Do we have a moral obligation to correct climate change?

Photo courtesy of the EPA

I believe, without question, we have a moral obligation to conserve and preserve the environment for future generations.  Similar to the way criminals are forced to compensate for their actions, we must be held responsible for the damage we do to our world.  The victims of our environmental crimes are our children and our grandchildren.  Unfortunately, they do not have a significant voice in our current political affairs.  I whole-heartedly support governmental action to curb the emissions and automobiles.  I would also hope that governments would invest into clean technology such as hydroelectric or solar power.  The United States, however, cannot do this alone.  This is why I am happy that recently the President Obama and his Chinese counterpart have met and agreed to regulations that will reduce the negative impact our countries have on the world.

According to 350.com, China has two significant environmental agencies within its borders.  Ironically, they are both located where there is significant controversy as to the extent of the Chinese government’s power in the area.  The first is a 350 syndicate in Hong Kong which “aims to widen and deepen our scope of combating global warming.”  Hong Kong, of course, just underwent significant social upheaval with anti-Chinese government protests.  The other is a “Taiwan Power Shift” which is essentially a meeting of young Taiwanese environmentalists over how to address climate change in the region.  Taiwan is a little bit of an international grey area with some countries recognizing its sovereignty while others, namely China, believing it is a part of it’s a part of the People’s Republic.  So to answer the question about the extent of environmental groups active in the country, it is limited at best and non-existent at worst. Greenpeace has a website dedicated to its action in China however it is in Mandarin.  This being the case it is hard to determine how effective the organization is in my country.  What Greenpeace has done however is analyze the current environmental situation in China and reported on it fervently.   They have gone to great lengths to analyze the carbon emissions of the country as well as the polluted water that the Chinese population consumes.  Additionally, Greenpeace covered the recent agreement between President Obama and President Xi Jinping to reduce carbon emissions going forward.  Greenpeace has also launched an international campaign to curb the amount of harmful chemicals China and other major textile producers dump into their waterways for the production of clothes they send to their citizens and rest of the world. 

Water.org is surprisingly not present in China given what Greenpeace had to say about the contaminants that are being poured into China’s rivers.  Instead, they work in India, Cambodia, Bangladesh, the Philippines, and Indonesia. 

If I had to guess the lack of NGO involvement is due to a few factors.  The first being that China is a developing country that does not want to be hampered with environmental restrictions as it attempts to climb the economic ladder.  They would prefer to get on equal footing with the United States and then proceed to worry about the quality of their water and air.  Secondly, despite recent reforms, China is still an authoritarian government that does not tolerate significant western interference in the form of aid workers.