In 2012 the only global deal for limiting greenhouse gas emissions – the Kyoto protocol – expires. There is no realistic prospect that it will be replaced before it elapses: the existing treaty took five years to negotiate and a further eight years to come into force. In terms of real hopes for global action on climate change, we are now far behind where we were in 1997, or even 1992. It's not just that we have lost 18 precious years. Throughout the age of good intentions and grand announcements we spiraled backwards.It appears to me that Monbiot has recognized that dealing with climate change within the existing institutions of capitalism has reached a dead-end and doesn't know what to do. But he does know that "we must stop dreaming about an institutional response that will never materialise and start facing a political reality we've sought to avoid."
Although he doesn't spell it out for you, I will--the "political reality we've sought to avoid" is removing the capitalist system and replacing it with a sustainable one. Let us hope and pray it is not too late.
