There is a problem moving forward and that is there is nothing substantially cheaper than natural gas on the scale necessary to further reduce U.S. emissions. Effectively, there is a new baseline from which the U.S. will operate for the next generation. But natural gas, as most readers are familiar, still pollutes far more than renewable energy sources. So U.S. emissions will continue to be quite high and more CO2 will accumulate in the atmosphere.

Despite the early flawed assumption, the papers' authors quite correctly state the following:

[...]any contextual interpretation of the science demonstrates that the threshold of 2°C [increase in average global temperatures] is no longer viable, at least within orthodox political and economic constraints. Against this backdrop, unsubstantiated hope leaves such constraints unquestioned, while at the same time legitimizing a focus on increasingly improbable low-carbon futures and underplaying high-emission scenarios.

I have written many times on the false hope that low- and moderate-emission pathways represent (given the unfortunate reality that our actual emissions are on a substantially different orientation) and lamented that even climate scientists misdirected their energies by rarely analyzing high-emission scenarios, thereby depriving policymakers with the required scope of potential futures from which we choose.

The authors do present this somewhat accurate portrayal:

At the same time as climate change analyses are being subverted to reconcile them with the orthodoxy of economic growth, neoclassical economics has evidently failed to keep even its own house in order. This failure is not peripheral. It is prolonged, deep-rooted and disregards national boundaries, raising profound issues about the structures, values and framing of contemporary society.

Rather than demonizing neoclassical economics, the authors should look for opportunities within such a framework that would actually result in emissions reductions. But the authors' do identify issues that really do lie at the heart of climate policy: the values of contemporary society. If those values were more robustly analyzed and respected for what they were as a foundation to climate policy, we would have made meaningful progress on the issue.

The lack of such effort is evident in one of the authors' concluding paragraphs:

It is in this rapidly evolving context that the science underpinning climate change is being conducted and its findings communicated. This is an opportunity that should and must be grasped. Liberate the science from the economics, finance and astrology, stand by the conclusions however uncomfortable. But this is still not enough. In an increasingly interconnected world where the whole - the system - is often far removed from the sum of its parts, we need to be less afraid of making academic judgements. Not unsubstantiated opinions and prejudice, but applying a mix of academic rigour, courage and humility to bring new and interdisciplinary insights into the emerging era. Leave the market economists to fight among themselves over the right price of carbon - let them relive their groundhog day if they wish. The world is moving on and we need to have the audacity to think differently and conceive of alternative futures.

This thrown gauntlet is full of high-minded rhetoric but short on grasping the realities of the world. I don't know of any climate scientist who is afraid of making academic judgements. But it is folly to accuse skeptics of unsubstantiated opinions and prejudice when advocates for climate activism also display their own set of opinions and prejudice - those opinion and prejudices arise through psychological lenses which themselves are rooted in biological constructs. Insulting one another has done and will continue to not to anything to solve this problem. Nobody has the "truth" market cornered. The "new" paradigm championed by the authors bears remarkable resemblance to other recommendations from legions of climate activists before them. What has such a stance accomplished? Emissions continue to grow, concentrations continue to accumulate, temperatures continue to rise, etc.

Many of the same people who rail against unsubstantiated opinions and prejudice also vehemently dismiss new articulated paradigms. I see nothing in this paper, or many others like it, that advocate for the rapid growth of developing economies based on 21st century technologies and innovations, even though such an effort is clearly needed while developed nations work at finding ways to decarbonize their own economies. Quite simply, this is the least expensive path forward - it leverages opportunity within the economic framework in which we operate. It strikes me as senseless to continue the same fight that has not achieved meaningful decarbonization in the last two generations.

Idiotic Analyses

WeatherDem — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 17:47:26 GMT

It's been slow posting as I've headed back to school to combine my meteorological experience with some exposure to policy. I'm buried under tons of reading, most of which is good and will spawn plenty of posts in the future when I have more time. In the meantime, I wanted to point out a piece of writing that is absolute trash. From the "Science and Public Policy Institute" (a D.C. "think tank"), I found a piece entitled 2011 U.S. Temperature Update: Alarmism Not by Chip Knappenberger. The purpose of this paper is to convince policymakers that temperatures in the U.S. aren't noteworthy and evokes the frame of global warming alarmism. The methodology of the paper is the bothersome aspect.

Chip starts by showing a graph of U.S. surface temperature data from 1895-1997. Any guess why? Because the most intense El Niño in recorded history occurred in 1998 and denialists like to use data since 1998 to try to show that global warming is not occurring. Count Chip among this crowd, as his next graph includes surface data up to 2007 in an attempt to set up people who thought a new phase of temperatures across the U.S. had started as alarmists. He does this by showing his next graph of surface data up to 2010. Since 2008-2010 was cooler than the 1998-2007 period, Chip states that "the warm period was starting to look out of place".

All of this is an introduction to his goal, which is to predict that 2011 will continue to be cooler than the aforementioned warm period. How specifically does Chip try to do this? By looking at a distribution of the difference between the annual temperature anomaly and the temperature anomaly observed during the first 6 months of the years 1895-2010. What does his distribution show? Supposedly, the mean of the data is 0°F. Then, even though it's not, he claims the data is close enough to having a normal distribution that he can use the data as he pleases.

More egregiously, Chip does something that makes absolutely no sense. He uses that anomaly distribution to predict what 2011's average U.S. temperature will be by combining the distribution alongside the same time series he used before. In other words, he is saying that based on the past 100+ years' of data, 2011 is likely to be no more anomalously warm than 2008-2010. Put yet another way, he is claiming that climatology is the best predictor of this year's average U.S. temperature.

Beyond the nonsensical use of statistics to prove an ideological point, allow me to provide additional information regarding our year-to-date temperature. Through June (the same data Chip used), the U.S. had recorded "Above Normal" temperatures: 79th highest out of 117 years. Giving Chip the benefit of the doubt that he wrote the paper in the middle of the year and conditions might have changed one way or the other, I will politely point out that through August, the U.S. had recorded the 92nd highest temperatures out of 117 years. Despite the Pacific Northwest and northwestern states recording below-normal temperatures, almost the remaining 2/3 of the continental U.S. were above normal, with 8 states at much above normal and 1 state recording the hottest year-to-date on record (Texas). Despite a cool start to the year, the number of heat records broken are outpacing cold records broken year-to-date by an incredible 3.4 to 1 ratio. Those kinds of things don't happen in non-anomalous years. But it's really the shoddy use of math that irks me.

As a side note, a paper by one of Chip's colleagues read for one of my classes. Written by the President of the "think-tank", it was filled with so many spelling and grammatical errors, the writer needs to do some serious thinking before publishing another paper. Or as some undergraduates are learning this semester, Word comes with a spelling and grammar check. Use it or you look like you don't know or don't care what you're doing. These guys are trying to influence public policy?!

A Proposal

Steve Harvey — Sat, 04 Dec 2010 01:41:23 GMT

(Cross-posted, with more extensive discussion of the various components, on Colorado Confluence: http://coloradoconfluence.com/...

To advance the cause of Reason and Goodwill, I propose a project, or movement, that is comprised of three integrated parts: 1) a policy analysis component; 2) an information dissemination component; and 3) a community organizational network component. While I conceptualize each of these in somewhat novel ways, in the context of grass roots political activism, it is the third which is perhaps the most innovative and crucial component, and so it is with the third that I will begin.
Currently, grass roots activism by those who claim the mantel of advocacy of Reason and Goodwill is almost entirely focused on electoral politics and public policy as generated through governmental mechanisms. As such, it is very easy for the opponents of this movement to dismiss these activists as people who want to take the opponents' money and give it to others. One aspect of this conceptualization is that government is not considered an agent of the people, but rather an external entity which imposes itself on people and deprives them of their liberty. The arguments for and against this conceptualization are irrelevant for my present purposes. There are clearly many people who do indeed adhere to this conceptualization, and that fact is what's relevant.

George Lakoff in The Political Mind talked about the need to activate the frames and narratives in all of us that are empathy-based, if we want to be successful in implementing empathy-based public policies. There are few people of any ideological stripe who oppose community involvement, and most actively support it. Many conservatives are involved in their communities through churches, civic groups, and PTAs, for instance. Such involvement is where their empathy-based frames and narratives reside, along with, in many cases, a notion of "family values," some aspects of which are also empathy based. By increasing the association of these activities with what is currently referred to as "the progressive agenda" (though avoidance of the word "progressive" might be crucial to the success of this project), we can increase the value of the (possibly renamed) brand, attracting more people to it, including some who never imagined that they might be attracted to it.

History is replete with examples of the persuasive power of those who "walk the walk." Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. are two examples of "progressives" in their day, fighting to advance particular causes (Indian Independence and African American Civil Rights, respectively), whose examples were so compelling that few today would denounce what either of them stood for. They were "political (and social) entrepreneurs" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_entrepreneur, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S... mobilizing "charismatic authority" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charismatic_authority) in service to humanity. We can't all be such giants, and we aren't all willing to make the sacrifices it requires, but we can all make more modest sacrifices and rise to more modest heights, demonstrating the sincerity of our convictions and, by doing so, making the power of our message that much more irresistible.

There are already many who invest a great deal of time, energy, money, and personal commitment into advancing the progressive agenda. If some significant fraction can be persuaded to invest some increased portion of that time, energy, money, and personal commitment into increased, non-partisan community involvement, they will contribute greatly to increasing the association of the policies they advocate with the spirit of goodwill in service to mutual benefit. And by being direct agents of reason and goodwill in their communities, the public policies such activists favor are given a human face; rather than being easily conceptualized as the impositions of a remote overlord, such policies can be plainly seen to be the sincere preference of some good neighbors and community members who believe that the spirit of community can be expressed not just directly, but also through our government acting as an agent of our collective will.

This community-strengthening component isn't only a laudable end in itself, but it also serves the second component I mentioned: Messaging. The cause of Reason and Goodwill is a powerful one, one which few would explicitly claim opposition to. The most pronounced failure of those who are its political advocates is the failure to connect the political expression of Reason and Goodwill to the widespread individual aspirations to be reasonable people of goodwill. One aspect of addressing that failure involves modeling what it means to be reasonable people of goodwill, and cultivating the commitment to it that might eventually translate into increased popular support for public policies that are expressions of reason and goodwill.

More generally, the messaging has to rely less on academic or legalistic argumentation, and more on resonating with the frames and narratives that form people's minds. We need to reach people where they live, finding their own empathetic frames and narratives, and connecting the set of well-reasoned public policies which are empathy-based to those frames and narratives. Therefore, the second component of the project I am proposing is the continuing and focused development of a cognitively sophisticated system of disseminating not just "progressive" ideas, but doing so in ways which resonate with non-progressive mindsets.

This project, therefore, involves not only increasing popular positive associations with progressive policies by modeling a progressive spirit of mutual goodwill, and forming increased positive social connections with people who do not self-identify as "progressives," but also involves communicating that same message in ways that are precisely tailored to most effectively resonate with those who are currently perhaps only marginally inclined to be attracted by it. The community involvement becomes the most important conduit for the message, communicated with increased credibility, and couched in increasingly effective ways.

Finally, the first component of this project involves reducing the arbitrariness and exclusiveness of what is assumed to be those policies which advance the cause of Reason and Goodwill. Rather than a traditional policy think tank with an ideological bias, this component of the project would have to strive to map out the entire range of public policy ideas and options, guided only by a commitment to reason in service to the public interest, acknowledging legitimate debates and ranges of uncertainty (such as, for example, between Keynesian and Chicago School Economics, and the associated policies of economic stimulus through public spending v. "fiscal conservativism").

I envision this component as a very ambitious social institutional analogue to "the human genome project," in which the social institutional landscape is mapped out using available analytical tools (e.g., microeconomic analysis, network analysis, legal analysis, meme theory, etc.), comprising a coherent complex dynamical systems paradigm, and then, within this context, all competing ideologies, policy ideas, proposals, and analyses are cataloged and evaluated, controlling as much as possible for ideological bias, simply subjecting the universe of human social and political thought to the crucible of methodologically rigorous reason.

Two important dimensions of this project need to be highlighted: 1) These three components are not mutually segregated, but are rather integral aspects of a single coherent effort, reinforcing one another, and creating a powerful synergy of progressive thought, communication, and action; and 2) An enormous amount of work has been done in all three areas, under a variety of organizational umbrellas; utilization and integration of the product of those efforts, and of the existing social institutional material that has been generated from all quarters, is a large part of what this project would be about. The community involvement component would actively seek out partnerships with churches and other religious organizations, civic organizations, PTAs, park districts, non-profits, local businesses, and all others who have already developed a community infrastructure to work with and through.

We would, through this synthesis of focused analysis, focused communication, and focused action, weave the spirit of reason and goodwill into the social fabric as it currently exists, and contribute to the ongoing evolution of that social fabric in ways more conducive to the cause of Reason and Goodwill.

I believe that this project would have to avoid direct political advocacy of any kind (a function already addressed by other organizations) in order to preserve its legitimacy, and to reduce the obstacles that explicit partisanship creates. Its purpose would be to explore the social institutional landscape with as little bias as possible (but with an explicit commitment to advancing the public interest through the advocacy of reason in service to mutual goodwill), and through a combination of direct involvement in our communities and well-designed (cognitively targeted) messaging, disseminating that understanding as widely and deeply as possible. This would "soften the ground" for traditional political advocacy, and would also increase the quality of what we are advocating for (by decreasing ideological presumption and increasing openness to all ideas).

Policy, Not Politics

Steve Harvey — Sun, 08 Aug 2010 19:58:59 GMT

For me, there is something a bit amiss when our political conversations become focused on individuals, and not on the purposes that they serve. There are really two fundamental questions all of our political discourse should be ultimately anchored in: What are we trying to accomplish? and, How can we best accomplish it?
The first one, in broad terms, should be fairly easy to answer: We're trying to keep refining our social institutional landscape in ways which improve the quality of life, increasing 1) the robustness with which we produce the things (both material and non-material) that facilitate a higher quality of life, 2) the sustainability of our processes for producing it, and 3) the fairness with which opportunity to benefit from that production is extended to all human beings everywhere. Of course, this also involves continuing to discover what "a higher quality of life" really means, and what it is that really does contribute to it. So, such considerations as work/life balance, opportunities for personal and spiritual growth (however one chooses to define them), and the aesthetic qualities of our shared space and the pleasantness of our shared existence, all figure into the mix.

Of course, many of our disputes, and our most fundamental ideological chasms, are defined by the relative weight we assign to these different components, and how we define what best contributes to a higher quality of life. But understanding that helps those who choose to be reasonable people of goodwill do a better job of more effectively addressing those differences and discussing them in productive ways.

The second question is far more difficult to answer, because it involves understanding the complex systemic dynamics of the world we live in. The obvious answers are rarely the most effective ones, and often particularly counterproductive due to the unintended consequences that had not been considered. But politics is not driven by systemic-understandings; rather, it is driven by successful marketing strategies.

More than any other thing we ever discuss, this is the fundamental obstacle we face. The ultimate challenge we must confront is: How do we most effectively liberate and mobilize our collective genius in service to the broad goals described in answer to question number one?

There are some clear answers concerning how not to do it:

1) Do not advocate for government by plebiscite. This aggravates rather than mitigates the problem of policy being captured by marketing strategies rather than guided by reason. As in any other information-intensive endeavor, the principal (which is the people, in this case) hires agents to dedicate themselves to those information intensive tasks. And in many others, the stakes for the principal are certainly comparable: After all, when you employ a surgeon to perform a life-or-death operation on your child, the stakes are as high as they get for you personally.

A representative democracy has two demands placed on it: a) to hold the agent accountable to the principal, so that the agent is acting in the principal's interests. This is best accomplished by most effectively aligning their interests, such that the agent's interests are as identical to the principal's as possible. And, b) to ensure that the agent is not only motivated to act in the principal's best interest, but is also equipped to do so effectively. This involves mobilizing the greatest degree of expertise possible in service to the agent's mission.

2) Promote open-mindedness rather than ideological entrenchment. We benefit most from a robust discourse, fueled by a combination of humilty (after all, even the smartest of us recognizes how dumb we really are), and commitment (I may be dumb, but I sure want to keep dedicating myself to becoming less so, and to mobilizing what knowledge and understanding I do have to maximum public benefit).

We should not assume that what we think we know is the incontrovertable truth. That is the stuff of Crusades and Jihads, of theocracy and totalitarianism, not of progress. When we catch ourselves arguing implacably with others who are not arguing indefensible positions, then we are probably not contributing as well as we might to the discovery of wisdom. It is not the robust commitment to a position that is dysfunctional, but rather the inability to ever sway or be swayed. Whatever good the debate itself might produce, there is no way to harvest it if no party can be moved. A court requires a judge or jury; the academy requires peer review; and the people require something that does more to settle the truth of our disputes, for our elections only settle the crude popularity of competing positions.

In other words, we need to work at better aligning what is popular with what is right, and that is something more, and more useful, than merely working to convince everyone else of our own positions.

This is a discussion I think we need to be having, including all who are willing to have it. It's not really about whether Romanoff or Bennet is the more honest or more corrupt. It's about seeking subtler understandings, and the means of implementing them, together.

Yes, of course, that's not the way it is, and that's not the way it is going to be. But that is what we should be moving toward, every time we try to move in the direction of progress.