History tells us that when environments deteriorate, societies turn to supposed strongmen and religious zealots rather than smart, pragmatic leaders. That is happening now.
>> In addition to the dictatorships of China, Russia and Saudi Arabia, a growing number of young democracies have relapsed into authoritarianism: the Philippines under Rodrigo Duterte, Turkey under Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Egypt under Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, and next, it would seem, Brazil under Bolsonaro. And underlying this is environmental stress, which has been building for over two centuries.

Now that this paradigm is being replicated by the world’s most populous country, China, there are very few places left to absorb the impact. Competition for what is left is growing. So is violence and extremism.
> Centre-ground politicians who once talked chummily about “win-win solutions” have been pushed to the sidelines. No one believes this any more.
>Voters may not see this in environmental terms, but consciously or subconsciously they know something is broken, that tinkering is no longer enough.

In the US, with massive support from the fossil-fuel industry, Donald Trump has undermined the Environmental Protection Agency, opened up swaths of national parks to industry, cut pollution controls and promised to pull out of the Paris accord. In Australia, Malcolm Turnbull was ejected from power by his colleagues because he tried to fulfil promises to cut carbon emissions. And now in Brazil, voters are backing a politician who has vowed to pull his country out of the Paris deal, abolish the main government agency tackling deforestation and end the demarcation of indigenous land.

Bolsonaro has the backing of agribusiness and mining leaders, who are rubbing their hands in glee at the prospect of an Amazon denuded of its greatest protections. The markets – which are heavily driven by extractive industries – also love him. The main stock index and exchange rate of the Brazilian real spiked after his first round win. An editorial in the Wall Street Journal endorsed him as a “conservative populist”.

Such neo-fascist politicians should not be blithely dismissed. They are the hired guns of the industries working against the Paris accord and other international agreements that aim to prevent further environmental catastrophes, which hit the poorest hardest. Their “anti-globalism” is first and foremost anti-nature and anti-future. An extraction-first approach may bring economic benefits in the short term, as cronies and campaign donors clear more forests, open up plantations and dig more mines – but the profits are concentrated while the environmental stress is shared.

>The great fear climate scientists have is that a warming planet could create feedback loops that will make everything much worse. But there has not been enough study of economic and political feedback loops. How drought in China puts pressure on the Amazon to produce more food and clear more forest.
>Or how powerful business interests will choose a dictator over a democrat if it means easing environmental controls that threaten their ability to meet quarterly growth targets.