Dn the current context of the energy and climate crisis, it is more than urgent that we collectively question our way of life and our development model, taking into account its effects on the climate and on natural resources. The fundamental question is: how do we regulate our consumption to respect planetary boundaries while reducing inequalities within our nation and globally? How to live differently so that, simply, everyone can live with dignity? The answer given by the Socialist and related Members is the “solidarity sobriety”.
This new form of sobriety is defined by two guidelines. The first is social justice. Today, the disparities in carbon emissions are colossal: the less well-off half of our fellow citizens emit five times less CO2 per year and per person than the top 10% earners. The challenge of justice is all the more dizzying because, to limit climate chaos, we must collectively commit to a transition that takes us from an annual average of around 9 tonnes of carbon per person to just 2 tonnes. There is no solution without a fight against injustice and without questioning the privileges of some, when so many of us already experience a form of “constrained sobriety” on a daily basis. For this reason, the sobriety plan prerequisite planned for this winter, both symbolically and from a budgetary point of view, must be tax reform. This can be achieved through a new solidarity tax on wealth: the “climate and biodiversity wealth tax”, which will make it possible to invest in ecological transition. The tax reform also involves a tax on the super profits made by certain multinationals in a context of high inflation and shortages.
Improve our power to live
The second guideline of solidarity sobriety is the sharing of social and environmental rights. Sobriety cannot be reduced either to our direct consumption of gas and electricity or to small individual gestures (such as limiting the air conditioning or heating, disconnecting the Wi-Fi, etc.), limited in time, such as they are currently requested from French women and men. We must do everything we can to support the Ukrainian people by cutting off supplies to the Putin regime and take emergency measures accordingly. But solidarity sobriety is a more ambitious project, bringing social, environmental and technological progress. It must improve our power to live and aim for a new balance of our real social rights: the right to decent housing, to mobility, to healthy food, to a healthy environment.
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