Manifesto for Europe
Detailed proposals can be found elsewhere in nef’s and others’ materials that spell out how to reduce consumption of carbon and other resources, and how to design policy to reduce inequality and increase well-being.
Key overall targets for European policy-makers can be summarised as:
- Reducing consumption overall and setting legally binding targets for carbon reduction. General over-consumption is at the heart of the problem and the people of Europe need to shift to lifestyles that require less resources to be consumed. Energy is an area where decisive government action can make a real difference. Countries like the UK need to decentralise their energy production and make far better use of their abundant renewable energy resources. Every European government needs to set legally binding targets for reducing carbon dioxide emissions, setting carbon budgets for 3–5 year periods, to ensure each country does its part in keeping global temperature increases below 2 degrees Celsius.
- Reducing inequalities Inequalities – not just of income, but also of education, health and social opportunity – have a damaging impact on well-being. They deplete the social cohesion and social capital required to develop shared solutions to our environmental problems. They help drive the materialistic aspirations of overconsumption. Governments should aim to halt and reverse rises in inequality, and provide more support for local communities to thrive.
- Support meaningful lives Governments should take notice of the emerging science of well-being and its implications for policy. For example, employers should be encouraged to enable their employees to develop full lives outside the workplace, be flexible and make time for them to undertake voluntary work. It is time that European governments invested in and implemented national well-being accounts to inform policy making across government, ensuring that the impact of policy decisions on people’s well-being is taken into account.
Individuals, communities, governments and societies at large can afford to greatly reduce their levels of consumption without it needing to undermine the well-being of the citizens of Europe. The impacts of global warming, both within the EU and around the world, means that we can no longer justify the marginal benefits reaped from our current inefficient levels of resource consumption. The price paid by future generations and people alive today in poorer countries with fewer resources to adapt is simply too great.
Europe needs urgently to find a new development path where good lives don’t cost the earth.
More:Global Manifesto for a happier planet, nef
The Big Ask, Friends of the Earth
Mirage and Oasis: Energy Choices in an age of global warming, nef