Abstract

This chapter is a brief response to David Weisbach’s call for a “policy” approach to climate change that dismisses ethics. It argues that though Weisbach provides a deeply tempting account of the realities of global climate politics, especially for an affluent Western audience, we should largely resist his vision, since it fails to take seriously the ethical challenge of the perfect moral storm. The response highlights concerns about dangerous utopianism and the true practical implications of an economic realist approach. It also points out the ambiguity in “zero emissions _eventually_”, the flaws of the Kyoto Protocol, the radical elimination of climate justice, the evolution of unjust climate policy towards parochial geoengineering, and a concern about efficiency blinders. Finally it indicates the role of ethics in bearing witness to moral failure.