https://arab.news/r8ms4
More than seven months into President Donald Trump’s second term, the US is experiencing a sharp federal reversal on climate policy: withdrawal from the Paris Agreement, rollback of clean energy initiatives, and a halt to key climate finance programs. The reaction of Western “scholars and watchdogs” to the moves was summed up recently by a columnist in the UK’s Guardian newspaper who put this way: “It’s an agenda that in only its first six months, has put back environmental progress by decades.”
But there is another way to look at the US climate-policy reversal: as a golden opportunity to transform climate change from a First World wedge issue into a universal challenge in which both the global North and South have equal stakes. And to seize it, countries, cities, businesses and ordinary people must adopt an organic, “whole of society” approach in the form of carbon literacy, lifestyle shifts, technological innovation and international cooperation.
It is easy to forget that climate change is neither a political theater nor a liberal luxury, but a human issue. Record heat this summer has once again scorched the Arab world, Europe and Asia, while devastating floods and wildfires have dominated news headlines. The consequences of more frequent hot days, fewer cold days and increased evaporation transcend national boundaries and public concern has reached historic highs across the spectrum.
