The benefits of an authoritarian government like the one practiced in China is that it avoids bureaucracy and, in the motto of the Americorps, "Gets things done." That was the argument, among others, made by Grinnell College professor of biology David Campbell in an Earth Day lecture and later in an interview with the school's newspaper, Scarlet & Black, Campus Reform reported.

Typically, authoritarian governments make decisions against the welfare of the people, Campbell cedes. Lately, however, the one in China has been helping their people with quick decisions, specifically in cleaning up environmental policy. Of course, the country still has a long way to go, while also making room for the millions of people rising to the middle class and demanding electricity.

"It does both," Campbell said in response to the question, "How does China's authoritarian political system help or hinder its ability to help the environment?" "Authoritarian governments can make rapid decisions. Sometimes they're benign, more often than not they're malignant. So, you just have to hope. You have to hope it's done right. But by and large, I think the Chinese government in the last few decades has been very enlightened. By and large, look what's happened. There's been a magical transformation of the economy and of the welfare of its people. And it's been brilliant. No other civilization in the history of our species has accomplished so much, so fast. Magnificent."

Later in the interview, Campbell weighed in on the seemingly hypocritical situation faced by developing countries, which are asked by already developed countries to help fight an environmental problem in which they had no part. The biology professor sympathizes with such countries, but also notes that the pathway taken by a country like the United States is "just not an option for the developing world anymore."

On fracking for natural gas, Campbell was cautious. He believes the U.S. has somewhat unnecessarily employed the technique, given its effects aren't widely understood and the country isn't in the same type of crisis as China.

"Fracking, in a regime where there's an emergency like China's-where you've got to provide power, fast, for a lot of people-might be something you just have to swallow hard and do," Campbell said. "But in the U.S., I think we should be a little more cautious. I'm scared of fracking. I don't think that it's necessarily a bad thing if it's done sensibly and transparently, but right now it's not transparent. We're shooting all these proprietary formulas down into the earth, and nobody knows what they are except the fracking companies."

As a wrap-up to his seven-question interview, Campbell said he didn't feel the United States was fully appreciating the effects of climate change and energy consumption. The country wasn't treating it as an emergency. China, he pointed out, was showing greater urgency -- perhaps because the future of their country more immediately depends on it.