The Sacrifice Zones of Carbon Capitalism: Race, Expendability, and Loss and Damage

This chapter examines the numerous forms of “loss and damage” experienced by poor and racialized communities who reside in the sacrifice zones of the fossil fuel-based world economy (carbon capitalism), including displacement, dispossession, and poisoning of land, air, and water. It argues that the Paris Agreement, despite its references to human rights and climate justice, contributes to the structural violence of carbon capitalism by failing to curtail fossil fuel extraction, promoting a variety of highly profitable false solutions to climate change (including the commodification of carbon), and neglecting to require high-emitting, affluent states to provide compensation for the climate change-induced disasters that continue to inflict disproportionate harm on racialized frontline communities all over the world. The Paris Agreement thereby eviscerates the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities.  It also perpetuates the climate crisis that displaces racialized, climate-vulnerable people, who are then demonized by right-wing authoritarian social movements in the name of national security. These right-wing “populists” deploy racism to create cross-class alliances in support of extractive industries and carbon-intensive models of economic development. The article offers an expansive interpretation of loss and damage that articulates the links among racism, extractivism, and economic inequality in order to promote solidarity among diverse social movements and collective opposition to carbon capitalism.