The common refrain in any country around the world (with the exception of China) is
“Why should we cut carbon emissions, when China continues to increase theirs?”
There is also a variant of this relating spefically to protests.
“Why don’t you stop protesting here and go and protest in China?”
This was the line taken by all sitting members at the recent congressional hearing, where Greta Thunberg, Jamie Margolin and other teen acitivists testified.
This post lists 4 reasons why this is a poor argument.
1 There are a lot of people in China
Complaining about China’s gross national emissions is clearly not the most equitable way of approaching this. If you turn up late to work and defend yourself by saying that your absence was trivial in comparison to the sum total of the absenteeism from the entire marketing department, that’s not going to cut the mustard. So the most equitable way of comparing China’s emissions with any other country is per capita. “In terms of CO2 emissions per capita, China is ranked only ranked 47th “
2 They make all our stuff
Check the label in your underpants. China makes a huge amount of stuff imported by the West. Embodied emissions of imports are not counted in national emissions. So complain about China when you make your own underpants.
3 The majority of emissions are from countries that are not China
China emits 27% of global emissions (2017 – figure is rising). That means if every country sat abc and said “but China..” 73% of the world’s emissions would go untackled. Who emits what is largely an argument of convenience and with a few mathematical twists can be turned to anyone’s advantage.
e.g China has 34 provinces. If you divide the emissions by province, then each would account for <1% of total emissions, so why should any province reduce their emissions when they are les than those of the UK (1.02%) ?
4 The Protest Variant
A citizen of a country is responsible for the actions of that country, not any other. That’s the reason you don’t have to go off and protest in China.
In conclusion, instead of producing more emissions blowing hot air about China, jsut reduce your own.