Donald J. Munro

The technology exists to slow down the trajectory toward bad hurricanes and rising sea levels. However, politically we are at an impasse on how to use it. I suggest how to judge alternative solutions that face our two countries. The right path is the one that is consistent with some core human values, especially the equal worth of all people, and reciprocity. At present, neither the U.S. nor China have an energy policy. They need ones that stress the efficient use and reduced consumption of oil, and, at the center of my remarks, building new electricity generating plants that employ coal gasification.

The impasse on global warming centers on carbon emissions from coal burning power plants. China will not discuss changing its energy consumption unless the U.S. becomes serious about changing its consumption. The conflict is built into the Kyoto Protocol’s two tier set of mandatory requirements, some rules for industrialized nations and others for developing ones, such as China and India.

Instead of accepting the two-tiered set of requirements, my alternative choice demands something of everyone. Its appeal is the fact that it embodies the universal values of equal worth and reciprocity, from which all people will benefit. In this case, equal worth applies to people’s equal rights to the basic resources needed for survival, reproduction, and health: a climate with tolerable levels of greenhouse gases, clean air, and clean water. Reciprocity builds trust and leads to the benefits of cooperation. It would apply to the agreement by both China (and perhaps India ) and the U.S. to move rapidly toward adopting the new technology of gasification (integrated gasification combined combustion or I.G.C.C.). Its product for use in generating electricity, is “syngas,” from which carbon dioxide is removed and does not reach the atmosphere. In addition to both sides agreeing to a choice that benefits their current and future populations by reducing global warming, they would reciprocate in the sharing of information about the technology. Initially, this puts the U.S. in a donor capacity because it would share its existing secret technology. In time, China would have its own discoveries to share. The financial and political costs of this choice are such that only central government leadership can drive it to successful implementation.

Reciprocity can also apply between regional governments. Already in the U.S. there are state and city governments that are far more active on global warming than is the current Washington administration. This means there are local institutional and human models of doing the right things, from which we can learn. China has its local models as well.

There is a relatively untapped source of motivational energy lying in familiar social emotions. Trust, anchored in China in the early idea of cheng (sincerity, trustworthiness) and shame/pride (xiuchi, xiukuei and zizunxin) are universal emotions. This seminar talk begins by revealing the meanings and logical content of some traditional and modern Chinese terms captured by the English words. Both trust and shame/pride have the same structure, being composed of feeling, cognition, and motivational components. In our time, the two emotions can be used to promote the values of consistency or predictability. These values underlie the kind of ethics and rule of law accepted as goals of the modern, civilized society. When motivating action, the values consistency and transparency are non coercive means of encouraging cooperation, initially between leaders and led, the so-called public trust. Cooperation, in turn, fosters evolutionary survival Acceptance of the values consistency and transparency can be built into the cognitive part of the two emotions, trust and shame.

After making a case for the continued honoring of the old legacies of cultivating trustworthiness (cheng) and being responsive to shame/respect, I turn from individual ethics to new and desirable institutional changes that incorporate some of that earlier legacy. I focus on the legal system, especially the role of judges in Chinese society. This system is often lacking in the values consistency and transparency. My focus begins with the reasons for that lack. It ends with one piece of the prescription for remedying the situation. This is the application to judicial training of the teaching method known in Western medical and business schools as “simulation.” The positive rewards and sanctions in the simulation training involve trust and shame/respect.