Climate change: Disruption, risk and opportunity

Q1 Social Sciences
Alistair Woodward
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引用次数: 18

Abstract

Climate change is disruptive because virtually all aspects of our lives are best located in the Goldilocks zone: the place where it is “not too hot and not too cold but just right”. Rising greenhouse gases are heating the globe faster than has ever occurred before, and record-breaking intense, extreme weather is becoming more common. In the last three years unexpectedly severe hurricanes, heatwaves and forest fires have affected millions of people. What makes disruption dangerous? I suggest low predictability, high scale, speed and lack of reversibility are good guides. Risks to health are direct and indirect and include also the “transition risks” associated with responses to climate change. Sometimes disruption is welcome because it provides opportunities for radical action that would not be possible otherwise: in this vein, it has been argued that climate change is “not just a challenge, but the greatest public health opportunity of the 21st century”. The co-benefits agenda (justifying climate interventions on the basis of positive outcomes in other sectors) is beguiling: it promises a relatively smooth way forward, but might an emphasis on win-win interventions distract from the radical changes that are needed? There are other reasons for caution – the intersection of climate and health policies may contain trade-offs as well as synergies, and the prospect of future gains that outweigh immediate losses is seldom, on its own, sufficient to change in-grained behaviours and policies.

气候变化:破坏、风险和机遇
气候变化具有破坏性,因为我们生活的几乎所有方面都最适合居住在“金发姑娘地带”:即“不太热也不太冷,但刚刚好”的地方。不断上升的温室气体正以前所未有的速度使全球变暖,破纪录的强烈极端天气正变得越来越普遍。在过去的三年里,意外严重的飓风、热浪和森林火灾影响了数百万人。是什么让颠覆变得危险?我认为低可预测性、高规模、高速度和缺乏可逆性是很好的指导。健康风险是直接和间接的,还包括与应对气候变化有关的"过渡风险"。有时破坏是受欢迎的,因为它提供了采取激进行动的机会,否则这些行动是不可能的:在这方面,有人认为气候变化“不仅是一个挑战,而且是21世纪最大的公共卫生机遇”。共同利益议程(在其他领域取得积极成果的基础上证明气候干预措施的合理性)是诱人的:它承诺了一条相对平稳的前进道路,但强调双赢的干预措施是否会分散人们对所需的根本变革的注意力?还有其他需要谨慎的理由——气候和卫生政策的交集可能包含权衡和协同作用,未来收益超过眼前损失的前景本身很少足以改变内在的行为和政策。
本文章由计算机程序翻译,如有差异,请以英文原文为准。
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来源期刊
Global Transitions
Global Transitions Social Sciences-Development
CiteScore
18.90
自引率
0.00%
发文量
1
审稿时长
20 weeks
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