If scientists are to be believed—and if you’re not going to believe scientists, who are you going to believe?—human activities are pumping significantly more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than what goes up naturally, the extra Co2 is causing the planet’s climate to change in ways deleterious to our health and life, most of the human activities that release this extra carbon dioxide are related to energy production and consumption, and if we want to reduce human production of Co2 to levels that won’t quickly change the climate, we need to reduce our energy consumption by somewhere north of 80%.

And we have maybe 25 years to do it or we’ll lose control of the situation and suffer serious climate change no matter what we do.

Strangely coincident with this phenomenon, if scientists are to be believed again, is the fact that oil, the chief conveyer of energy in most human systems, and the burning of which is the chief source of human-produced Co2, is running out. There are quibbles about the time frame on both points, but the price of oil, hovering this week around $135 per barrel, and the condition of polar ice caps and ice shelves, this week breaking off and melting at astounding rates, make clear there is only a debate about when exactly we hit the wall, not whether we do, and it’s all happening relatively soon no matter what the details turn out to be.

What we don’t know is whether or not oil will run out fast enough to bring about the necessary reductions in our burning of it. Given how consumption of oil has not really declined much despite the fact the price has quadrupled in the space of a couple of years, it’s safe to assume we need to voluntarily reduce our consumption of it long before the cost of it forces us to reduce our consumption.

Western nations, and Canada in particular, burn far more oil per capita than most of the rest of the world. All nations need to drastically reduce their consumption of oil, but Western nations need to reduce their consumption far deeper and far faster than most of the rest of the world for the simple reason that even if all non-Western nations reduced their consumption dramatically, the effect would remain negligible so long as Western nations did not also reduce their consumption dramatically.

It is highly unlikely that individuals and companies in Western nations will ever voluntarily reduce their consumption of oil to any level approaching effectiveness. This kind of change requires the coordination and leadership of governments which are alone in society in being able to enact laws that are backed by police, courts, and jails.

That makes the saving of the climate a political matter, and in particular, a political matter for governments in Western nations. How hard will it be for Western political jurisdictions to deliver legislation that will reduce oil consumption by 80% or more over the next 25 years or so? Some idea of the nature of the job now upon us can be gleaned from the experience of the government of British Columbia lately.

Beginning July 1, the right-leaning Liberal regime in British Columbia will begin government collection of a couple cents per litre of gasoline purchased by motorists. The finance minister, Carole Taylor, designed the so-called “carbon tax” so that it is revenue neutral from the government’s point of view—there will be rebates and tax cuts to taxpayers equal to or greater than the cost of the average annual expenditure on the carbon tax. This innovation was specifically designed to drive home the point that the carbon tax is not meant to raise government revenues, but rather is meant to discourage purchases of gasoline. More carbon taxes are scheduled to apply as time goes on till gasoline becomes so expensive at the pumps, drivers begin using other means than their gas-burning cars to get around, or simply stop going around.

This newspaper has in the past criticized the carbon tax as ineffective because the government has not committed to seeking a reduction in economic activities that the higher gas prices are meant to induce. By failing to thoroughly explain to the public that the carbon tax is meant to reduce gasoline-oriented economic activity—which is to say, just about every kind of economic activity we do—the government will simply react to reduced economic activity caused by higher carbon-taxed gas prices by spurring more economic activity in other ways, thereby inadvertently restoring gasoline purchases, and thus defeating the purpose of the carbon tax.

The New Democratic Party, the left-leaning opposition in British Columbia, has also attacked the carbon tax, but for entirely different reasons. Carole James, the leader of the NDP, has chosen to ride public discontent with the carbon tax into the upcoming election cycle scheduled for next year, making its repeal the NDP’s key campaign platform.

This is a most regrettable move. The NDP hasn’t so much as announced its opposition to the carbon tax as it has announced its opposition to any measure that might effectively reduce British Columbia’s production of Co2. It is the same with the Ontario NDP that last year endorsed the creation of a new high-gas-consuming car factory in Ontario, despite the increased Co2 it would generate, because of the jobs the factory promised. These decisions by putatively progressive parties makes clear why there is room for a genuinely radical party in British Columbia politics, and why all Western nations need to see the rise of radical parties in all their jurisdictions. The NDP has revealed itself as just as committed to models of economic growth as the Liberals and every other leading party in every other jurisdiction are. James’ problem with the carbon tax is exactly the feature it should have if it were to work: she fears, or rather, panders to the fears of constituents, that the carbon tax will make gasoline too expensive to purchase in the volumes we currently purchase it in. She needn’t worry: the governing party will make sure economic activity, and thus the burning of gasoline in ever greater volumes, will never decline.

When we talk of reduced gasoline purchases and hence reduced economic activity achieved by the coercion of higher prices, we are talking about individuals suffering difficult and unwelcome choices in what they need to cut from their lives, and companies suffering losses and closures with all the attendant job losses and reduced tax revenues that come with those closures. There is no way in which we will reduce our production of Co2 by 80% in 25 years without experiencing much reduced prosperity and much reduced activity all around. So long as no leading political party is willing to explain this to the public, there will be nothing but cries and complaints to such a crescendo that no leading party hoping to form government will be able to withstand it. With neither the Liberals nor the NDP in British Columbia willing to state the true nature of the task before the province, this province will never achieve anywhere near its necessary reductions in Co2 production.

The same phenomenon is playing out across all provincial and national jurisdictions throughout the Western nations. The reason no leading party in any jurisdiction in any Western nation can state the argument that needs to be stated is because reduced economic activity, though it is clearly the only choice if the climate is to be salvaged, is a thoroughly radical meta-policy that requires a radical party to champion, and there are no radical parties around anymore. Virtually every party in every jurisdiction is committed to ever growing economies, and whatever differences exist between them amounts only to the style and means of achieving that universally-agreed upon, and thoroughly wrong-headed, meta-policy.

The climate threat may be the first threat in history confronting Western democracies to which they prove incapable of responding. Conversely, it may be the first time in history citizens force radical solutions upon their government rather than the other way around. It’s either going to be one or the other, because Western governments under any current party, including that of British Columbia, have already proven themselves incapable.