Regaining control of our political and climate future: Thomas Bateman

Addressing two related problems together — in this essay, rising autocracy and worsening climate disasters — can prompt multisolving in which a single action helps resolve multiple issues. For example, protecting our climate solves many problems because it will lessen the harms of weather-related disasters, pandemics, food and water shortages, wars, and many more issues. Protecting and strengthening democracy is a multisolution because it is more likely than other forms of government to help our climate, reduce poverty, safeguard the rule of law, enhance disaster response, and revitalize research, universities, and our public health infrastructure.

Regaining control over our political and climate crises is not a pipe dream. We know climate science and solutions, and we understand how democracies and autocracies succeed and fail. The remaining key is human behavior — potentially our ultimate multisolution.

To regain some control of our future, we need to:

Understand reality: Authoritarianism and climate upheavals are serious and rapidly growing threats, but they are manageable. Our leaders’ and our personal choices will make a tremendous impact, for better or worse, for a long time to come.

Become more future-minded: We humans are not as rational as we seem to think; one of our many dangerous biases is to prioritize immediate and near-term costs and benefits (pleasures and pains) in ways that jeopardize our long- and even intermediate-term futures. Short-termism is rampant. It’s time to apply more thoughtful concern for what lies ahead and what could lie ahead if we make better choices. Succumbing to immediate temptations is a well-worn path to self-sabotage.

Strengthen decision processes: We underuse decision-making processes that can overcome the destructive and deadly effects of short-termism. Helpful practices include identifying multiple possible future scenarios, seriously considering the benefits, costs, and risks of our choices over longer time horizons, brainstorming unexamined assumptions and unintended consequences, and overcoming either/or thinking (“we’ve got two options…”) by seeking third and fourth possibilities.

Change trajectories big-time: When current paths are heading in the wrong direction, making changes that benefit the future is the core of behaving proactively. “Should’ve been more proactive” is a cliché when said belatedly about stalling too long before starting a project, but its deeper meaning is profound. Strategic proaction forges the futures we want when pursued with wisdom and commitment.

Start the new path ASAP: Vital political and climate action occurs at the state level and can curb unwanted actions from Washington. Energetically supporting candidates in this year’s state and local elections, combined with the highest possible voter turnout in 2026, can kick-start the changes we need.

Do what we know will work: Conscientious voting can multisolve by restoring and strengthening democratic governance, which, with public support and pressure, can mitigate climate change. Curtailing fossil fuel use, exploration, and production will slow and eventually stop global heating. These activities would dramatically reduce all kinds of future harm. Managing climate change requires both mitigation and adaptation; neither alone will do what we badly need, nor will waiting for innovations of unknown effectiveness and risks. Politically, passivity by staying on current paths won’t save us, but energetic civic engagement has a fighting chance.

Learn and adapt as we go: Adapting means changing as needed. Concerns about the Constitution or democracy may sway some people, but don’t convince others. We won’t motivate successful climate action until we strongly emphasize local threats and personal impacts. Adapting includes using emotions to motivate helpful action. Leverage whatever emotion works: anger, worry, fear, optimism, or love for children and grandchildren.

Human wisdom is the ultimate multisolver, if we choose to use it.

Thomas Bateman, who grew up in Berea, is a professor emeritus at the University of Virginia’s McIntire School of Commerce.

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