People Must Know What They Are in For!

This chapter deals with solutions, affordability and the power of civil society to keep climate change within tolerable limits. Due to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the consequences of a global warming of +1.5 °C have been and are mainly explained and communicated. However, we are heading for +3 °C by the end of the century. Due to the non-linear progression of the consequences of increasing global warming, this leads to a world that becomes a threat to all of humanity and to all societies. The overwhelming majority of the world’s population is unaware of this. In order to prevent such a devastating “three-degree scenario”, democracies need three prerequisites: Information campaigns by politicians make the population aware of the consequences of +3 °C global warming and assure that no further financial burdens will fall on the majority of the population (climate justice). In addition, the Paris climate treaty must be supplemented: Nature-based solutions must immediately become part of climate protection policy; they can be implemented promptly, at relatively low cost and, above all, in a socially acceptable manner. The political will to invest at least about two trillion US$ annually (2% of the world social product) in climate protection policy by the year 2050 must be organized. Two types of tax, the inheritance tax and the financial transaction tax, are the focus for raising the financial resources for this investment requirement.