Carbon Inequality and Direct Responsibility

There are two sides to carbon inequality: the inequality of citizens in a state (inequality within country) and global inequality of citizens of different countries (inequality between countries). The trend that intercuts the two sides is what I will call the global inequality of personal carbon footprints. This is an important issue that does not get enough attention in climate ethics. Throughout the previous chapters, I have argued that collective and shared responsibility for climate change is conceptually prior to direct individual responsibility. While this holds for almost everyone, there is a relatively small group of individuals who forms a possible exception to this rule. I will call these people super-polluters, as their lifestyles result in emissions many times over the carrying capacity of the Earth. When it comes to climate harms, individual direct responsibility is limited to very wealthy individuals with high emissions. People with very high personal carbon footprints, regardless of where they live, have direct personal responsibility regarding taking meaningful climate action. This individual direct responsibility is to not increase the probable risk of serious harm—the deprivation of fundamental capabilities—to others, as long as they can do so at a less than significant cost to themselves. I will also argue that offsetting is not a reliable way to meet it. Instead, what should take focus are mega-polluting consumption and the investment choices of the super-polluters.