Global capitalism and climate change

Abstract

Humans have been emitting greenhouse gases for eons but it was the industrial revolution, with its heavy reliance on fossil fuels and the capitalist system of production and consumption, that contributed most clearly to a new type of climate change – one not generated by natural events so much as by human-induced or anthropogenic activities. As archaeologists like Fagan (2008, p. xvii) say, “[W]e’ve entered a time of sustained warming, which dates back to at least 1860s, propelled in large part by humanity – by the greenhouse gases from fossil fuels”.