Yet another conference...

It’s been the hottest year on average all around the world. Extreme weather (a cause-effect of this) has hit the developed and developing countries with indiscriminate force. The United Nations 20th Climate Change Conference (COP20) in Lima, Peru was held in early December. As an optimist, you would think that this would be the time to establish a global environmental commitment, that is, if there ever was one. All the components are there, the science is undisputed, the effects are witnessed all over the world and there are innumerable sustainable solutions and technologies out there that could help solve this. It is an issue that concerns and unites indigenous communities with the ruling classes, the private sector and the aid industry, from local to regional and even as far as to a global level. Yet, it is hard not to be pessimistic because, after all it was the 20th Climate Change Conference.

All we have to show for global political commitment is unbinding agreements, halfhearted commitments and a yearly circus of a sad clown trying to make us all laugh. Despite big words and inspiring promises, it ends in a never ending quarrel between children; “If you don’t play, I don’t want to play either!” The cause is not enough end for the means, I guess. American author and political activist Hellen Keller, once said something wonderful: “No pessimist ever discovered the secrets of the stars or sailed an uncharted land, or opened a new door to the human spirit.”

Unless you are quivering in fear at night or are naively ignorant of the world around you, somewhere in you, there is an optimist. There is optimism within all of us who care, all who discuss and raise their voice, all who work and create for a sustainable future. The power is not with the elected (or nonelected) politicians at COP20. Their inability to get things done is well documented, so the power now lies with civil society, with us, with you and I. Politics is merely a vehicle, while the civil society is the driver.

- The reader is a Swedish writer based in Malmo, Sweden