The Death of Neo-Liberal Ecomodernism? feat. Jon Symons

Ecomodernism holds out the promise of decoupling human
flourishing from environmental impacts through investment in
mission-oriented research, development and deployment of an array
of breakthrough low emissions technologies that can transform
industry, transportion, agriculture and energy systems. It is a
movement founded and largely based in the USA which tries to
create a big tent and appeals to an all of the above politics. It
embraces the roles of private sector entrepreneurs, free markets,
civil society and the state in pursuing their goals. I am joined
by Jonathan Symons who argues that a real crisis like climate
change requires collective agency in the form of state funded
democratically controlled intervention. It's how we got a man on
the moon, how we developed nuclear energy and how competent
nations like Taiwan and Australia are containing the COVID
pandemic. The market isn't up to the challenge. To fulfill its
promises ecomodernism requires a social democratic
politics.