3.5.c- alternative futures sustainability and social change

8/6/2019 3.5.C- Alternative Futures Sustainability and Social Change

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ALTERNATIVE FUTURES:SUSTAINABILITY

AND SOCIAL CHANGE *

by

Charles Harper

Americans have had a long love affair with their cars, Indeed, thepromise of speed, personal freedom, and convenience that magicallyconveys you wherever the road will lead is powerful cultural icon inamerica and around the world. Cars in the words, are not justtransportation. Particularly in America, they are a powerful symbol ofpersonhood and status. Several years ago, when my wife and I Had threecollege-aged youths in our household, I was shocked one night to lookout the window and count five cars parked around the house.(Some wherejunkers,but cars nonetheless.) How irrational, I thought ...one foreach person in our family!

In spite of the oil shocks of the 1970s, Americans drive more nowthan ever(on average,22% more miles in 1990 than in 1969),and gas-guzzling muscle cars are back. Since the 1970s, the sale of pickuptrucks, which use 25% more fuel, has tripled (particularly in urbanareas where they are rarely needed), and the sale of racy BMWsincreasecd 10-fold in japan. Though the 400-million strong auto fleetis not growing as rapidly as it once did (only 3% a year, down from 5%a year in the 1970s), the absolute number of cars continues to grow as19 million are added to the world fleet each year.

But along with the American car culture and the proliferatingnumber of autos come ubiquitous problems. Making autos has asubstantial impact on the environment. In 1990, a typical American car

contained 1,000 kilograms of iron , steel, and other metals, and 100kilograms of plastic, making the auto industry the leading consumer ofmetals and plastic. The manufacture of metals and plastic and turn is ahigh-impact industry, itself: high in energy intensity and in theproduction of toxic wastes. Fueling passenger cars accounts formorethan a fourth of world oil consumption, and the refining industryis the worlds highest in energy intensity and the fourth highest intotal toxic waste emissions. Motor vehicles are the single largestsource of air pollution, creating a haze of smog over the worldscities. This smog aggrevates bronchial and lung disorders and is oftendeadly to asthmatic, children , and the elderly. Automobiles emit asubstancial proportion (13%) of the carbon dioxide(CO2)produced fromfussil fuels. Accommodating autos makes a substantial impact on landuse: In the U.S. roads, parking lots, and other areas devoted to carsoccupy half of all urban space. Nationwide, pavement covers an arealarger than the state of Gergia. Cars have also resshaped communitylife as cities sprawl, public transit atrophies, and suburban shoppingcenters multiply. Workplaces have begun to scatter, increasing theaverage commuting time. Despite auto safety improvements, accidentskilled more than a quarter of a million people around the world, andseveral million more were injured or permanently disabled.

____________________________*REPRINTED FROM: Charles Harper, Environment and Society

(Prentice-Hall:Upper Saddle River, NJ,1996), Chapter 7,pp245-282.


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The point is that cars are not only an important meansof tansportation or a cultural icon of indutrial

civilization: They are also powerful symbols of our socialand environmental predicaments. How did we get caught up inautomania, particularly when forms of transportation existthat are much less socially disruptive and environmentalgreener? Furthermore, because autos are so central to oursocial and environmental predicaments, what are theprospects for an orderly transition to a sustainablesociety without cooling our passion for cars and, in asense, regaining control of the auto?

The central concern of this chapter is with therelation between the environmental problems I have beendiscussing and the notion of social and environmentalsustainability. What is a sustainable society?Conceptually, and in the abstract, the matter is quitesimple: A sustainable society is one that does not exceedits environmental carrying capacity. It can persist overgenerations without undermining either its physical or itssocial system of support. Another way of putting it is thata sustainable society is one that meets the needs of thepresent without compromising the ability of future

generations to meet their own needs (World Commision onEnvironment and Development, 1987). Few would disagree withthis abstract definitions or with the desirability of asustainable society. But when we get to particulars, thereis a lot of disagreement about what sustainable society isor how close we are to attaining it. How many people canthe world support? How much consumption? How many cars? Howmuch solid waste and pollution? A common theme runningthrough orevious chapters is that there are differentintellectual paradigms for understanding human the notion

of sustainability and the kind of transformation, if any,required to produce a sustainable society. The growth inscale in a finite world paradigm, the market failures andresource allocation problems paradigm, and the socialdistribution paradigm have quite different views of thecauses and severity of environmental problems and quitedifferent implications for action and policy. Previouschapters therefore have also been concerned with findingthe grounds for action and policy in the face ofuncertainly, scientific as well as paradigmatic.

In this chapter, I will try to examine both the issueof different paradigms and criteria for action and policy


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in a clearer and more holistic way. First, I will drawtogether some strands of the previous several chapters bylooking again at the human causes of environmental changein a more summary fashion. Second,i will address differentparadigms of human and environmental futures, particularly

in terms of different views of the consequences ofcontinued population and economic growth forsustainability. Third, I will examine the most pertinentexisting evidence in relation to these different paradigmsand explicate what I believe to be the most prudentcriteria for action and change in the face of considerableuncertainly. Fourth, I will attempt to describe in somedetail what a sustainable society would look like.

CONCEPTUALIZING THE HUMAN ENVIRONMENTALIMPACT: /=PAT

In Chapter Two,I discussed the driving forces of environmental changeas (1) population size and growth,(2) institutional arrangements,praticularly the political-economy, (3) cultural values and beliefsystems, and (4) technology. Previous chapters examined in depth twocaeses of environmental modification: human population growth and theenergy system that underlies all economic activity in the industrialera. The human causes of environmental change have been described in amore summary model that is simple captures interaction of types offactors.

Biologist Paul Ehrlich and energy scientist John Holdren createda way of conceptualizing the joint impact of the human causes ofenvironmental change. They argued that the impact (I) of any populationor nation on environmental and ecosystem is a product of its population(P), its level of affluence(A), and the damage done by particulartechnologies(T) that support that influence:

I = P x A x T

This is a simple way of illustrating different but related dimensionsof environmental impact: as functions of the number of people, the

technologies they employ to produce goods, and the amount of goods theyconsume. While the relative weights of these are subject to debate, itis methodologically useful for scholars, because it is possible todevelop quantitative summary measures for each term of formula. Becauseeach term multiplies impact independently, it follows that theopportunities for changing them are different in different societies.The less develop countries (LDCs)have, for example, the most room forimprovement in P; the MDCs have the greatest potential for improvementin Aand T.

The I = PATmodel is simple,robust, and useful as a framework forresearch. It is usually applied as an accounting or different equation,where values for three of the four terms are used to solve for the

fourth (usually T), and in which the relative impact of P, A, and TonIis determined by their changes over time. That assumes the model islinear and the effects of the differents terms are proportional. But


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research by Dietz and Rosa reformulates I=PATas a sthocastic model, inwhich values of the term of the equation are allowed to vary acrossobservational units (nations).Their reformulation is also sensitive topossible nonproportional threshold effects that identify diminishingor increasing impacts of the terms of the equation of relation toenvironmental impact (I). Specifically, they used nonlinear regression

formulas and other multivariate statistiical techniques to study thecontributions of population, affluence, and technology on theproduction of greenhouse gases in various nations. They used existing

data from 111 nations about CO2 emissions (in millions of metric tonsof carbon per year), population (population size), and affluence (grossdomestic product per capita). Technology was not measured directly but,rather, modeled as a residual term, that is, as a multiplier in theequations to capture all things (physical infrastructure, social andeconomic organization, culture, etc.) whose effects are not captured bypopulation and affluence.

Dietz and Rosas (1994) findings demonstrate the significant

utility of the I=PATmodel, and I discuss them here in some depth. Theyfound that increasing population among nation increased CO2 productionand did so in a linear way without any threshold effects: the more

people, the more CO2. Dietz and Rosa argue that these findingembarrass the argument made by some economists and by Julian Simon(1981) in particular that population has little effect or even abeneficial effect on the environment and lend support to ongoingconcern with population growth as a driving force of environmental

impacts. By contrast, they found that the effects of affluence on CO2emissions level off and even decline somewhat at the very highestlevels of gross domestic product per capita. They suggest that thisderives from the shift from manufacturing to service economies and from

the ability of more affluent economies to invest in energy efficiency.Unfortunately, they note that this effect occurs at affluence levelsabove 75% of the 111 nations in the sample and that, for theoverwhelming majority of nations, continued economic growth can be

expected to produce increasing, rather than declining, CO2 emissions.

In other words, reductions in CO2 emissions will not occur in thenormal course of development and will have to come from targetedefforts to shift toward less carbon-intensive technologies.

Dietz and Rosa use the technology multipliers to identify somenations for particular analysis because they have multipliers differentfrom what one would expect at particular levels of affluence andpopulation size. Of particular interest were nations with unusually

large multipliers, indicating that they emit far more CO2 than would beexpected from their size and levels of affluence. These includeBulgaria, Zimbabwe, and Poland. In contrast, some nations had

relatively small multipliers and small CO2 emissions for their size andlevels of affluence. These included France, Spain, and Brazil. Theauthors hypothesize about particular technology-infrastructuredifferences that would account for such anomalies. Bulgaria and Poland,as former Soviet bloc nations, consumed a lot of fossil fuels relativeto their of levels of affluence. Zimbabwe has a large indutrial sector

relative to its level of affluence of CO2 production than would beexpected a given levels of size and affluence: Frances extensivereliance on nuclear power, Spains use of nuclear and hydroelectric

power and its relatively low level of automobile ownership, andBrazils reliance on hydroelectric and liquid natural gas fuel.


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Finally, Dietz and Rosa estimated the coefficients of their

statistical model to project global CO2 emissions for the year 2025,using various U.N. projections for populations and economic growth.They concluded that, to achieve a goal of stable emissions at 1991levels in the face of economic and population growth, average energyefficiency gains of 1.8% per year would be neeede from 1990 to 2025.The researchers believe that these increases are feasible, but willnot occur without strenous efforts. I have discussed this research insome depth because the findings themselves are interesting andsignificant for both science and policy and also because they vividlydemonstrate the usefulness of the I=PATmodel as a research tool. I=PATis also important because it incorporates the major human drivingforces of change that almost everyone would agree are important andones that are at the heart of current debate and discourse regardingenvironmental problems. The I=PAT model also provides a framework forintegrating disparate insights and scholarly literatures. Next iattemptto demonstrate this by elaborating one of the models dimensions.

Affluence, Social Inequality, and EnvironmentalImpact

Not surprisingly, social scientist have been most interested in A ofthe I=PAT equation. They have suggested that affluence by itselfoversimplifies the social dimensions of environmental problems. It doesso because it is one kind of consequences of the operation of morebasic social system components: Cultural values and institutionalarrangements. Just as important, it oversimplifies the human impactbecause affluence is one end of a broader continuum of social

inequality. Social scientists are coming to understand not justaffluence and poverty as ends on a continuum of social inequality both within and between nations as causes of environmentaldisequality. If affluence is an environmental problems, poverty may beas bad. How so?

Increasing Social Inequality

before addressing environmental impacts, you need to recognize thatsocial inequality has been growing slowly but steadily since the 1970sboth in the MDCs and the LDCs. And it has been growing both within andbetween societies. The growth of social inequality means a growth of

both affluence and poverty at the same time. In the MDCs, socialinequality declined after World War II until about the mid-1970s, afterwhich it has steadily but slowly increased. In America, for example,between 1960 and 1974, real wages of experienced workers increased byabout 20% but between 1973 and 1992, average real wages for the bottom60% of male workers fell by 20% and the overall median male wages fell12%. According to economist Lester Thurow, the earnings prospects arecollapsing for the bottom two-thirds of the work force. At thesametime, 1980 census data show that the proportion of middle-incomehouseholds in the populations shrank from 71% to 63% while theproportion of low-income households rose by 33% as did the share ofaffluent households. However it is measured, the overall pattern isclear: (1) more and comparatively richer rich; (2) fewer in the middle

with slowly eroding living standards for the middle class; and (3) moreand comparatively poorer poor. While growing social inequality wasvisible in most MDCs, it was more notable in the United States. In


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fact, by 1990 the distribution of wealth (not income) in the U.S. moreclosely resembled that of the Philippines, India, and Venezuela thanthat of Germany, the United Kingdom, or Canada.

The growth of global inequality stands out in even sharper reliefbetween nations. In 1960 the richest 20% of the worlds people absorbed

70% of global income; by 1989 (the latest year for which comparablefigures are available) the share of the wealthy had increased to nearly83%. The poorest 20%, meanwhile, saw their share of global income dropfrom a meager 2,3% to a more meager 1.4%. The ratio of the richestfifths share to the poorests thus grew from 0 to 1 in 1960 to 59 to 1in 1989. Both within and between nations, the chasm between the richand the not so rich is growing.

The causes of growing social inequality are complex but ingeneral have todo with (1) the increasing shift of less skilled laborto low-wage LDCs and (2) the technological upgrading of production,which reduces the total demand for less skilled labor. Thus, inequality

has been growing even as the world economic output has increased andthe world market system has become more integrated. The socialconsequences of this process are profound. At minimum, it is likely toincrease social polarization and political tensions both within andbetween nations.`

Inequality and Environmental Degradation

Part of the reason that inequality increases social tensions is thatenvironmentaldegration impacts the living standards and life-styles ofdifferent social classes and ethnic group in different ways. Theaffluent can respondto environmental problems with minimal consequences

for modifying their life-styles. For instance, they can afford higherprices or energy taxes, or they can purchase more efficient homes,autos, or appliances. The less affluent classes are less able to do so.An enormous body of research demonstrate that both lower socioeconomicclasses and racial minorities bear more than their share of the costsof environmental problems and change. They live in zones morethreatened by toxic wastes of all kinds, and landfills and wasterepositories are more likely to be built in the neighborhoods andcommunities where they live. Both inter-and intranational trade ingarbage to the neighborhoods and nations of the poor. The differenteffects of environmental degradation on the poor compared with the richmight be obvious. But what might not be obvious is how growinginequality is itself a potent cause of environmental decline.

By now ample evidence shows that people at either end of theincome spectrum are far more likely than those in the middle to damagethe earths ecological health: the rich because their affluent life-styles are likely to lead them to ensume an over proportionate share ofthe earths food, energy, raw materials, manufactured goods and thepoor, because their poverty drives them to damage and abuse theenvironment. The poorer classes in MDCs damage the environment notbecause they consume so much, but because they can afford only older,cheaper, less durable, less efficient, and more environmentallydamaging products autos, appliances, homes, and so forth. Im otherwords, the affluent who can afford the newest and most efficient of

everything danage the environment because of the volume of energy andmaterial they consume. The poor do so because whatever they consume islikely to have a greater per unit environmental impact. It is important


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to note that it is not the poorest among the poor who have no autos,apartments, or appliances of any kind who are environmentally mostdamaging. Rather, it is the most marginal segment of unskilledworkerswho still have sufficient amenities to have an impact on theenvironment, not, for instance, the transient or homeless, who havevirtually nothing.

In LDCs, population pressure and inequitable income distributionpushes many of the poor onot fragile lands, where they overexploitlocal resource bases, sacrificing the future to salvage the present.Short-term strategies such as slash-and-burn agriculture, abbreviatedfallow periods, harvests exceeding regenerations rates, depletion oftopsoil, and deforestation permit survival in the present but placeenormous burden on future generations. In fact, with uncannyregularity, the worlds most improverished regions also suffer theworst ecological damage; maps of the two are almost interchangeable. InChina, India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, for instance, theimproverished live in degraded semiarid and arid regions or in the

crowded hill country sorrounding the Himalayas; Chinese poverty isparticularly concentrated on the Loess Plateau, where soil is erodingon a legendary scale.

Often, the environmentally destructive behavior of the worldspoor has to do with highly skewed land ownership patterns. Rural smalllandholders whose land tenure is secure rarely overburden their land,even if they are poor. But dispossessed and secure rural householdsoften have no choice but to do so. Neither hired workers, hiredmanagers, nor tenant farmers care for land as well as owners do (whichalso is evident in the U.S.). Being landless is in fact a commoncondition among rural households in many LDCs: Among rural households,40% of Africans, 53% of Indians, 60% of filipinos, 75% of Equadorians,

70% of Brazilians, and 92% of Dominicans are landless or near landless.Although such poverty impacts the environment, the causality here isnot one way. Even before it is degraded, a marginal area by nature doesnot ussually produce enough surplus to lift its inhabitants out ofpoverty. Poor areas and poor people destroy each other. Furthermore, asin the MDCs, it is not the poorest of the poor, who have no consumeramenities or access to land whatsoever, who are the greatest problem.The poorest of the poor, whether in rural areas or urban shantytowns,are most likely to be widows, divorcees, and single mothers. Theyconsume less and produce less waste per capita than all others. Theyprobably tread lightest of al on the earth and do less damage to theenvironment than any other groups. They are victims, not prepetrators.

A reformed land tenure system that gives secure ownership of land, evenin small parcels, to the landless peasants of the world would go somedistance toward moderating the high birthrates and staunching thedestruction of ecosystems by the worlds poor.

The affluents population of the MDCs also threaten the globalecosystem, but obviously not because they are desperate with fewalternatives. MDCs have the consumerist culture, the purchasing power,and economic arrangements to support life-styles that consume anoverproportionate share of the worlds resources. With about 20% of theworlds population, they consume ten times the energy as theircounterparts in LDCs, 10 times the timber, 13 times the iron and steel,14 times the paper, 18 times the synthetic chemicals, and 19 times the

aluminum. They account for a disproportionate share of resurcedepletion, environmental pollution, andand habitat degradation than


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humans have caused worldwide. A world full of affluent socieites thatconsume at such levels is an ecological impossibility.

Affluence and Personal Happiness

Because the dominant social paradigm of MDCs, particularly American,leads people to see affluence as a prerequisite for personal happiness,you need to ask an important question: Is there, in fact, arelationship between affluence and happiness? No one would suggest thatdesperately poor people are as happy as the wealthy. But empiricalstudies of the relationship between affluence and happiness suggest afar weaker relationship than you might expect. Since the 1950s,Americans have nearly doubled their consumptuon, both in terms of GNPand personal consumption expenses per capita. Yet regular surveys bythe National Opinion Research Center reveal that no more Americansreport that they are very happy now than in the 1950s. The very

happy proportion of the population has hovered around one-third sincethe 1950s. Nor is there as much variation in reported personalhappiness between nation as you might expect. One study in the 1970sfound that Nigerians, Filipinos, Panamanians, Yugoslavians, Japanese,Israelis, and West Germans all ranked themselves near the middle on ahappiness scale. Studies generally confounded attempts to correlatematerial consumption and personal hapiness. Summarizing this evidence,psychologist Michael Argyle suggested that there are very small overalldifferences in the level of reported happiness found in rich and verypoor countries. The connection between income and happiness turns outto be relative (mainly to social class) rather than absolute. That is,the upper classes in any society are more satisfied with their livesthan the lower classes are, but thye are no more satisfied than the

upper classes of much poorer countries, or than upper classes in themuch less affluent past.

In sum, poverty and affluence are both threats to the environmentand are becoming more so as the chasm of social inequality widensaround the world. A reduction of social eniquality within and betweennations would reduce pressure on the environment, both through reducingthe resource consumption of the affluent and by reducing the need tooverharvest, overgraze, or overfish to meet the short-run subsistenceneeds of the poor.

SOCIAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL FUTURES:

TWO VIEWS

Since 1950, population has doubled and will likely double again in thenext 20 years. Global economic output has quintipled. The culturalethods of consumerism that favors high growth and ever-risingconsumption is rapidly diffusing around the world. At the same time,the chasm of inequality grows, poverty proliferates, while theprospects for global equity seem increasingly remote. Signs indicatethat every environmental and ecological system is becoming degraded andthat there is a very real prospects for altering the climate of theplanet. What are the implications for our social and environmentalfuture is such trends continue? Can they continue without devastatingthe carrying capacity and resource base of the planet. Or will we beable to invent and grow our way into a sustainable high-consumptionworld for every large numbers of people? The traditional finite world


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paradigm of most physical scientists and demographers argues for theformer, and the market allocation paradigm of neoclassical economistsargues for the latter possibility (if we will let markets operate toregulate scarcities and stimulate investment in innovation). Theseconflicting views of the trajectory of social and environmental futureshave, in fact, been quite well articulated. They are scenarios

developed first in the 1960s and 1970s, but bith views havecontemporary defenders. Although they are very different, both have aposotive visiov. Each provides some hope for a good human future but invery different terms.

A Future Without Limits: Cornucopia?

Since the 1960s. Herman Kahn (the late director of Hudson Institute)and his collegues have argued that universal affluence and permanentsustainability are possible and, indeed, the most probable outcomes ofpresent trends. They argue that all persons in the world can, in fact,live like contemporary Americans without devastating the planet. Kahn

and his collegues argue that barring bad luck or mismanagement

theprospects for achieving eventually a high level of broadly worldwideeconomic affluence and beneficent technology are bright, and that thisis a good and logical goal for mankind... How so?

Kahn argues that, taking a very long view, we are now still inpart of a great transition that began with industrialization in the1700s. Kahn and his collegues argues, In much the same way that theagricultural revolution spread round the world, the IndustrialRevolution has been spreading and causing a permanent change in thequality of human life. However, instead of lasting 10,000 years, thissecond diffusion process is likely to be largely completed with a totalspan of about 400 years or roughly by the late 22nd century.

The great transition has three phases, encompassing (1) theIndutrial Revolution and industrial societies of the early twentiethcentury; (2) the superindustrial economy, meaning the emerging globaleconomy of igh technologies, service undustries, and multinationalcorporations; and (3) the future transition to a true postindutrialsociety. These phase0s overlap and completementeach other in time indifferent parts of the world but, according to Kahn, the generalpattern of evolution is clear. Kahn expects the general pattern of thegreat transition to follow an S=shaped curve. That is, from the 1800s,there were exponential increases in world population, the gross worldproduct (GWP) and per capita incomes. In the mid-1970s, world

population growth to decline, but affluence continued to spread so thatworld per capita incomes will continue to increase; these trends willcontinue. Kahn and his collegues are at pains to stress that theslowing of economic growth will uccur because, with the spread ofaffluence, there will be a reduced growth of demand rather than supplyshortages.

Thegrowing inequality that I have noted is what Kahn and hiscollegues vies as a transional gap between the living standards ofthe poor and the rich nations, which they argue is inevitable asindustrialism spreads and living standards of some parts of the worldrelative to others are raised. But that is analogous tothe widespreadmisery and poverty of early industrialism, which eventually spread

better living conditions to all classes in indusrial societies. You cansee Kahns depiction of the great transition in terms of his estimates


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of changes in population growth, the GWP, and per capita incomes inFigure1.

Kahn envisions the future from now until about 2025 dominatedby what he calls superindustrial societies as a somewhat difficulttransition period. It will be a period of slowing down of percentage

growth rates for the GWP and a particular period of malaise for therich countries. The present time represents the spread of problem-pronesuperindustrial economies that experienced many difficulties:technological crises, pollution and destruction of the environment, theexploitation of labor in the LDCs, and problems of coordination andcontrol of multinational firms. Because many of the projects ofsuperindustrial societies are so large scale, they are problem prone,and we do not (yet) know how to eliminate, control, or alleviate allthese effects. During this period, Kahn predicts commercial ventures tocolonize and to initiate economic activity in space, particularlyregarding energy and minerals, which will exponentially increase theresource base available to human societies. As superindustrialism

spreads among the developed countreis, manufacturing industry willspread among the middle-income nations and perhaps eventually to someof the poorer ones. But in Kahns view, the present environmentalproblems, the growing social inequality and poverty, and consequentgeopolitical tensions and conflicts are all transitional problems.Toward the end of the period (probably sometime in the middle of thenext century), the problems of superindustrialism will begin to besuccessfully managed. The first signs of a worldwide maturing economywill be seen.

By 2175, Kahn and his collegues expect superindustrial societiesto be everywhere, most likely including a vastly expanded spaceeconomy, and true postindustrial ones to rapidly emerging in many

places. They predict after this date a slowing down of both populationand economic growth rates, not only in percentages but in absolutenumbers. But the slowdown of economic growth rates does not mean adecline in standards of living because of (1) the economies of scalethat accompany large-scale systems and (2) intensive technologicalprogress that will provide energy savings and will sustitute newresources for scarce ones. Kahn expects that in true postindustrialsocieties, economic tasks will constitute only a small part of humanendeavors. Evntually, furnishing the material needs and commercialservices of a society will be carried out largely by highly automatedequipment and complex computers operated by a small professionalgroup. Thus, in the context of growing economic efficiency, rapid

advances in technology, and a stabilizing world population,unparalleled affluence can be sustained on a global basis. Theyenvision a world of large-scale system dominated by high technology andtechnocrtas, in which the large bulk of humans will be preoccupied withnoneconomics pursuits.

Although they do not ignore the problems of the present, Kahn andhis collegues have little patience with those who view present problemsin apocalyptic terms. Reacting to one such report (Global 2000, aReport to the President, 1979) they responded that

Global problems due to physical conditions...are

always possible, but are

likely to be less pressing in the future than in the past.

Environmental, resource, and population stresses are


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diminishing, and with the passage of time will have less

influence than now upon the quality of human life on our

planet. These stresses have in the past always caused many

people to suffer from lack of good, shelter, health, and

jobs, but the trend is toward less rather than more of such

suffering. Especially important and noteworthy is the

dramatic trend toward longer and healthier life throughout

all the world. Because of increases in knowledge, the

earths carrying capacity has by now no use ful meaning.

These trends strongly suggest a progressive improvement and

enrichment of the earths natural resource base, and of

mankinds lot on earth.

In short, Kahn and his collegues believe that continuing thepresent trends will produce a much brighter tomorrow, in spite of thepresent difficulties of the transition, and that

it is not very practical to adopt any deliberate

alternative to growth, and it is probably safer to keep on

growing than to try to stop. Attempting to change the

historical trend would either have little effect or lead to

disaster.

In a nutshell, this optimistic view of the future accepts thepresents trends as basically benign. It si a cornucopian view of thefuture. Kahn and his collegues have taken a clear human exemptionalistview, which holds that human are essentially exempt from the limits of

nature. With faith in human goodwill and inventiveness, Kahn and co-workers see no reason to deflect or attempt to change the course ofsocial change that has been in effect since the 1600s. As you mayimagine, this very attractive view of the nature which posits thepossibility of universal affluence, environmental sustainability, and aleisure-oriented society has many contemporary advocates. (forexamples, see Naisbett, 1982, 1994; Simon, 1981; Zey, 1994).

A Future With Limits:Outbreaks-Crash

The counterpoint to the cornucopian scenario argues that present trendsare putting us on a collision course with the finite carrying capacityof the planet, which we may shortly overshoot. Some argue that we arealready in an overshoot mode. If so, we must dramatically reverse thehistoric trends of the past 200 years or inevitably suffer a collapseof human civilization because of a collapse of the resource base onwhich it depends. The most articulate and influential statement of thisview was by a 1970s futurist think tank called the Club of Rome, whichwas originally located in Italy and sponsored by a variety ofindustrialists and multinational corporations. Rather than rely on themental and intuitive models of Kahn and his collegues (cited earlier),the methodology of the Club of Rome used an elaborate computer

simulation called A World System Dynamics(WSD) model developed byMassachusetts Institute of Technology scientists Jay Forrester,Donella Meadows, and their collegues. This model started with what was


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known about current patterns and trends in population growth,economicgrowth, resource consumption, food supply, and pollution effects, eachof which has been growing exponentially. The WSD model then developedan elaborate set of coeffecients for how continued growth in each ofthese areas would impact the others and attempted to project the sum ofthese interactions into the future of several hundred years.

The resulting projection by the WSD model was a classic outbreak-crash model, familiar to biological ecologist. It is what happens whenpopulations of animals (e.g., the reindeer on St. Mattews Island) growat a such a rate that they strip the environment of available foodsupplies. After doing so, their populations declines precipitouly. Thehuman outbreak-crash pattern predicated by the WSD model argues thatcurrent exponential growth in population, resource consumption, andfood production will produce such enormous stress on the carryingcapacity of the planet by 2100 that the resource and capitals inputs tosupport such consumption levels will not be sustainable. So muchinvestment of wealth is required to obtained dwindling supplies of

petroleum, natural gas, silver, petroleum, nickel, zinc, and otherresources to maintain world industrial development that capitalinvestments can no longer keep up with the growing needs. This preventsincreases in fertilizer production, health care, education, and othervital activities. Without food and necessary services, world populationand living standards will undergo a steady decline sometime during thetwenty-first century. Thus, the Club of Rome research group arguedthat, on a global basis, the whole of humanity will replicate the morelimited ecological crash experience of the Copan Mayans, theMesopotamians, and many other preindustrial societies. In theirdegraded environments, they could no longer obtain the investmentsnecessary for social maintenance. The views of the Club of Romeresearch group have been forcefully stated in a variety of technicaland popular publications. The most recent report by the group usingmore recent data is significantly, entitled Beyond the Limits andargues that we have already overshot the earths carrying capacity andare now living with a dwindling resource base. This is depicted infigure2, in what the MIT analysts called their standards run,reflecting current world conditions.

In various publications, the Club of Rome research group produceda large variety of computer runs of the simulation to reflect moreoptimistic assumptions (e.g., doubling resource asupply estimates,controlling population growth and pollution effects), but the resultwas the same: At some time shortly after the run of the next century

(2100), growth would be unsustainable. The problem was not any singledimension but the cumulative effects of the way that they interact. Andthe underlying probblem is growth itself. Hence the MIT researchersemphasized the urgency of global efforts to dampen exponential economicgrowth itself(not just population growth and pollution side effects)and move toward a global equilibrium. The language of the steadystate, used in earlier versions of their scenario, has been replacedwith the language of sustainability in which they take pains to pointout that certain types of growth are possible, so long as there aredramatic reductions in material consumption. In this view, it is notenough to simply wait for markets to adjust to scarcity of food andnonrenewable resources: By that time, irreversible declines in

ecological equilibrium and resource availability may have already takenplace, and a variety of points of no return of no return may have beenpassed. Nor can technology save us. All that technological advances cando is delay the inevitable end, bec


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cause dominant cultural patterns and institutional arrangementsperpetuate conditions of profligate consumption and problem solving by

growth that are in the end self-defeating and environmentallydestructive. The specter raised by this division is that, if preenttrends continue, after 2100, a smaller human population will be ekingout a more marginal existence on an exhausted and polluted planet.

The Club of Rome research group does not suggestthat the collapseof civilization is inevitable. Their view is rather that there is stilltime to avoid the widespread but gradual collapse of civilization inthe next century, even though time is short and we are further alongthe trajectory to collapse than when their initial report was issued 20years ago. But achieving sustainability will entail at minimum(1) theestablishments of limits on population and economic growth,

particularly as the latter implies material consumption, and (2) anemphasis on development tailored to the resource basis of each nationso that economic advances can be ecologically sustainable.

This is indeed a sharp counterpoint to the cornucorpian view ofthe future presented by Kahn and his collegues. It is a darker and morepessimistic scenario about the future, and as you might imagine, it hasprovoked a blizzard of commentary and criticism over the years. Themost common criticism questioned (1) the assumptions of resourcesestimates and/or (2) the interactions assumptions. It is the old baneof computers simulations GIGO, garbage in, garbage out. Inparticular, earlier versions predicted impending depletion and costincreases of several mineral resources that have not occured (many aremore abundant and cheaper than they were in 1970). Indeed, the subjectof mineral resources is treated in a much more nuanced fashioned inlater publications, often emphasizing sink rather than source problems.On the otherhand, the Club of Rome groups projection about theavailability of pther types of resources (e.g., water, arable land percapita) seem, in the retrospective of 20 years, on target. Otherattacks on the perspectives of the Club of Rome groups have been morepolitical and ideological than empirical. They have been attacked byconservatives and free-market economists for providing thejustification of a planned and rationed world socioeconomic order andby those on theleft as providing justification for halting growth andthus betraying the aspirations of the worlds poor. Indeed, though the

Club of Rome has recognized the importance of distributional problemsin the transition to sustainability, concrete suggestions about how toachieve sustainability or global equilibrium are absent.

Voluntary Simplicity, Appropriate

Technology, and the Soft Path

I said earlier that there is a posotive vision of the future in eventhis more gloomy scenario, and you may be wondering by now exactly howthis is so. Some have argued that learning to live sustainbility in aworld with limits is not just a nasty necessity but could be the basisfor a better social life, albeit one in which material consumptioncould not grow indefinitely. One such suggestion urges people in theMDCs to change their life-styles toward voluntary simplicity. By livingfrugally and simply, individuals could change patterns of consumption


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and reduce pollution and environmental disruption. Personal efforts tolive more gently on the earth are embodied in voluntary simplicity.Such efforts are not new, and advocate Duane Elgin estimated probablyoptimistically, in 1981 that 10 million adult Americans, as well aspeople from other nations, were experimenting with voluntarysimplicity. Simple living is less convenient. It values simple rather

than fancy habits and appliances (e.g., cooking from scratch ratherthan convenience foods, clotheslines rather than drying machines, andwalking and bycycling more and driving less). It requires moreforethought and attention to how life is grounded in the seasons andnature. Lowering consumption need not deprive people of goods andservices that they say really matter conversation, family andcommunity gatherings, theater, music, and spiritually. According to ahusband and wife who gave up high-paced jobs in journalism andscreenwriting to run a rural family orchard, simple living ha scome tomean spending more time attending to our lives and less time attendingto our work, and living more deliberately and hurriedly. But they doso in opposition to the powerful consumerist culture. In fact,

relatively few have been willing to voluntarily give up moreconvenience and the prospect of life in the fast lane for thepleasures of a simplified life-syles. Most in the MDCs spend more timeand energy figuring out how to maintain and extend consumption ratherthan practice voluntary simplicity. And it has little to do with theneeds of the poor in the MDCs and around the world, who already live ininvoluntary simplicity of a much more malevolent kind.

This is a cultural argument, but there is a related technologicalone. It urges the increasing adoption of appropriate technoligies (AT),defined as techologies that are best able to match the needs of allpeople in a society in a sustainable relationship with theenvironment. ATS differ from the high technologies of the

cornucorpian scenario. They are often (1) simpler (and can beunderstood and repaired by the people who use it), (2) less phrone tofailures (as are more complex technological systems, and (3) lesslikely to cause several ecological side effects. Proponents of ATadvocate, for example the subsitution of organic fertilizers forinorganic ones that have deleterious effects on soil and water and thesubsitution of solar space heating for usind electricity to heat homes.Heating homes with electricity (perhaps generated by nuclear powerplants) when solar space heating is practical, cheaper, and moreenvironmentally benign has been comparedto cutting butter with a chain saw! In some senses, AT means

reintegrating expert knowledge with traditional ways of doing things,

as illustrated by the discussion of traditional, organic, and low-inputfarming in Chapter Five. Appropriate technologies are proposed for boththe MDCs and LDCCs. For the LDCs, AT may provide alternatives toimporting inappropriately expensive and complex technologies that havein part been responsible for developmental failures (e.g., Western-style power plants and industrialized agriculture). Rural AT energy andagriculture, not requiring lots money, machinery, or largelandholdings, could reduce the migration of displaced peasants toalready overcrowded cities. It could thus reduce conflict between ruraland urban residents. The most articulate spokesperson for the use of ATwas the late British economist E.F. Schumacher, whose book Small isBeautiful has been widely influential.

Physicist Amory Lovins described two sharply divergent possiblepaths for energy and social development. One is the hard path, which iscapital intensive, large-scale, centralized, bureaucratic, and uses


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energy-intensive technologies. The social world of the hard path wouldbe one in which political power is technocratically based and alsohighly centralized. It would be a world in which structuralunemployment is a chronic problem for those displaced by newtechnologies. It implies specialization and interdependency in massivestructures and a culture in which material consumption is in itself a

measure of status and self-worth. It would also be, according toLovins, a culture of alienation for the masses of people who live insystems that are too large and too technically complex for generalcomprehension. It is the epitome of the path advocated by Kahn and hiscollegues. The soft path, on the other hand, envisions a world ofdecentralized or smaller scale organizational structures, less complexand less resource-intensive technologies, and less intensivecapitalization required for production. It implies more localism,bartering, and an emphasis on self-efficiency. Lovins broadly views thetwo paths as basically incompatible, in that a presistent retreat tothe prevailing hard path with its supply-expansion strategies willforeclose future options for a soft technology with a high standard of

living.

Comparing the Two Scenarios

The cornucorpian and the limits scenarios are two strikingly differentvisions of future. I hope that their relevance to the differentparadigms for understanding human-environment interaction is obvious toyou. The cornucopian scenario argues that the good future is to befound in complex technological solutions to resource problems and ineconomies of scale that come with the coordinated global management oflarge-scale, bureaucratic systems. Proponents of this scenario tend to

gloss over the fact that such systems may increasingly becomeunmanageable, less amenable to democratic control, and more vulnerableto catastrophic blunders, accidents, and disruptions. They take it asarticles of faith that (1) resource limits and environmental decay canand will be overcome by good management, good markets, andtechnological fixes and that (2) without extraordinary measures,affluence will increasingly diffuse on a global basis. Both of theseare plausible but arguable assumptions.

By contrast, the world with limits scenario argues that seekinghigh-tech solutions to sustain growth in a finite world is at best aFautian bargain that will buy some time but will be ruinous in the end.Proponents of that scenario argue that the good future is to be foundin a world of smaller scale and more decentralized social units, AT,and more self-sufficiency. Their vision is of a world where life ismore comprehensible to ordinary person, a culture of frugality, andwhere mistakes and blunders have less serious ecological consequences.If nothing else, this visions entails a reversal of the of the socialtrends of the last 200 years. It would involve a deliberate dampeningof growth and resources consumption before the planet becomes exhaustedand polluted. Doing so would required widespread life-style changes anda coordinated effort on a global scale; the political consensus thatwould be required to achieve such a fundamental redirection of currenttrends is a daunting prospect. Presently, many powerful organizationsand groups in contemporary societies have deeply embedded vested

interests in perpetuating growth and the culture of growth. And anantigrowth policy is of limited appeal to the poorest half of humanity,which has not been able to share in the culture of affluence.


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But wait. this is not a whole story. Substantial externalizedcosts are not considered in these reserves-demand-price cost-accountingdata about energy and industrial minerals. In the production process,industry produces twice as much hazardous wastes and 42 times as muchsoid wastes as all municipal solid wastes. Mining and utilities produce30% of all U.S. solid wastes. Mining, in particular, has become more

efficient but not less environmentally destructive. It can destroy ordegrade farmland and wildife habitats, pollute groundwater, and changegroundwater characteristicsand flow patterns. The solid wastes leftover from mining are a source of air and water pollution. In all, thecost of environmental damage from fossil fuel use has been estimated at$100 billion per year in the United Sates alone. Put in context, $100billion was about one-tird of the annual U.S. defense budget in theearly 1990s. None of these costs are computed in the resource prices.They are borne by taxpayers, if at all. More likely, such by-productsof extractive and manufacturing processes simply accumulate in variousenvironmental sinks.

Furthermore, a world 11 billion rather than 5.7 billion peolpe(the U.N. intermediate population projection for sometime in the latterhalf of the next century) would make enormous demands on the worldsmineral and energy reserves. Consider a scenario: Economic growth boomsin the global economy and trade system, and development and risingliving standards diffuse around the world to bring most people in thedeveloping nations close to present U.S. or Europeans standards ofconsumption. The result would be simply catstrophic. Even withanticipated gains in efficiency, the worlds aluminum would be consumedin only 18 years instead of 224 (1988 reserve estimates), copper woulddisappear in 4 years rather than 41, oil reserves would become verytight in 7 years rather than the projected 50 or so, and even theearths vast coal reserves would be exhausted in 34 rather than 224

years. Such a scenario is impossible. None of the considerable humantechnological inventiveness or economic market adjustments could copewith consumption on such a vast scale. This nightmarish vision is onlya scenario; it could not possibly happen. But it does illustrate that aworld of 11 billion people could not continue to consume resources atcurrent Western standards. At some point, scarcity of minerals wouldlimit either population, or economic growth, or both. The result neednot be the collpase that the limits scenario suggest but, rather, couldbe a gradual and oainful series of adapations, subsitutions, andreductions in consumption. But long before such a resources (source)crisis, we would have to deal with a more immediate pollution (sink)crisis.

The most compelling evidence for the limits scenario does nothave to do with energy systems or the material consumption of anindustrial society for which we can imagine many technically feasiblesubstitutes, improvements in efficiency, significant life-stylechanges, and so forth. Rather, the most compelling evidence concernsthe relationship between the worlds growing population and its food-producing resources. Unlike the resource of energy, manufactured goods,and services, agricultural resources including good cropland,rangeland, fisheries, water, and forests are limited and finite.There are subsitutes for the metal in autos (indeed, for autosthemselves), but there is no subsitutes for soil and water to growwheat rice. The strategies humans have used since the 1950s to increase

food production (adding land, new genetic crop varieties, irrrigation,inorganic fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides, and so forth) havereached plateau and are not now increasing food supplies. In fact, the


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evidence is accumulating that we are crossing the tresholdssustainability in the capacity to produce food.

The worlds major food supply systens are under pressure fromgrowing human demands for food. With fisheries, rising human demand isunsustainable everywhere. After speaking in 1989, the worlds fish

catch has declined, producing per capita drop in seafood supplies and arise in prices. This trend is likeli to continue, because, according tothe U.N. agency that monitors fish stocks (the food and agricultureorganization [FAO], all 17 major oceanic fisheries are now being fishedat or beyond capacity. Nine are in a state of decline. Simply stated,the current level of fishing is ecologically unsustainable. Limits arealso beggining to constrain production on the worlds rangeland, whichsupport herds of cattle, sheep, and goats; like fisheries, rangelandsare being grazed at or beyond their sustainable yield almosteverywhere. Grain is the worlds most important food supply. Pressureson the worlds croplands, two thirds of which produce grain, arebecoming unsustainable in many countries, leading to crop erosion.

After using steadily between 1950 and 18\984, per capita grain supplieshave declined steadily. Agricultural and water resource systems usedbeyond their sustainable yield are evident in the MDCs, but mostnoticeable in Africa and Central Asia, where cropland and rangelanddegradation deprive many of their livelihood, forcing them into citiesor food relief camps.

What do these facts mean? Quite simply that because of ourgrowing population, consumptions patterns, and technological choices,we are surpassing the planets agricultural carrying capacity.Environmental assets are now insufficient to sustain our present lifesupport systems. If population grows are projected to 2010 (not thatfar way), per capita availability of rangeland will drop by 22%, and

the fish catch by 10%, thus jeopardizing much of the worlds animalprotein. Irregated land per capita, which now yields about a third ofthe worlds food harvest, will drop by 12%, and cropland per personwill drop by 21%.

Empirically based assessments of food-enhancing strategies...suggest that we will able to feed the earths population in 2020 butbarely and with many qualifications and optimistic assumptions aboutchanges in agrotechnology, dietary patterns, and slobal land and fooddistribution. Those assessments are also very concerned about thecombined effect of climate change and declines in soil fertility as aresult of increased foor production. Those assessments do not negate

the clear current signs that, in the longer term, the relationshipbetween human population and consumption growth and per capita growthand per capita agricultural and water resources may already be beyondthe limits of sustainability. Biotechnology may be of some help, but sofar, it has been used to increase the profitability of food producing,rather than to increase the total food supply.

In addition, you need to remember that increasing food supplyrelative to future population growth means appropriating even more ofnature for human use and increasing the current 40% of the earths netprimary production (NPP) appropiated by humans and our chosen cropcreatures. But what then of the way that human survival depends on theenvironmental services of natural systems? These are possible to

quantify like the population and food resources data, but as we detroy,alter, or appropriate more natural systems for ourselves, theenvironmental servuces are compromised. At some point, the likely


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result is a chain reaction of environmental declined: widespreadflooding and erosion brought on by deforestation, worsened drought andcrop losses from desertification, pervasive aquatic pollution, andfisheries losses from wetlands destruction. Stanford Universitybiologist Peter Vitousek and his collegues argue that those whobelieves that limits to growth are so distant as to be of no

consequence for todays decision makers appear unware of thesebiological realities.

There you have it: I think those are the most compelling bits ofcontemporary evidence related to the two scenarios. But they are stillambiguous, as would be any empirical evidence, because if themultidimensional, macroscopic, and long-term nature of the twoscenarios. As I mentioned earlier, these scenarios can be envisions,not predict. Although I have tried to fairly represent different pointsof view, paradigms, scenarios, and evidence throughout this book, Imsure you recognize that I take the evidence for a future with bothsocial and environmental limit problem to be more plausible than the

cornucopian future. I told you that up front in the introductorychapter, as well as in other places, and now I hope you can see some ofthe reasons why. In a nutshell, as human popultions and impacts grow inscale in relation to total environmental resources, environments andecosystems are more likely to be overwhelmed or degraded, and therelative value of human adaptiveness and technological flexibilitydeclines. Historically, in a wolrd with less crowded and lowerconsuming human populations, there were fewer serious problems withenvironmental manageablilty. As crowding and consumption increase inscale, there will be many.

In spite of the popular media controversy and politicalconroversy, there is a sustantial and growing consensus within

scientific communities about these issues. Theres a lot ofdisagreement about the details but not much about the broad outlines ofour present situation. The Union of Concerned Scientists issued astatement of warning in 1992, signed by 1,600 scientist around theworld (including 102 Novel Prize winners) that destructive humanavtivities may so alter the world... [that] a great change in ourstewardshipof the earth and the life on it is required, if vast humanmisery is to be avoided and our global home on this planet is notirretrievably mutilated. You might expect such from an environmentalmovement organizations, but listen to the Scientific Advisory Committeeof the U.S. environmental Protection Agency a body not known forpartisan or rash judgements: Ecological system like the atmosphere,

oceans, and wetlands have a limited capacity for absorbing theenvironmental degradation caused by human activities. After thatcapacity is exceeded, it is only a matter of time before thoseecosystem begin deterorate and human health and welfare begin tosuffer. Most remarkably, in 1992, the U.S. National Academy of Scienceand the Royal Society of London, two of the worlds most scientificorganizations, neither known for taking extreme stands, issued anunprecedented joint statement that advances in sciences and technologyno longer could be counted on to avoid either irreversibleenvironmental degradation or continued poverty for much of humanity.

Choices in the Context of Uncertainty

Such statements and expert assessments are usually ignored orchallenged in the heat of political debates where real tax money and


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organizational interests are on the table. Even with a growing abstractscientific consensus, great uncertainty remians about the magnitude ofparticular effects (some of which can be quantified), and moreuncertainty and disagreement cintinue about the social consequences ofpursing a particular vision of the future. This is particularly truewhen any policy to promote change creates categories of winners and

losers relative to those who benefit from the current scheme of things.But it is also true that not to decide to persue am positive vision ofthe future is a decision by default to let things unfold us theymay.

Even if the evidence is murky and inadequate, it is stillimportant to think about the most rational and prudent basis for actionand policy in an uncertain future(including doing nothing). What is themost prudent and conservative best bet or gamble? Which ffuturescenario has the least costs if it fails? If we bet on the cornucopianscenario and it comes to pass, then all is well(universal massconsumption and affluence are , indeed, appealing prospects). But if

the cornocopian vision is unworkable and there really are limits,then the cost of failure - a dergraded planet and socialdeterioration- are quite high. In the longer term, they are perhapsdevastayting to any dignified human future. On the other hand, what ifthe finite world scenario is indeed the actual future, and we act onthis assumption? What we gain is a much better likelihood of asustainable relationship between humans and the earth. What if we acton the assumption of a world with limits when in fact it is largelyfalse? What are the cost of this mistake? They are the substaintial butmanageable investment in social and technical change and globalcooperation. For the affluent classes of the MDCs, it would mean acomfortable but certain ty more frugal and less affluent life thanwould be theoretically possible. It would also mean cooperation in

addressing growing material destitution in both the MDCs and the LDCs.For myself , I think that assuming a future with real limits is thebest bet, if only because the cost of failure are not nearly so great.If we wait until we find out that the cornucopian future is unworkable,critical points of no return will have been passed.

I develop this way of thinking about uncertainty and risk inChapter Four (about responses to the prospect of global warming) and inChapters Five and Six (about population and energy issues). It is notunique to me but is based on an strategy for making the most prudentbest bet in the face of uncertainty. It was emboided in the rationalfor believing God by French mathematician- philosopher Blaise Pascal

(1632-1662). He argued that if one believed in God and was faithfull,and God really existed, then all awas well. If one was faithfull to Godand he did not exist, not much was lost, perhaps some foregonepleasures and vices. But if one didnt believe in God and he did exist,one was in danger of being damnation. Pascals defence of faith was nota proof of what is true, but rather has to do with the risks and costof different kinds of errors(for which he was condemned by religiousauthorities at the time!). Not accidentally, Pascal worked out a numberof theorems dealing with probability, and became a founder of modernprobability theory. Dressed up in fancy languge of modern statistic,Pascals defense of faith has become the difference between the costsassociated with the making two different kinds of errors: A type Ierror, Which falsely rejects a true hypothesis, and a Type II error,

which fails to reject to as one.


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shift to natural gas as an interim(but less polluting) carbon fuel, andeventually depend more on energy from a wide variety of renewableenergy sources as determiined by local conditions( including hydrogenfuels,solar, wind, geothermal, biomass,and hydroelectric). In the longterm, sustainable societies would be powered more by sunlight andhydrogen than carbon. Cogeneration, the combined production of heat and

power, would be widespread, and many factories would generate their ownpower, using the waste heat for industrial processes.

4.A sustainable society would work to become economicallyefficient in all sences. It would invest in the technology andproduction of efficient vehicles, transfortation systems, machinery,offices, and appliances. It would maximize the recycling of thematerial and waste. More fundamentally, it would reduce the waste inprocesses of production, packaging, and distribution of goods services.It would reduce waste by reducing the material component of goods andservices. Such dematerialization would create a permanent net drop inwaste created and resources consumed. Thus, in a truly sustainable

economy, the pricipal source of material would be recycled goods. Bothproducers and consumers would create an economy that functions morelike an ecosystem (cyclically), rather than one that only withdrawsfrom sources and throws away junk in environmental sinks.

5.A sustainable society would have social forms compatible withthese natural, technical, and economic characteristics. A mix ofcoordinated decentralization and flexible centralization would exist.Thus enterpreneurialism and small-scalenetwoks would flourish alongwith the large organizations and urban life. The latter can producemany economies and efficiecies,and people would come to uderstand thatsmall is not always beautiful and large is not always ugly.Transportation system would become an effiecient mix of different

modes, including autos, ride-sharing programs,mass transit, andbicycles. High-density settlement would be encouraged, and urban sprawlwould contract. Multiple-family rather than single-family dwellingunits would be encouraged, and informal community netqwoks would evolveto regulate social life, and for trade, bartering, and cooperativesharing of goods and services that supplement mass markets, Socialinequality would persist ina reasonably free sustainable society, butsocial policy would be establish toinhibit both grinding poverty andredundant material wealth. Economic profits and productivity would bemeasured more by servise related to the quality of life than the volumeof stuff consumed. Recycling and environmental services themeselveswould become important industries. New forms of crime would

emerge(exploiting the commons), and ecological problems would become aspolitically important as economic ones.

6.A sustainable society would require a culture of beliefs,values, and social paradigms that define the legitimize thse natural,economic, and social characteristics. The natural environments of humanlife would be recognized more as ecological systems to be nourished andmaitained than as open environments to be used and exploited at will.Dominant social paradigms that underlie belief and actions wouldchanges appropriately. The virtues of material sufficiency andfrugallity will replace the culture and consumerism; materialism simplycannot survive the transition to sustainable societies. Neither self-worth nor social status would be measured primarily in terms of

possessioms; much of the energy now devoted to accumulating andconsuming goods could be directed at forming richer humanrelationships, stronger human communities, and greater outlets for


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artistic and cultural expressions. Western-style freewheelingindividualism would be tempered with a communitarianism that balancesindividual human rights with obligations to community. There would besocial restraints, but truly sustainable society would not boauthoritarian. Tolerance of diversity, social justice, and democraticpolitics would be valued as necessary to elicit the required

responsiveness, cooperation, and coordination of people-both within andbetween societies.

7.In a world where socities are connected with each other and toa shared environment, a sustainable society would be required tocooperate in the negotiation of sustainability in other societies-interms of their different circumtances. In doing so, it wouldparticipate in regional and international political regimes,treaties,regulatory 0agencies, and multinational govermental and nongovermentalorganizations. It would work to transform the system of globalinvestment and world trade to promote a world of sustainable societies,rather than one of growing environmental disruption and inequity. It

would promote the development of the LDCs in a sustainable way. In afinite world, it would work to balance the requirements for some sortof global regulatory system with desires of national autonomy.

As you can see, I have described the charateristics ofsustainable societies in pure(utopian?)form. But true sustainabilitymay require smething close to them. Are todays societies anywhereclose to being truly sustainable ones? Of course not.Surely,sustainability i\s relative, and change in that directions may evolvein small, incremental stages. But enough change to be effectiveeventually requires a dramatic social transformation on a large scale-eventually on a global scale. Given the difficulties of such socialtransformations is it reasonable to think that they have even a change

of happening.

CONCLUSION: A TRANSFORMATION TO SUSTAINABILITY?

Is a major transformation on this scale possible? Quite simple, yes. Isit probable? Who knows.Educated guesses vary widely. Can the purposiveactions of humans shape that process? Yes. Can the outcome be mainly asenvisioned by any particular human actor or organization? No. Outcomesof change are no more likely to be positive than negative, but nietherare we really trapped in a particular set social structures,institutional arrangements, structures of power and denimination,consumptio dynamics, and so forth.

In fact, history has examples of such massive and purp[osive socialtarnsformations. In the nineteenth century, feudalism was abandoned inJapan, as was slavery around the world. The twentieth century has seenthe retreat of imperialism and the creation of a united Europe. Warprovides obvious examples. Given the belief that the national survivalwas at stake during World War II, the U.S. population mobilized andtransformed itself in remarkable ways, Equally impressive was theMarshall Plan for reconstructing Europe after the war; in 1947, Americaspent nearly 3% of its gross national product on this huge set ofprojects. In our time, the Soviet system collapsed, largely through theaction of agents within the system. Most remakably, by 1993 the Unionos South Africa had transformed itself peacefully and democratically

from an outrageous brutal and authoritarian racial caste system to amultiparty and multiethnic society with a black man as the popularlyelected prime minister. None of these changes tured out exactly as


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intended or brought a problem-free social world into being. They onlydemonstrate the transformations on the scale required arepossible.

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3.5.c- alternative futures sustainability and social change

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