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Peter Dauvergne Environmentalism of the Rich MIT Press, Cambridge, 2016, 218pp., $56, hardback. Beginning in the mid-1960s, the modern environmental movement burst onto the scene as a reaction to the [...]

After nearly a decade of policy inaction by the Abbott/Turnbull/Morrison Coalition governments, the election of Anthony Albanese's Labor government has ushered in expectations of a sea-change in Australian climate policy, one that might allow the country to finally emerge as a global leader on the issue. Yet while years of inaction have left some relatively easy victories for the new government to rack up, the change of leadership and rhetoric obscures some key continuities in the Albanese government's approach that need to be foregrounded and critiqued by domestic and international audiences alike. In this brief commentary, we consider what the new Labor government might mean for Australian climate action over the coming years. We focus, in particular, on the role that fossil fuel exports will continue to play in overwhelming any emissions cuts achieved domestically, and underscore the need for a much broader and more ambitious national climate strategy designed to wean the country off its reliance on coal and gas revenues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The terms 'media' and 'press' have come to group diverse fields of communication under a single heading. The term 'media' has acquired a negative connotation in the mind of the public due to credibility and trust problems. Serious journalists find themselves labeled as members of the 'media' which is the same term used to describe television talk shows that cater to the lowest level of audiences.

State presidents are forced to action when the television reports political turmoil and catastrophes in other parts of the world. Televised images are mostly disjointed and seconds create an effective impression of foreign hostilities which the presidents should looking into. The television has forced the presidents to take an active interest in the news that filters into households and increase pressure to act upon such views.

Television, which helps the government and the public notice international events, pressurizes presidents to be sure of foreign policy issues and be decisive in their response. Television cannot frame the foreign policy of a nation, but it criticizes irresponsibility and helplessness of presidents if they do nut have clear policies. The public, with the advent of television, takes more active interest in the making of policies and sometimes influences the policy making process.

Television journalists must act to restore democracy by overcoming the manipulations of a political media elite. Presidents have become permanent campaigners while public voting has declined from over 60% in 1960 to 50% in 1988, possibly due to disillusionment. Advertising on TV has become the dominant form of political campaigning, and one solution would be to ban such ads on TV.

The article focuses on the efforts of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada in negotiating carbon pricing. It mentions about the impact of the carbon price on macroeconomics, and the plan of Trudeau which involved providing rebates that would actually improve the economic standing of Canadian households. It also mentions that while Canadians were unlikely to feel any negative effects of the carbon price, they would learn about it from conservative politicians and right-wing media outlets, who indicated early on their intention to take advantage of the public's poor grasp of carbon pricing to undermine the policy and gain electoral advantage.

This paper argues that the Trump administration's position on climate change should be understood more in terms of continuity than disjuncture. It develops this argument in four principal ways. First, it situates Trump in the US's paradoxical relationship to the UNFCCC, as a would-be leader that struggles to commit itself to substantive action, and the evolving geopolitics within the UNFCCC. Second, the paper focuses on an on-going struggle between pro-fossil fuel interests and a 'decarbonising' bloc, interpreting Trump (like George W. Bush) as a pro-fossil fuel backlash. Third, it explores the pattern of climate politics within the US, where stalemate in Congress has been often offset by action at the state, city, and corporate levels. Fourth, it should be understood in relation to the emergence of a 'global climate governance complex', where the UNFCCC has to be understood in relation to multilevel and transnational governance initiatives on climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the national climate policy of Canada under the administration of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. It reviews whether Trudeau's federal strategy to combat climate change would materialize after the government launched the Pan-Canadian Framework on Clean Growth and Climate Change involving provincial, territorial and federal governments. The impact of several oil pipeline and liquefied natural gas plant projects on the country's climate policy is discussed, as well as the effect of the limits of federalism on regional and economic interests.

This paper aims to provide an addendum to the rapidly growing concept of a global ‘green energy race’ between major states. It argues that although this framing has been useful in underscoring important dynamics in the process of decarbonisation, its narrow focus on installed capacity obscures a much broader and more complex process at play. In particular, it overlooks the critical role played by states aggressively investing in R&D and export manufacturing in the renewable energy sector. The paper thus supplements the concept of a green ‘energy race’ with that of a green ‘global division of labour’, which sees the process of decarbonisation not exclusively as an effort by individual states to install renewables domestically, but rather as a collective and interdependent process by dozens of states, all striving in different ways to promote capital accumulation on their soil. The paper provides an overview of data covering innovation, manufacturing and deployment in the clean energy sector, and offers a theoretical analysis of the trends observed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]