Podcast Summary: Nicholas Beuret, "Or Something Worse: Why We Need to Disrupt the Climate Transition"

Podcast: New Books Network
Date: March 6, 2026
Host: New Books
Guest: Nicholas Beuret

Episode Overview

In this engaging conversation, Nicholas Beuret discusses his new book, Or Something Worse: Why We Need to Disrupt the Climate Transition (Verso, 2025). The episode explores the current landscape of climate activism, the politics and realities of the so-called green transition, and the necessity of disruptive ecosocialist strategies. Beuret, drawing on his multi-continent experience as an activist, NGO worker, and academic, offers a critical take on mainstream climate policies and the economic and social transformations labeled as climate action. The discussion traverses from economic analyses to strategy debates within the climate movement, culminating in a call for more militant, collective and community-based disruption.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Beuret’s Background and Motivation (01:30–07:05)

• Background:
  Nicholas Beuret recounts his journey from environmental NGOs and activist work in Australia, the US, and the UK, to academia. His campaign with Friends of the Earth for the UK's Climate Change Act was a pivotal moment.
• Motivation for the Book:
  “There was a real, almost a presumption that anything green, anything that was actually substantively could be called substantive action on climate change, was necessarily good or actually progressive. ... I started becoming incredibly suspicious of this narrative.” (B, 05:15)
• He critiques the left’s assumption that ambitious climate policy inherently equates to socialism and warns that the current transition may be entrenching neoliberal accumulation rather than advancing working-class interests.

2. Defining the Transition Economy (07:05–13:19)

• Transition Economy:
  A period of economic flux, with state-led reorganization, aimed less at decarbonization than at reviving stagnating Northern economies.
• Key Features:
  • State interventions for "de-risking" green investments.
  • Creation of guaranteed profits and new markets (heat pumps, EVs).
  • Erosion of democratic checks: attacking unions, environmental groups, and regulations that hinder “green” investment.
• Quote:
  “A core part of the transition economy is a renewed assault on any vestige of democracy that remains ... democracy and growth, economic growth, are in opposition here.” (B, 11:57)

3. The "War of Green Transition" & Gramsci (13:19–20:49)

• Conceptualizing the “war of transition”:
  Drawing on Gramsci, Beuret argues the current struggle isn’t about holding positions in a set political terrain, but organizing as the ground itself shifts.
• Key Actors:
  Green capitalist class (big capital, state actors); far-right populists as "transition parties"; and the environmental left, who must map and intervene in real transitions rather than idealized policies.
• Populist Examples:
  “Trump and MAGA on one side and Reform in the UK ... are possibly some of the first openly transition parties ... they have located their base as protagonists within the war of transition.” (B, 16:37)
• Recomposed Working Class:
  Recognizing new social categories (e.g., small contractors) as part of the working class being shaped by the transition.

4. The Squeeze: Everyday Life Under Climate Capitalism (22:17–32:42)

• Definition:
  The squeeze manifests as both financial (high costs of living, shrinking wages) and experiential (mundane disruptions like potholes, missed trains) impacts stemming from climate change and its economic management.
• Disconnect:
  Most people see climate change as distant, not realizing its deep connection with daily economic struggles.
• Quote:
  “The cost of living crisis is a climate crisis ... If you're concerned about the cost of living crisis, you're concerned about climate change.” (B, 24:16)
• Hope as Contestation:
  Hope is materially conditioned; neoliberalism made hope scarce, and the squeeze contracts not just finances but the space for collective dreams and alternatives.
• Quote:
  “Just as we need to hope for something different and better, the material grounds for it contract, making it very difficult to imagine life in six months, let alone life in six years.” (B, 31:50)

5. The Green Installation Economy & Labor Politics (32:42–43:00)

• Green Jobs Myth:
  The green jobs boom, especially in the Global North, is actually about low-wage installation, not manufacturing or revitalized labor power.
• Causes:
  Global manufacturing overcapacity and automation mean fewer, less stable jobs.
• Quote:
  “Any new manufacturing investment or new industry investment often comes with some of the most sophisticated manufacturing processes. ... you can just run an entirely, a dark factory ... and not 2,000 workers on a production line.” (B, 37:02)
• Securitization as Green Work:
  Security, border, and military jobs increasingly serve the green transition (protecting resource flows, suppressing protest), challenging the idea that "green jobs" are inherently progressive.
• Quote:
  “The biggest risk is us in a nutshell. ... All forms of de risking are critical. So the security guards standing in between a local community and the solar park ... they're green workers.” (B, 40:50)

6. Strategy Debates: Disruption, Blockades, and Public Support (43:00–49:01)

• Disruption as Role of Environmental Movement:
  Blockades (of oil, infrastructure, etc.) disrupt critical supply chains and open political possibilities, even if they alienate some of the public.
• Quotes:
  “I don't think public opinion is a useful target to build power. ... Its job is to be disruptive.” (B, 46:23)
• Coalitional Potential:
  Unlikely alliances (farmers and activists in anti-fracking campaigns) are possible through community-based, disruptive struggle.

7. The Market as a Site of Struggle: Shoplifting, Price Strikes, and the Anti-Poll Tax Campaign (49:01–54:05)

• Market Refusal as Tactic:
  Actions like shoplifting can be mass, political acts—inspired by historic anti-poll tax and proletarian shopping movements.
• Community Organizing:
  Emphasis on “community unions” (e.g., renters unions, anti-poll tax unions)—direct, regional forms of collective refusal that can disrupt market discipline, akin to workers’ strikes.
• Quote:
  “We could turn consumption into a train of organized contestation. And there's no reason not to extend the union ... to community organizing.” (B, 53:41)
• Limits:
  These are not substitutes for mass structural change but could catalyze disruption and legitimacy crises.

8. Workplace Organizing: Against a Single-Site Strategy (54:05–61:16)

• Critique of Narrow Class-First Organizing:
  Push-back against the idea of focusing on a single strategic workforce (as in Matt Huber’s approach)—the transition economy is too fragmented.
• Whole Worker Approach:
  Advocates for organizing workers as members of broader communities, and for defending and transforming work in ways embedded in local needs.
• Community Takeover:
  “We do need to start thinking about taking over local municipalities and regions, taking over local government, in a sense occupying every single position of power that we could possibly find and in an organized fashion as a movement.” (B, 59:01)
• Limits & Necessary Scale:
  Without these community-based coalitions and capacity, even a left government would lack the power to shape the transition.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “There’s almost a naive, implicit belief that any real climate policy would look something like that [ideal Green New Deal].” — Nicholas Beuret (05:02)
• “A core part of the transition economy is a renewed assault on any vestige of democracy that remains.” — NB (11:57)
• “In a war of transition, I would suggest one of the things that marks it out is that almost anything can become immediately political.” — NB (14:42)
• “If you're concerned about the cost of living crisis, you're concerned about climate change.” — NB (24:16)
• “The green jobs boom ... is not enabling a renaissance of labor organizing, but rather a deepening of neoliberal trends.” — Host (33:22)
• “The biggest risk is us ... The security guards standing in between a local community and the solar park ... they're green workers.” — NB (40:50)
• “We don't have the environment movement we need, we don't have the community movements we need around price controls and we don't have the actual community/worker coalitions … we don't have any of the pieces yet.” — NB (60:36)

Important Timestamps

• Beuret’s activist and academic journey: 02:05–07:05
• Defining “transition economy”: 08:28–13:19
• The “war of green transition” & class shifts: 14:13–20:49
• Explaining ‘the squeeze’: 22:17–29:42
• Hope and its political scarcity: 29:42–32:42
• Green jobs and deindustrialization: 32:42–38:45
• Security and border work as green jobs: 38:45–43:00
• Blockades as movement strategy: 44:50–49:01
• Shoplifting & anti-poll tax organizing: 49:01–54:05
• Whole worker/community organizing: 54:05–61:16

Episode Takeaways

• The green transition is not inherently progressive; it is currently structured around capital accumulation, not social justice.
• Disruption, not just persuasion, is vital. Climate activism should center blockades, refusal in markets, and transformation of work and community at the local level.
• Climate struggle is everywhere: in workplaces, markets, and our daily lives. The real task is building coalition, militancy, and hope amid the squeeze of neoliberal climate politics.

For readers and activists seeking a radical rethinking of climate strategy, Beuret’s analysis—and this conversation—offer a provocation to map the terrain as it is, disrupt it collectively, and build disruptive power from below.