Over the last few years, climate change has come to be recognised as the crisis it is. While some claim we have under a dozen years left to save the planet, others are resigned to the belief that we are already too late. In 2018, prominent activist Greta Thunberg told United Nations Climate Change Conference attendees that “we are running out of time” and as sea levels, carbon emissions, and temperatures rise, so do the awareness and anxieties of the public.

CAPITALISM AND THE GREEN AGENDA

Though this wave of environmentalism is positive, its impact is causing businesses to react.  In doing so, “sustainability has become a commodity itself, to be traded, bought, sold and managed like all others”. As such, terms including “green capitalism” have been coined as a tool to explain how capitalism can resolve the environmental and climate problems we are facing. Green strategies supposedly decrease energy and material consumption, which enhances production chains. These strategies, however, are fundamentally flawed as the decreasing consumption is antithetical to capitalism.

Capitalism can be thought of as both exchange and production and as the movement of capital. A simple way to describe capitalism is in a Marxian sense. In Capital Volume I, Marx describes capital as moving in a circular motion whereby it goes from the investment of money, to the production of the commodities, back to its owner as surplus value—M-C-M. The point is that money and growth are central to capitalism, which conflicts with the green agenda and sustainability. “[T]he idea that capitalism can be “greened,” however, is attractive to those seeking to maintain the status quo in the midst of an ecological crisis of capitalism’s making. 

GREEN GRABBING

A trend within green capitalism is green grabbing, which is the idea that land is a commodity and we must sell nature to save nature. Therefore, it is typically used to describe the appropriation of land justified by environmental concerns. Examples of green grabbing include eco-tourism and the expansion of renewable infrastructures in places such as the Mexican state of Oaxaca where transnational companies are quickly building thousands of windmills. With projects like these, conflicts tend to rise between communities and companies due to the inequalities and harms that accompany them. The exploitation of natural resources and less developed countries, displacing already disadvantaged groups, is the main by-product of green grabbing.

CONSCIOUS CONSUMERISM 

As consumers, the rhetoric directs us towards buying the “right” or “better” option. We are encouraged to believe that we can help save the planet by opting for a different brand, however, “green consumer culture is essentially a culture of consumption” and we are scarcely encouraged to buy less or go without. In line with this ethos of conscious consumerism, many businesses and brands have come to learn that profit can be earned from sustainable lines and ranges. The point is that although we are opting for more environmentally friendly choices, or so we think, we are still contributing to the capitalist economy.

Another term that contributes to this idea of sustainability becoming commodified is greenwashing. Coined in 1986 by the environmentalist Jay Westerveld, greenwashing describes how companies claim to be green on packaging, in the media, and in marketing but do not actually take steps to support these claims. Due to the increased awareness of climate issues amongst the public, people are opting for more sustainable products. Therefore, greenwashing “is not only misleading, but it is also really not helping to further sustainable design or circular economy initiatives”. Subsequently, well intentioned shoppers are misled, and the crisis rages on.

Greenwashing is carried out by many companies both unintentionally and deliberately, and the fast fashion industry is particularly guilty. A recent controversy is H&M’s “Conscious points’ scheme,” which encourages shoppers to purchase more of their products. Although some of their clothes are made from recycled materials, most of them are not and “the brand still operates under an unsustainable, fast fashion business model”.  

RENEWABLE ENERGY

Since the 19th century, fossil fuels have been the essential oils of capitalism but are widely understood now as being damaging and key contributors of CO2  emissions. As fundamental as fossil fuels are to the capitalist system, some believe it is not possible for a fossil fuel-less capitalism to exist, as they are far too ingrained. Nonetheless, plans for ditching fossil fuels for renewable energy are innovative, admirable, and welcomed with Denmark, for example, planning to build an island to act as a renewable energy hub. Though plans such as these are positive movements, the local, decentralised production and distribution of renewable energy means, on a geopolitical level, “no single country can dominate the source of solar energy,” which could be a reason as to why renewable energy has not been widely adopted yet in a capitalist world. 

THE PARADOX

Though renewable energy sources are not yet the norm, “in 2020, for the first time ever, a clean energy group overtook a major oil company […] in stock market value,” a sign that, perhaps, green capitalism could be a possibility. Furthermore, with the realisation that planetary resources are plummeting, and ecosystems are dwindling, pressure from society and employees is pushing companies to conduct business in more sustainable ways. The unfortunate result here is that, instead of making greener choices, companies market themselves as eco-friendly and monopolise on sustainability, rather than opting for more tangible changes.

To combat this sort of greenwashing activity, the European Union is working on a new law to determine what is “green” and to ensure fund managers “declare if they match the new science-based criteria”. However, company transparency and public awareness is not enough. Sustainability requires reducing consumption, degrowth, and perhaps “green growth”—though this might only be able to exist alongside the degrowth of destructive sectors.

If accumulation of capital is the goal of capitalist production and if growth and expansion is detrimental to our resources and ecosystems, then green capitalism is surely a contradiction.

Though it seems that green capitalism has some well-intentioned and positive contributions to the green agenda, the question is whether the two are genuinely compatible if expansion is always at the core of capitalism, while being such a large contributor to ecological damage. Therefore, as Greta said, “if solutions within this system are so impossible to find then maybe we should change the system itself”.

Poppi is studying for a Master in International Studies on Media, Power and Difference at Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona. She has experience working on social documentaries and content writing and her main academic areas of interest are the climate crisis and human rights.

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