— Analysis of the Root Causes Behind the Frequent Wildfires in California and the Wider West
The United States experiences major fires almost every year, in many different places, and California has long stood out above the rest. Often it suffers more than one major wildfire in a single year, and each time the pattern seems to confirm that there is never a “largest,” only something even larger. The frequency of these fires has become so high that the world seems to have grown accustomed to them, looking on with indifference, as if merely watching a fire from the opposite shore.
During the summer vacation of 2016, my family spent nearly two months driving through the American Midwest. In Yellowstone we saw many forests still scarred by past fires. Later, when we encountered wildfires near the Grand Canyon and along California’s coastal highway, I was filled with anger. This time, however, my anger has become impossible to suppress, and I feel compelled to write. This latest blaze is described as one of the largest American wildfires in decades. It has caused enormous losses of life and property in California, devastated precious forests on our planet, severely polluted the atmosphere that circulates around the globe, and inflicted grave harm on the “lungs of the Earth” and on the breathing of people everywhere. In this sense, it is not merely a local disaster, but a brutal assault on the common destiny of humankind.
Whether we live in the West or the East, whatever country we belong to, we will all be affected directly or indirectly, sooner or later. We therefore cannot treat this as spectacle, much less take pleasure in it. Instead, we should restore the true meaning of the idea that “every ordinary person bears responsibility for the fate of the world”: responsibility not just for one country, but for all under heaven. As President Xi Jinping has advocated, humanity should build a “community with a shared future for mankind.”
This fire makes one thing especially clear: if the cause is natural, then we should work together to help; if the cause lies in institutional constraints, then those institutions must be thoroughly changed.
1. Analysis of natural factors
From north to south, California includes temperate marine, Mediterranean, and humid subtropical climatic features. Located on the western side of the Rocky Mountains, it generally has ample rainfall, fertile soil, dense forests, and a pleasant climate. These advantages have attracted one of the largest populations in the United States and drawn talented people from around the world. It ought to be a uniquely favored earthly paradise. So one must ask:
(1) If there are forests, are fires therefore inevitable? Not necessarily. Aside from human causes of ignition, spontaneous forest combustion in nature would mainly depend on lightning, which is relatively rare. And when lightning does ignite a fire, it is often followed by rainfall—sometimes torrential rain—which can cause natural fires to extinguish themselves. That, too, is part of the balancing law of nature. Otherwise, the natural world would have been burned bare long before human beings ever appeared. Moreover, even in ancient societies, people would spontaneously fight forest fires caused by lightning, or governments would organize them to do so, preventing them from becoming major disasters.
(2) Looking specifically at California: in the north, around San Francisco, the temperate marine climate and rich vegetation form a beneficial cycle of favorable weather and regular rain. Plants are less likely to dry out, and rainfall can suppress fires, so major fires are comparatively fewer. In central and southern California, including Los Angeles, the Mediterranean climate is drier in the second half of the year, but forests there are not as lush as during the first half, and conditions are not always such that “a single spark can start a prairie fire.” Many places on Earth share a Mediterranean climate, especially the countries along the Mediterranean itself. Yet whether in the forested areas of southern Europe—southeastern France, Italy, eastern Spain, Greece, the former Yugoslavia—or in North African countries that the West often labels authoritarian, one does not constantly see news of catastrophic wildfires. Many Mediterranean coastal countries are plains or rolling hills, terrain that in fact can favor the spread of fire. Why, then, does the fire god seem especially fond of California’s narrow southwestern coastal strip? This becomes even more puzzling when one looks at the characteristics of central and southern California.
(3) California’s coastal mountains block the main ocean winds from the Pacific, and east of those ranges the land gradually turns into semi-tropical desert with sparse vegetation. That means that even when fires occur, their lateral spread is naturally limited. Meanwhile, Pacific winds generally move west to east, so the strongest tendency should be to push fire eastward over the mountains and into the desert beyond. Yet deserts, where vegetation is scarce, hardly welcome fire. Why, then, could this fire so easily change its main direction of attack and spread north-south, seizing territory as though unopposed, even charging into the luxurious homes of Hollywood stars in Los Angeles—as if the fire itself were a fan chasing celebrities? Was it determined to “burn with passion,” or did it think the fire scenes in Hollywood films were not real enough, and decide to provide the most shocking visuals for free? Yet when the fire arrived of its own accord, the stars and directors did not appreciate it; they fled in panic, exposing themselves as people who “profess love of dragons but fear the real thing.” This shows that blaming nature simply for creating many forests is neither scientific nor reasonable. Otherwise, one might as well swap California’s people with those living in the deserts of the Middle East and North Africa: in such vast arid regions, no matter how much people behaved recklessly, such forest fires would be impossible. Americans, especially Californians, should be grateful for possessing such extraordinary land—mountains and water, minerals below, beauty above, a place endowed by nature and desired by countless people who have struggled for generations in deserts and wastelands. The proper response is therefore deep reflection and a search for human causes.
Let us proceed step by step and analyze how wildfires develop: their causes, fire suppression, and the accountability of individuals and governments.
2. Why is the United States especially prone to wildfires?
Among living beings, it is almost only human beings who start fires. On the one hand, people may deliberately set fires to serve personal purposes, and such fires often become especially destructive. On the other hand, humans generally eat cooked food and often enjoy outdoor barbecues, which can also cause fires through negligence. American-style barbecue seems different from practices in some other Western countries. In Western Europe and Australia, public electric grills are often provided, so ordinary barbecuing is less likely to start fires. But in many American parks and outdoor areas, the grills are charcoal-based. Barbecuing is easiest when aided by wind, yet once natural wind becomes slightly too strong, sparks from the grill can easily scatter and ignite nearby plants. Barbecue itself produces thick smoke—whether from the charcoal or the meat—which distracts the cook, while the smell of grilled meat leaves diners too eager to notice that a tiny spark may already be spreading. After eating and drinking, people may drive away in a haze, leaving behind embers capable of flaring up again, as if planting the seeds of nature’s revenge against those who consume and destroy it.
Although public security in the United States is poor and acts of terror have increased, terrorists do not seem commonly to use arson as their method. Perhaps that is because traditional terrorists often come from the Middle East, where vast desert environments make people cherish vegetation from childhood. There, water is more precious than oil, and grass more precious than meat. Even if they seek revenge against Western society, they may be reluctant to do so by destroying green forests on a large scale. By contrast, American citizens who wish to vent rage against society or others do not need the indirect means of arson; they can simply take up firearms and kill directly. One need only think of the 2015 shooting at a gay nightclub that killed more than fifty people, or the 2017 Las Vegas massacre at an outdoor concert, where within just over ten minutes the gunman killed and injured more than five hundred people. Yet Western society often no longer even uses openly condemnatory labels such as “murderer” or “thug,” instead describing such people in relatively neutral terms like “shooter.” The media rarely devotes equivalent attention to the innocent victims or to the thousands of grieving family members left behind. It is as if those who died unjustly are weak and therefore unworthy of attention, while perpetrators are treated as figures worthy of fascination and preservation. Capital punishment is not imposed; at most, such offenders spend the rest of their lives in prison, supported by taxpayers that include victims’ families.
The logic of allowing private gun ownership while abolishing the death penalty, in the author’s view, pressures everyone toward violence. To be strong, one takes up weapons. To make others weak, one kills them. To protect oneself and one’s family—even women, the elderly, or children—one is forced to prepare to pull the trigger first. Some places further compound the problem by tolerating drug abuse, creating the danger not only of intentional killing but also of killing without awareness or self-control. If one can kill without paying with one’s own life, then the deterrent disappears. Yet journalists, editors, and scholars have not mounted the overwhelming criticism that such a reality should provoke.
The countless “sparks” that can set the American land ablaze therefore come mainly from people’s appetite—especially outdoor and wilderness barbecue. Such consumption not only fattens the human body and may contribute to disease; it also devours the skin and nourishing lifeblood of Mother Nature, who has sustained humanity.
Many people enjoy grilled food, a practice that may trace back to antiquity, when humans ate animals killed by natural fire. But after cooking became commonplace, why have Americans remained so attached to charcoal grilling?
3. Why are Americans so attached to charcoal barbecue?
The author argues that the greatest unfairness on Earth is the division of the world into many states. Different climates and landforms create huge natural inequalities. In the subtropical high-pressure belt roughly between 20 and 40 degrees latitude, the western sides of continents are often deserts. Without mountain barriers, deserts can stretch all the way to the sea, as with the Sahara, which spans nearly all of North Africa, crosses the Red Sea, covers the Arabian Peninsula, extends through West Asia, and continues toward Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia. Much of the Middle East lies within desert conditions.
Deserts are barren lands, almost lifeless seas on land, scarcely fit for human life. Yet because the world is artificially divided into closed nation-states, Arab and Muslim peoples have been forced for generations to struggle in such environments. They may not be able to start forest fires, but many may carry a fire of grievance within their hearts. By contrast, white populations historically occupied many of the regions most suitable for human development: the temperate zones between 40 and 60 degrees latitude, where climates are moderate, vegetation is abundant, and water is comparatively plentiful. Europe, especially Western Europe, enjoys exceptionally favorable temperate marine conditions, enhanced by the warm Atlantic current. Forests have long flourished there.
Because forests exceeded local needs, Europeans developed habits of burning wood. Homes routinely included fireplaces and chimneys. Wood was converted into charcoal not only for heating but also for outdoor grilling, much as preserved meats became culinary tradition elsewhere. Fire risk in Europe did not disappear, but because Western Europe is divided among many small states with limited land and forests, people were compelled to pay close attention to fire prevention. Once electricity became widespread, public electric stoves and grills largely replaced charcoal in many places, reducing fires significantly.
That progress, however, did not carry over in the same way to the United States. In America, the old habit of consuming forest resources continued and even expanded. White settlers favored lands resembling Europe in climate and geography—southern Canada, much of the United States, southeastern Australia, New Zealand, and certain coastal parts of China, among others. In countries such as the United States, Canada, and Australia, colonial states replicated Western European lifestyles under white rule. And among them, the United States possessed especially abundant forests over a vast territory. Even its so-called southwestern deserts are often semi-desert grasslands capable of supporting animals and humans. In this sense, America had the greatest room for waste and overconsumption of forest resources. Thus, despite leading the world in technology and electrical infrastructure, many American parks and public green spaces still provide little in the way of public electric grills and continue to allow charcoal barbecue. The barbecue areas are often not strictly separated from trees and forests; grass runs continuously, fallen leaves cover the ground, and a single spark may ignite a sweeping blaze.
4. How does the American West fight fires?
To put out fires, one must rely not only on professional firefighters but also on the people. Fires are generally caused by humans, and those who caused them should help extinguish them—except perhaps children. Fire spreads explosively and rapidly. If one waits for professional firefighters to arrive, it is often too late, and the cost multiplies many times over. Even where firefighters are present, their numbers are limited. Once fire spreads in many directions and becomes a sea of flame, complete suppression requires encirclement: one must surround the source so that the flames have nowhere to go. That requires mass participation. Fire can be fought with courage and responsibility, not only professional skill—except in highly dangerous environments involving explosives, chemicals, or similar hazards. In open wilderness fires, the public can and should be mobilized to form a human line and cut off the path of the flames. The author recalls taking part in collective firefighting actions in the Chinese countryside during childhood, and even finding such efforts energizing. In China, public slogans have long stressed the seriousness of fire prevention and the duty to fight fires: “Whoever causes a fire goes to jail”; “One person’s fire brings disaster on the whole family.” Such messages have helped keep fire incidence comparatively lower and have encouraged early suppression by those nearby. Yet such slogans are sometimes criticized in the West as violations of rights or the rule of law.
By contrast, in the American West, reliance seems to be placed mainly on voluntary self-restraint. Outdoor barbecues are usually family gatherings, at most involving a few households, with no strict division of labor and very limited firefighting capacity. Small flare-ups may be noticed or extinguished, but embers capable of reigniting are often not fully dealt with. Once a major fire occurs, people may shirk responsibility and flee first. Worse still, because parks are generally free, governments do not station administrators or firefighters on site for prevention. Moreover, although the West pioneered communications technology, telecommunications are privately run, and private carriers focus on densely populated areas. Signal coverage claims are often misleading. In wilderness areas and national parks, there is often little or no practical signal. Even emergency phone systems may be inadequately staffed, and reaching help can take too long. In such circumstances, many people simply retreat. The United States also lacks the dense, omnipresent surveillance systems seen elsewhere, so even if a fire is caused by a specific person, identifying that person may be difficult, especially once the blaze destroys the original scene.
The author also links this indifference to broader patterns of violence. If tens of thousands die each year from gun violence and the government still tolerates widespread firearms, then some may come to regard arson as comparatively trivial: after all, it burns “surplus” grass and forests rather than directly killing people. Some may even find spectacle in it. In the author’s view, this helps explain why some people respond to wildfires with indifference.
The author recalls traveling in 2016 to the Grand Canyon and seeing a large fire on the opposite rim. Many onlookers treated it as something to watch from afar, but the author felt deeply anxious, because the Grand Canyon is not only a world natural heritage site but also one of the great wonders of the Earth, a treasure for all humanity. Yet when asked why government aircraft did not seem to be fighting the fire, one white observer responded like an academic: sending aircraft costs money, and one must weigh the cost against the loss of forest; besides, the ash left by burned forest serves as natural fertilizer and helps vegetation regrow. When the author objected that the atmospheric pollution, damage to scenery, and soil erosion were vast losses affecting the globe, the listener seemed startled. When the author further asked why the U.S. government could send military aircraft abroad yet hesitate to deploy them against fires at home, the response was silence.
Similar examples are said to exist elsewhere. Around Lake Michigan, for instance, governments may strictly regulate public fishing while at the same time tolerating severe blue-green algae problems and simply closing beaches instead of actively cleaning them. When challenged, people may dismiss such problems as natural, even when they are plainly tied to runoff, fuel pollution, and other human activities. In the author’s view, such complacency stems from the fact that these societies possess abundant natural beauty with relatively small populations and therefore feel they can afford waste. People elsewhere, by contrast, are confined by borders to far harsher environments. The author then broadens this argument into a critique of global inequality, colonial history, race, religion, and the gap between scientific knowledge and actual behavior. Western societies, the author argues, may produce advanced science while still indulging in anti-scientific habits—whether in religion or in practices such as barbecue, even though science warns against carcinogens and environmental harm.
The author further argues that barbecue persists in white mainstream society because their weekend life is otherwise monotonous: after church or outdoor activity, food becomes the central shared pleasure. When a fire is accidentally started, people then shift responsibility to government, saying that as taxpayers they have paid and should not need to act.
5. How does the U.S. government fight fires?
The author concedes that the United States has done some things well in preparation for urban fire response. Fire hydrants are widely available, parking in front of them is heavily punished, fire lanes are marked, and fire engines are advanced. Firefighters generally receive public respect. They are remembered especially for their courage on September 11, when many rushed into the Twin Towers and more than two hundred died in the effort to save others.
Even so, wilderness fires are fundamentally different from house fires. Their spread is faster, their area larger, and they cannot realistically be extinguished by firefighters or even police and soldiers alone. What is needed is strength in numbers and collective determination. Wilderness firefighting generally does not require highly specialized skill on the same level as electrical or chemical emergencies. Yet long-standing Western private-property culture, in the author’s view, has normalized selfishness. If something is not one’s formal responsibility, many people instinctively avoid it. At the same time, elites reserve more and more fields to “professionals,” and firefighting is no exception. As a result, firefighters are left to fight alone, often like a cup of water against a wagonload of burning timber.
A key institutional problem, according to the author, is American federalism. The U.S. Constitution leaves many powers to the states unless expressly granted to the federal government. Matters such as fire response therefore fall heavily within state authority. Without a state’s request, the federal government cannot simply intervene in command, even to help fight fires, unless the blaze crosses borders and becomes an interstate matter. State governments, meanwhile, may hesitate to seek federal help out of pride, fear of blame, concern over later funding consequences, or partisan rivalry.
6. Serious deficiencies in accountability
Because the United States is a federal system and each state has its own constitution and legal framework, responsibility for accidents often does not lead to criminal or administrative accountability. At most, civil liability may be imposed. The author attributes this to the dominance of private enterprise in Western economies and social development: so long as a matter is seen as part of private activity, governments intervene less, and even when harm is done to others, the result is often only compensation rather than punishment. Under such a framework, officials are even less likely to be held personally responsible.
More broadly, the author argues that in Western political systems civil servants are often treated as legally liable only for intentional wrongdoing, not for losses caused by negligence. At most they bear “political responsibility,” meaning they may lose office at the next election. By contrast, Chinese law imposes criminal and administrative liability for dereliction of duty, abuse of power, and major safety accidents under a broad range of conditions involving deaths, injuries, poisoning, financial losses, shutdowns, bankruptcies, reputational damage, or other serious harm to the state and the people.
According to the author, Western law and practice rarely impose comparable accountability. This has produced extreme bureaucratic irresponsibility: subway lines delayed for over a century, bridge collapses, fires in buildings using flammable cladding, massive industrial fires causing pollution and casualties, yet no serious pursuit of responsibility against regulators or executives. If that is so, then how much less likely is accountability in cases where unnamed citizens in remote wilderness areas, following long-standing habits, cause fires that governments then fail to contain? Even when dozens or hundreds die, the result may be little more than regret.
The author further claims that one cause cited for California’s latest catastrophic fire was misguided decision-making by state leadership—for example, restrictions on clearing brush around homes in the name of protecting certain species, thereby leaving no effective firebreaks. In the author’s view, this illustrates how personal decision-making by officials can create widespread harm.
When citizens wish to sue governments, the author believes Western constitutional systems still suffer from a fatal defect: there is no dedicated, independent institution specifically responsible for investigating and prosecuting official misconduct and dereliction. Legislatures make laws but do not investigate. Courts do not act unless cases are brought before them, and judges are themselves insufficiently accountable. Administrative agencies reviewing themselves is ineffective. Even anti-corruption bodies that formally oversee officials often remain subordinate to executive leaders and therefore cannot reliably investigate them.
The author contrasts this with China’s former procuratorial system, which had a stronger role in investigating official misconduct. He laments changes that, in his view, reduced the benefits of having overlapping institutions capable of mutual supervision. He further argues that ordinary people in Western systems often lack an effective direct power of recall, even when leaders are widely accused of corruption or abuse.
Conclusion
Any constitutional system, institution, or policy rooted in selfishness, contrary to science, and dismissive of public opinion will inevitably generate contradictions and social disorder. In the author’s view, Western constitutionalism has often escaped exposure only because many monarchic or quasi-monarchic systems still exist elsewhere, making its own defects less obvious, while some continue to praise it as a “universal value.”
We should remain clear-minded: something is truly universal only if it is affirmed by more than half of all people through a genuine public vote. Something has real value only if it accords with the laws of natural balance, natural science, and human nature. The idea of a “community with a shared future for mankind,” the author argues, fits those laws. Only by standing within nature as a whole, caring for the world, and allowing the people of the world to jointly plan, protect, and decide the fate of the common community can humanity find the only path that remains right in the long run. Otherwise, a guilty system will not only keep igniting merciless wildfires, but ultimately destroy humankind itself.
To learn what kind of system would be lawful, reasonable, orderly, and scientific—one that would allow “everyone to gain the whole world, boundless dedication, limitless love, and eternal youth through natural fulfillment”—please see the related constitutional texts, papers, and forthcoming lecture series on this website.
– Analysis of the Root Causes Behind the Frequent Wildfires in California and the Wider West
