China's Role in the World's Environmental Future

The developed world can dramatically change their behaviors, and it still would not make a difference to the overall future of the planet. The economic activity that China  and other developing countries stand to produce in the next 100 years will greatly outweigh any efforts made by the western world, and the method in which this economic activity is produced will largely decide the fate of the environment. The West and China are much like characters from Shakespeare's Hamlet, with the Western world as the Ghost of Hamlet's father and China as the center of the plot as Hamlet. The Ghost itself can only serve to warn Hamlet of the troubles in the future, and has no physical body to accomplish anything while Hamlet is left to manage the revenge of his father and treachery of his mother. The west can only serve to act as a model for the developing world, and transform itself into the model that it wishes the developing world to emulate, but doesn't really have the ability to impact the outcome of the planet. Hopefully the world will not end up like the conclusion of the play.

China: from Red to Green, great documentary about China and how it will affect the future of the world's environmental impact.