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The age of climate gradualism is over, as unprecedented disasters are exacerbated by inequalities of race and class. We need profound, radical change. A Green New Deal can tackle the climate emergency and rampant inequality at the same time. Cutting carbon emissions while winning immediate gains for the many is the only way to build a movement strong enough to defeat big oil, big business, and the super-rich—starting right now.

A Planet to Win explores the political potential and concrete first steps of a Green New Deal. It calls for dismantling the fossil fuel industry, building beautiful landscapes of renewable energy, and guaranteeing climate-friendly work, no-carbon housing, and free public transit. And it shows how a Green New Deal in the United States can strengthen climate justice movements worldwide.

We don't make politics under conditions of our own choosing, and no one would choose this crisis. But crises also present opportunities. We stand on the brink of disaster—but also at the cusp of wondrous, transformative change.

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Kate Aronoff is a Fellow at the Type Media Center and a Contributing Writer at the Intercept. She is the co-editor of We Own the Future and author of The New Denialism. Her writing has appeared in the Guardian, Rolling Stone, Harper’s, In These Times, and Dissent.

Daniel Aldana Cohen is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Pennsylvania, where he directs the Socio-Spatial Climate Collaborative, or (SC)2. His writing has appeared in the Guardian, Nature, the Nation, Jacobin, Public Books, Dissent, and NACLA.

Alyssa Battistoni is a Postdoctoral Fellow at Harvard University and an Editor at Jacobin. Her writing has appeared in the Guardian, n+1, the Nation, Jacobin, In These Times, Dissent, and the Chronicle of Higher Education.

Thea Riofrancos is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Providence College and the author of Resource Radicals. Her writing has appeared in the Guardian, n+1, Jacobin, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Dissent, and In These Times. She serves on the steering committee of DSA’s Ecosocialist Working Group.

Mary Annaïse Heglar is a climate justice essayist and writer. Her essays about climate change have appeared in Vox, Dame Magazine, and Inverse, and she also writes regularly on Medium. She is the director of publications at the Natural Resources Defense Council, and holds a BA in English from Oberlin College. She is based in New York City.

Billy Fleming is Wilks Family Director of the McHarg Center at the University of Pennsylvania. His writing has appeared in the Guardian, Places Journal, Dissent, and Jacobin. He is the co-editor of Design With Nature Now (Lincoln, 2019), An Adaptation Blueprint (Island Press, 2020), and lead author of "The 2100 Project: An Atlas for the Green New Deal."

One of the central, unanswered questions in debates surrounding the Green New Deal and ongoing stimulus negotiations in Congress is: how will we marshal the resources to transform America's economy around its principles of clean energy jobs, justice for frontline communities, and rapid decarbonization? This conversation has begun to take shape in the fields of economics and finance, where green stimulus, industrial policy, and other long-ignored policy levers have once again moved to the center of discourse. On Monday, April 20th, the McHarg Center organized a moderated discussion on this topic between Stephanie Kelton, Richard Murphy, and Gernot Wagner in conversation with Mark Paul and Billy Fleming.
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Stephanie Kelton, SUNY Stony Brook, is a well-known policy expert who has served as Chief Economist of the US Senate Budget Committee and as Senior Economic Advisor to the presidential campaign of Senator Bernie Sanders. She continues as chair of the Board of Economists for Peace and Security. In 2016, POLITICO recognized her as one of the 50 people across the country who is most influencing the political debate.

Richard Murphy is company secretary of the Green New Deal Group Limited, Professor of International Political Economy, City, University of London, and director of the Corporate Accountability Network. He is a chartered accountant and tax justice advocate based in England.
Gernot Wagner is a clinical associate professor at New York University’s Department of Environmental Studies and associated clinical professor at the NYU Wagner School of Public Service. He writes the Risky Climate column for Bloomberg Green. Prior to joining NYU, Gernot was the founding executive director of Harvard’s Solar Geoengineering Research Program (2016 – 2019).

Mark Paul is a political economist working in the areas of inequality, environmental economics, and applied microeconomics. His research is focused on understanding the causes and consequences of inequality and assessing and designing remedies to address it. Professor Paul is also involved in economic policy in the United States and is currently a Fellow at the Roosevelt Institute. His work has appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, The Atlantic, Vox, The American Prospect, The Nation, The Hill, and Jacobin, among other publications. Prior to coming to New College he was a Postdoctoral Associate at the Samuel DuBois Cook Center on Social Equity at Duke University.

Billy Fleming is Wilks Family Director of the McHarg Center at the University of Pennsylvania. His writing has appeared in the Guardian, Places Journal, Dissent, and Jacobin. He is the co-editor of Design With Nature Now (Lincoln, 2019), An Adaptation Blueprint (Island Press, 2020), and lead author of "The 2100 Project: An Atlas for the Green New Deal."

More specifically, we’re calling for an ambitious Green Stimulus of at least $2 trillion that creates millions of family-sustaining green jobs, lifts standards of living, accelerates a just transition off fossil fuels, ensures a controlling stake for the public in all private sector bailout plans, and helps make our society and economy stronger and more resilient in the face of pandemic, recession, and climate emergency in the years ahead. Rather than a one-time infusion of capital, this stimulus should be automatically renewed at 4% of GDP per year until the economy is fully decarbonized and the unemployment rate is consistently below 3.5%.

And there are other public agencies that need help. “Our local transit agencies, housing authorities, rural electric and agriculture co-ops, and other municipal services employ millions of people and, best of all, are already publicly owned,” says Billy Fleming of the McHarg Center. “Any package that does not allow those workers to keep their paychecks and benefits — and all of us to retain access to the vital services that make life possible in our communities — should be a nonstarter for members of Congress.”

A collection of progressive policy wonks, many of whom advised presidential campaigns, are unveiling a set of proposals to wrap into an economic stimulus aimed at dealing with the coronavirus pandemic that would blunt a recession, confront climate change and address inequality. "This is an inflection point for our nation. This is a pivotal moment to put tens of millions of Americans back to work, building a healthy, clean, and just future," the authors said.

The group — which includes advisers to Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a Democratic presidential candidate, as well as the defunct campaigns of Washington Gov. Jay Inslee (D) and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) — has drawn up a $2 trillion “green” stimulus plan. It includes everything from $1 billion cash for trading in old energy-wasteful household appliances to an extension of renewable energy and electric-vehicle tax credits.

Shannon Mattern delivered this lecture on January 23, 2020

Despite the dire situation the map expresses, the tone of the project remains overwhelmingly hopeful. “The reality is that we’ve never actually tried to craft a national response to these threats,” said Billy Fleming, Wilks Family Director of The McHarg Center. “We won’t know what we’re capable of achieving until, as the Green New Deal demands, we mobilize our communities, resources, and government around climate action.”

“It’s vital to build a visual language for what a world built and an economy restructured by the Green New Deal because ultimately that’s how most people will experience it,” Billy Fleming, the director of Penn’s McHarg Center.

“These are things that the country can take on together if and when it decides to make the climate crisis the sort of generational investment it deserves to be,” said Fleming.