Like a train hurtling towards a cliff: Amitav Ghosh

After the historically potent Ibis trilogy, Amitav Ghosh surprised everyone by shifting gears in his very next — this time to address a geographical reality. The just released book, titled The Great Derangement, is a work of non-fiction. It is nearly a caveat of sorts, in which the author summons us to confront the inevitability of the extreme impacts of climate change. While it may appear to be a departure from the kind of books he is known to write, with their narratives steeped in history, Ghosh points out that the phenomenon of climate change cannot be severed from history and political upheavals. In fact, the connection between them is a deep and a complex one, he argues.

“It’s a strange thing that we, as people, think that politics is completely independent of climate or weather. We know that Harappa collapsed because of a climate change event, climate shifts have historically determined how human beings adapt to the world. Today we see a similar emergence of political and climactic interconnections. One of the most destabilising things we have seen in the recent years is the Syria conflict that has also destabilised Turkey and in some ways destabilised Europe. It has led to this huge influx of migrants, which may well have played a part in the Brexit decision. And in the deep background, the Syria upheaval really started with a drought, which led to the migration of hundreds of thousands of farmers. The breakdown of Syria should make us think very carefully about the sort of effects that this might have,” Ghosh says.

The author finds it odd how events of natural disaster have found little expression in works of art. He is surprised how the 2005 Mumbai deluge hardly ever found any mention outside of news stories. “I have spoken to many people who were here in 2005, during the terrible deluge. I have asked them if they have written or spoken about it and strangely, it does not seem to be the case that many have. I was speaking to some very famous artists who were badly affected by the downpour, their houses were flooded, and they lost stuff. I asked them if the event had at all featured in their art, and they said ‘no’,” he says. Why the lack of intellectual engagement, we ask. “The question should not only apply to writers and artists. It should also apply to journalists,” he says.

If the world at large is choosing to turn a blind eye to the impacts of climate change, Ghosh cites a probable reason behind this. “Often the impacts of climate change and man-made impacts are very hard to distinguish from each other. For instance, in Chennai when we had this terrible deluge, the effects of rainfall were greatly worsened by mismanagement. But most people chose to concentrate on the political impact. And quite rightly, those things do need to be focussed on. But at the same time, there is a meta-political question, much larger than national or local politics, which is one of greenhouse gas emissions. I think people prefer to ignore that. They’d much rather focus on the local dimensions,” he says.

It also boils down to the human instinct of pinning the blame on someone, he points out. “Politics is more thrilling to talk about. As regards climate change, with many, it’s just the feeling that it’s too big to do anything about, let’s focus on these more local things where I can blame someone. Who do you blame when it comes to nature ”

Ghosh questions the way governments around the world have been fostering a certain idea of growth, where everyone consumes more and more. “We like to think this is a product of our individual aspirations and desire to own, but all collective institutions have been complicit in promoting this. As individuals, many of us might feel the desire to change our patterns of consumption, but the single most important thing we can do, is to apply pressure on collective institutions. Given a choice between you stopping to use plastic personally and you telling the municipal government ‘let’s stop using plastic bags’, I would say the latter is much more important. See the huge difference Bangladesh has made by banning the use of plastic bags.”

He rues how Indian retail practices continue to ape American ways. “It horrifies me how in America, when you go to buy vegetables, you have to put them in a plastic bag. Then you put that in a bigger plastic bag. This happens even in places where they encourage you to bring your own bag. What sense does that make When we go to the bazaars in India, who puts things in plastic bags We just put it in a thaili and it’s not like that poisons us,” he says.

The author feels that the more one becomes aware of this issue, the more one feels he or she can’t help but make changes in the way they live their own lives. He says, “At that level, this has been a really profound road of discovery for me — like discovering the joys of cooking your own food. Michael Pollen, the environment writer, says the single most important thing you can do for the environment is to cook your own food. When you cook your own food, you learn to be thrifty. It’s a genuinely educative thing, it sharpens your mind, it makes you creative, think on your feet.” He continues, “Also, if you actually grow your own food, there’s an intense pleasure in that. I try to grow a certain amount of my food — I have a vegetable garden and a spice garden. In many ways, it’s cooking that has been my connection with the environment forever. Also, especially since my children were born, I did all the cooking in the house. My children never once ate fast food. I cooked for them every single day, although they may not be glad about that,” he adds with a chuckle.

That a conversation on climate change can seamlessly take us from insurgencies to the wonders of cooking, the impacts of it truly seem manifold. And Ghosh stresses on how food is not a minor part of it. “Thirty per cent of total greenhouse gas emissions come from the agricultural sector. Even when you are talking about replacing carbon-based energy sources with solar, it still leaves the question of how we are going to lower the agricultural emissions unanswered. We should consider growing less methane-emitting varieties of rice. And certainly, one of the things that most direly need to be addressed is how meat is produced. A very large percentage of methane emissions come from meat. One of the lifestyle choices that the world will need to collectively think of in the future, is eating less meat,” he says.

Ghosh mentions that his talks with the climate change bureaucracy have been largely unproductive. “Their interests largely lie towards finding business solutions — creating opportunities in solar energy. They are not interested in talking about how we could change the patterns of living. That’s like you have a train that’s hurtling towards the cliff and you just want to change the fuel.” He points out how the problem was identified in the 19th century by one of the earliest energy economists, William Stanley Jevons. “He spoke of how efficiency in energy consumption leads to greater consumption. If you have cheaper light bulbs, you will only buy more light bulbs. Will it solve the problem It is just a different way of keeping the same system, making it go even faster,” Ghosh concludes.