Climate action must stem from ecological thought: interviewing Paolo Pileri
An excerpt of the Professor’s speech at ‘La Cura’ roundtable discussion by Chiara Savanco
The event was co-organised by Rete Ambiente Lombardia and the University Student societies, Diciassette and Statale a Impatto Zero. The discussion was chaired by enthusiastic students, who look to maintain the university’s ethos of promoting formal and informal debates and a free circulation of ideas. The panelists included the economist Carlo Cottarelli, the theologian Daniela di Carlo, the University’s professor of urban planning, Paolo Pileri, and the researcher Gianni Silvestrini. Below we present a comprehensive extract of the valuable contributions made by Paolo Pileri.
Paolo Pileri– professor of Urban planning at ‘Politecnico’ University of Milan
Panelists: In occasions like the present discussion, it is impossible (at least, in Italy) not to mention the PNRR[1]. Indeed, such plan should- at least, allegedly- provide for the country’s ‘green transition’, through measurable goals and steps taken by the Italian government. In some of your work, you pointed towards some of the limitations that this plan suffers from, especially on key areas such as soil consumption, methods of environmental impact evaluation… What would you identify to be the most ‘serious’ misconceptions, or gaps of the PNRR?
Prof. Pileri: The first important flaw is that the PNRR gives too many things for granted. Right now, we cannot allow any environment-related matter to be taken lightly.
Why am I saying this? Italy’s PNRR is commonly associated to two key words, or concepts: transition, and ecological. Unfortunately, the adjective ‘ecological’ is often misunderstood to signify ‘environmental sustainability’. This is a great misconception; the great flaw of the PNRR is that it bears nothing related to ‘ecology’. Nothing! The first version of the PNRR didn’t even mention the word ‘biodiversity’, despite the concept being recognized as one of the key challenges we face. The reason for this is that we have been foolhardy in allowing the PNRR to be drafted by the same people who were writing just ‘mainstream’ political plans up until now. It would be foolish to believe that the mindsets and behaviors of economists, lawyers and politicians of this country have been transformed overnight by the COVID emergency and are, all of a sudden, able to draft something truly ‘ecological’.
Just the other day, an important construction company at the Biodiversity festival in Rome was pledging its commitment to the ‘sustainable treatment’ of excavated lands. But excavation lands are not just land; they are part of an ecosystem. They are not mere material to be administered in a sustainable manner. Implementing an ‘ecological transition’ requires thinking ecologically. This is totally absent from the PNRR. Out of interest, I checked the academic curricula of economics degrees here in Italy: there is zero ‘ecology’ involved. For those studying law: there is zero ecology. For those studying engineering: there is very little teaching on ‘ecology’. Innovation does not magically happen because we attach environmental labels to political ambition.
And this mindset impairs our whole forward-looking culture. If one were to be particularly critical, even the tagline of this conference, ‘let’s clean up the air in Lombardy’ , is misleading; by exhorting us to ‘clean up’, it indirectly justifies continued pollution. And obviously we should not, and cannot do that. There are a number of aspects on which the PNRR is destined to fail because it does not envisage a fund allocation for education. It purports the achievement of ‘great things’ through a flurry of ‘substantial investments’, but it does this without educating people, and thus without bracing for change. We need to be humble and recognize that this plan should be a learning experience for our leaders, as well as for our citizens.
In a song by the Italian songwriter Battiato, the lyrics say “because you are a special being, I will take care of you”. What does this mean? How do I realise that you are a ‘special being’? I need to have emotive intelligence and intellectual capability to do so. If I don’t have these, I will not recognize that you are a special being. For urbanists today, land is not an ecosystem- they don’t consider it in these terms, but rather see it just for what it is: a strip of land. And possibly, a strip of land destined for construction because it is only in this way that we are adding value to it. This is the common line of reasoning, and it is hugely problematic. We have lots and lots to do.
I ask myself: how can we talk about ‘transitions’ if we don’t equip ourselves with the tools to recognize what a piece of land is, and what trees are? It is not by chance, that other European countries are overall less ignorant than Italy, on this front. It is because they speak a more ‘ecological’ language and they think in a way that is more ecological than ours.
I will always remember that, during my stay in Copenhagen, I was taken aback by the fact that on snowy winter mornings, at 7 am, I used to see mums on their bikes, riding their kids to school. I asked them: “why do you do this?” and their answer was “for the climate!” The city had worked hard to create a green and ecological mindset that could be internalized by its citizens, instead of merely providing ‘green incentives’. Our governments prefer to follow economic indicators of growth, convinced that by providing incentives they will be able to shape and change mindsets. But I have yet to find a paper proving that green incentives actually work: since 1997, we have been giving incentives to renovate buildings in ‘greener’ ways, and yet unsustainable land consumption keeps increasing.
If we merely offer incentives without building convincing intellectual frameworks, the ‘ecological transition’ will never be more than a pipe-dream. This is the challenge before us: to change our development strategy. And again: it is not sufficient to provide half-hearted tweaks in environmental management, in order to retain the current model of economic growth. The challenge is not about merely selling electric cars to diminish petrol consumption, allthewhile not doing anything to curb traffic; if I end up stuck in a three-hour traffic jam, even my electric car I’m hardly any better off than I was before.
We must learn to distinguish between abstract aspirations, and tangible concepts; there is no such thing as ‘traffic’, or general ‘livestock farming’. There are people who eat meat, and people who drive a car. It is us, as human beings, who must actuate change. This is the crucial concept, or mentality, that the PNRR is lacking. I honestly don’t know how we are going to cope; two-hundred billion euros in investment, and not a single penny devoted to educating people on ecological thought.
I recommend reading a fascinating book by a Norwegian philosopher and ecologist named Arne Naess who used to say: “ It is not sufficient to think we can get by with superficial ecology”. What is meant by superficial ecology? The concept entails making a shift from thinking: “I must take care of forests, because I need them to breathe clean air”, to: “I must take care of forests, because I love the forest”. This requires a major mindset and culture change. As of now, this mindset change still eludes us.
Panelists: If, starting from tomorrow, you could point to an utmost priority within the agenda of the climate crisis, what would that priority be?
Pileri: Has the PNRR truly invested in environmental data collection? Do we, as citizens, have the tools to truly understand the climate issue? No. Each year the ISPRA[2] issues analyses and reports but it really struggles to do this, because it is not adequately financed. Most research is conducted on a voluntary basis.
During the pandemic, soil consumption increased by 22 %. This is mad. And we still don’t have an official national or regional statistic on the number of structures or buildings that are currently vacant; as far as Italy is concerned, if we are not aware of the problem it means the problem doesn’t exist. As we speak, 883 hectares of soil sealing happens annually in Lombardy alone, and the region has only just issued laws to regulate soil consumption.
‘Cura’ is a wonderful word. It has ancient roots; it comes from ‘cucua’, which means ‘to observe’. Living rapidly and frenetically doesn’t allow us to truly see things for how they are made. We really need to observe things well. In a couple of years’ time, we might ask another group of young people to re-organise a discussion like this one to reflect on the progress made, and to fill in the gaps.
We, too, hope that humanity will soon stop to ‘observe’ the current situation that we are in, and that this will spur a change in mindset and attitudes. We thank Professor Pileri for his precious insight.
Now it is up to us, as students and as citizens of civil society, to make use of these important points, and the questions they raise, to push for a more conscious and ecological management of the climate issue, in Italy and beyond.
[1] ‘Piano Nazionale Ripresa e Resilienza’: Italy’s post-pandemic plan to access the funds allocated by the Next Generation EU mechanism.
[2] ‘Istituto Superiore Per la Ricerca Ambientale’: Italy’s national data provider and environmental research agency.
