Collapse (2005)

Environmentalists can sometimes be accused of fear mongering.  And it’s true that nothing rallies the troops like a bit of imminent dread.  With that in mind, here's hoping that my review of the fatalistic, Collapse, can present a balanced approach to a scary subject.

No society lasts forever.  For every society that adapts and prospers, marking their dominance with the building of complex structures and systems, there is an inescapable demise.  The only pertinent question is how long can you survive?

Jared Diamond, professor of geography at the University of California, Los Angeles, and author of the Pulitzer Prize winning, Guns, Germs and Steel (1997) - an examination of the factors that have historically caused societies to prosper - takes a historical look at how environmental factors are inextricably connected to the collapse of almost all societies.  Lest we get carried away with melancholia and fatality, I think it is important for me to note that Diamond has written a scary historical account of the world, but it is a nonetheless a tale of cautious optimism; by better understanding the past we can endeavour to do better in the future.

   

Diamond approaches the task of learning from the past by laying out a distinct five-point framework from which to approach each case study:

1. Environmental Damage – here we are talking about the way which we exploit our natural resources for gain and whether an environment is naturally fragile or resilient to such exploitation.  Diamond makes the point that the reversibility of such damage is dependent on both a society’s decisions (e.g. the number of trees cut don per acre per year) and the characteristics of the given ecosystem (e.g. the number of seedlings that germinate per year or the sapling growth rate).  Thus, what is a sustainable rate of exploitation in one area will not always be sustainable in another.
2. Climate Change – it is refreshing to get to use this term in a neutrally political sense, as Diamond is more expansively referring to the natural variations in the climate that effect the conditions in which we live.  These are exclusively non man-made (e.g. volcanic eruptions, changes in the orientation of the Earth’s axis effecting local temperatures, wet versus dry decades, etc.)
3. Hostile Neighbours – the effect of intermittent or chronically hostile neighbours is perhaps the first factor you may have thought of when considering the collapse of past societies, however, Diamond presents compelling evidence to suggest that hostile neighbours are usually the proximate, not the ultimate, cause of collapse.  That is to say that, ecological factors usually weaken a society to the point where military conquest is possible (i.e. the straw that broke that the camel’s back).
4. Friendly Trade Partners – the ability to trade with neighbouring states greatly affects a society’s ability to provide everything that it needs, as no environment provides an abundance of all natural resources.  Consequently, the economics of competitive advantage and opportunity cost have been used for centuries to provide an improved standard of living.
5. Societal Response to Environmental Problems – obviously this is the factor most clearly separating the winners from the losers, and Diamond makes his way through the following case studies with a keen focus on human decisions.

Diamond devotes a lot of time carefully dissecting the collapse of the Easter Islanders (in South America circa 1600 A.D.), The Anasazi (in the Southwestern U.S. circa 1300 A.D.), The Mayans (in Mexico circa 1300 A.D.), The Vikings and The Norse (in Scandinavia circa 1100 A.D.).  At this point I could expand on the all the nuances of the above collapses, but for the purposes of this article I will very quickly skim over these investigations (which take up a good 300 pages) and briefly summarise the findings so that I can focus on the more modern topics explored in the book.

The three recurring reasons for the societal collapse of historic civilisations, that I noted, were:

1. Deforestation,
2. Soil Erosion, and
3. High Population Density

Short-term exploitation of forests decreases the availability of natural resources that are vital to many areas of the economy, increases your need to import raw materials thus weakening your trading position, drastically reduces your ability to control forest fires and destroys habitats and jobs.  Soil erosion (generally caused by working the land too hard, failing to rotate crops and farming on too steep a gradient) seriously undermines a society’s ability to feed itself and strengthen its economy as farming becomes harder and harder.  And high population density causes any problem to become exacerbated as the fight for resources, food and money becomes more intensified.

These factors appear time and again in Diamond’s analysis of the past societies and create a clear platform from which to view modern societies.  Diamond’s analysis of past societies is educational and thorough, but I must admit that I found the second half of the book (regarding modern societies) much more compelling and engaging.

While the collapse of previous societies had felt slightly impersonal and distant, the magnitude of the topic was really brought home when Diamond explored how environmental factors played a crucial role in the Rwandan genocide.

In 1994, almost 1,000,000 people (close to 20% of the entire population) were savagely murdered in Rwanda.  The motivation for such savagery has traditionally been attributed to ethnic cleansing.  The rivalry between the Hutu and Tutsi people was said to have provided the kindling and the plane crash that killed the Rwandan and Burundian presidents on April 6, 1994, the spark that ignited the horrific atrocities.  Yet Diamond unearths the compelling environmental factors that explain how the tensions were not so cut and dry as first thought.

Firstly, for several decades prior to 1994, Rwanda had been experiencing unprecedented population growth.  By 1994 the population density had reached 760 people per square mile (for comparison, the UK is approximately 600 people/m² and Canada 10 people/m²) leading to the average farm being a meagre 0.07 acres.  Furthermore, a high percentage of the population were farmers for subsistence and unlike industrialised nations could not harness efficient and mechanised agricultural methods.  Consequently, farmers struggled to feed their families, soil erosion and soil fertility loss exploded as farmers tried harder to survive on smaller plots of land and deforestation rates increased as farmers searched for new arable farmland.    In short, the ground could not feed the country and disputes over land and resources became common and violence and theft sky-rocketed.

Consequently, when the global price of coffee and tea (Rwanda’s primary exports) declined and a severe drought swept the nation in the beginning of 1994 we can see how tensions must have reached an all-time high.  The assertion that this was a genocide led to by the Hutu people against the Tutsi is not supported by the fact that nearly 5% of the entire Hutu population died.  What is more telling is the fact that the prevailing link between those who died, is that they were almost all landowners. 

Such devastation is truly saddening and hard to comprehend.  When I think of the face of genocide I think of people like Idi Amin (Uganda), Pol Pot (Cambodia) and Slobodan Milošević (Serbia) and it easy to think that bad people cause such tragedies, but Diamond really brings home just how serious mismanagement of the environment can be when stating, “it is not rare, even today, to hear Rwandans argue that a war is necessary to wipe out an excess of population and to bring numbers into line with the available land resources.”  This is the ultimate Malthusian nightmare and a truly haunting chapter that stuck with me for a long time.

While Diamond’s harrowing exploration of Rwanda’s circumstances unveiled the humanitarian consequences of mismanaging the environment, the comparison between the Dominican Republic and Haiti underscores just how deeply it can affect a nation’s economy.  The point is strikingly brought home by presenting these two nations who share one island.

Historically, Haiti had been the much richer and more powerful of the two island nations.  Unfortunately, the 20^th century was marred for both countries as they suffered under oppressive dictators.  Haiti was ruled by Francois “Papa Doc” Duvallier from 1957 to 1971 and then by his son, Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvallier from 1971 to 1986.  Similarly, Rafael “El Jefe” Trujillo and then Joaquin Balaguer brutally ruled the Dominican Republic from 1930 to 1996.

While all four dictators cannot be commended for their perpetual abuse of human rights, it is interesting to note how the Dominican dictators’ approaches (primarily those of Balaguer) to the environment has left a stronger economy for two nations sharing extremely similar characteristics.  Only 1% of Haiti is still forested following the aggressive deforestation policy and accelerated use of charcoal advanced by the Duvalliers’ policy in order to continually prop up the economy in the short-term.  In contrast, 28% of the Dominican Republic remains forested due to Trujillo and Balaguer’s concentration on modernisation (building dams and hydro-electric facilities, though it is said that their motivations were purely political) and importing fuel.  The effect is astonishing:  the economy of the Dominic Republic is now five times larger than that of Haiti.  Haiti’s leadership has continually undermined its own ability by squandering its own resources and failing to come up with a long-term plan.

Lastly, Diamond inspects the most fragile environment in the First World, Australia, to underline how this is not a problem exclusive to Third World countries.  Australia is the most unproductive land continent in the world.  Australian soil is in a state of crisis, supporting the lowest nutrient levels and the slowest plant growth rate in the world.  This is because nutrient rich soil is created in one of three ways: volcanic eruptions, glacial movement or tectonic uplift, and none of these have occurred on Australian soil in thousands of years.  Consequently, its agriculture, forestry and fisheries are all becoming decreasingly competitive.  Coupled with the fact that Australia has traditionally traded with the West (despite its Eastern location) due to Colonial ties and suffers with geographic isolation, Australia’s agriculture is becoming less globally competitive and its land management is increasingly becoming a cycle of land clearance, investment, bankruptcy and abandonment.

Consequently, Australia is at a cross roads and must make some very difficult and personal decisions about how to move forward.  As Diamond states, “It would be a ‘first’ for the modern world if a government voluntarily decided to phase out much of its agricultural enterprise, in anticipation of future problems, before being forced in desperation to do so,” however, these are going to being discussions that will become increasingly prevalent as the 21^st century progresses and Australia may very well set the tone.

Diamond argues that the development of public environmental concern and governmental countermeasures is accelerating, and rightly so.  Unfortunately, the development of environmental problems (as the modern examples of Rwanda, Haiti and Australia demonstrated) are accelerating exponentially.  Even in the fastest growing economy in the world, China, Diamond outlines the multitude of problems that may serve as their downfall: air pollution, soil erosion, soil salinization, disappearing wetlands, biodiversity loss, invasive species and megaprojects (and trust me, the list goes on).

In the end Diamond provides the poignant reminder that all societies (and therefore, economies) are built on the use of a mixture of renewable and non-renewable resources.  Consequently, we must seriously ask ourselves, where, in what amount and by what means we use these resources if we are to avoid (or at least prolong the time before) collapse.

Diamond provides a stark warning when he summarises that his analysis of past collapses has made him realise that, “a society’s steep decline may begin only a decade or two after the society reaches its peak numbers, wealth and power.”  The truly modern realisation is that Globalisation is a double edged sword.  While we have created networks in which we can better support each other, we have also exponentially sped up the pace at which we are working and decreased the time we have to react.

I will conclude by presenting a map showcased in the book (apologies for the quality) that depicts the world’s most politically troubled nations.  This is then followed by a map of the world’s most environmentally endangered countries.

The conclusions are so obvious I barely feel the need to comment.  What is left to say is that Collapse is a serious and thought-provoking book that raises a timely reminder that in a world of fast-paced, global competition, it is not worth winning in the short term if we sacrifice future generations.  All countries have a responsibility to plan long-term and must engender a willingness to reconsider core values if they are to avoid collapse.

Score: 75

That Used to be Us (2011)

That Used to be Us is a sober and honest assessment of the Unites States’ decline from being the world’s premier superpower (post WWII) to a country short on intellectual capital and overdrawn on political stagnation and budgetary deficits. 

The book is co-authored by Thomas Friedman and Michael Mandelbaum (both American before I get any flak for being anti-American).  Having written popular titles such as, The World is Flat and Hot, Flat and Crowded (see previous review), Friedman expands on his previous work in which he so astutely describes the major trends influencing economic and environmental change around the globe, while Mandelbaum lends ever more credibility to the book with his wealth of experience in nuclear disarmament treaties and international diplomacy.

Strictly speaking, this is not an environmental book.  However, both the following problem and solution are inextricably connected to environmental issues and policy, so I hope we can agree that it is a pertinent continuation of the blog’s goals.

The book offers a lucid picture of the distractions that have led to America’s economic (and somewhat cultural) downfall.  The authors argue that the turning point was after the victory in the Cold War when America lost a common enemy that united its citizens.  But more importantly, the authors argue that America’s leadership misunderstood the world they were creating when Capitalism ‘triumphed’ over Communism.

The book depicts an America resting on its laurels, borrowing too much from future generations and overreacting to the threat of terrorism post 9/11.  The world in which Capitalism ‘won,’ the world in which 

we now live, is now centred on four factors:  

(1) Globalization: The spread of capitalism and the ability to source cheap labour all over the globe has created a hyper-competitive world in which no country or city has an inherent right to be the leader of any given economic sector.

(2) The IT Revolution: The power of technology to automate jobs while increasing productivity is destroying blue-collar jobs and increasing the demand for highly educated and creative employees.  Furthermore, the IT Revolution has created a hyper-connected world in which scenarios play out much more quickly than in the past.

(3) Debt and Deficits: The authors describe this as a “war on math[s].”  Never before in America’s history has the country been as fiscally irresponsible as in the presidency of George W. Bush in which two wars were waged while at the same time taxes were cut.  The author’s argue that the political entrenchment of Republicans refusing to raise taxes and the Democrats’ refusal to cut spending has fuelled the largest budget deficit in U.S. history (a deficit which is now worryingly being financed by borrowing from China).

Lastly, (4) Energy and the Environment: (“The war on physics”) The U.S. has refused to face up to the reality that it must reduce its dependence on foreign oil and make significant investment in the great industry of the future, clean energy, and also impose a carbon tax (though President Obama has recently given a speech pledging to refocus his administration’s efforts on addressing such problems).

At this point many readers would be forgiven for thinking that this is a depressing and America-centric read.  Both assumptions would be wrong.  The book is wilfully optimistic in recounting the formula that made America so exceptional.  The authors argue that America once thrived using the following formula, but has fallen away badly in recent decades:

• Investment in Infrastructure: America has fallen very far behind in public transport, transportation network maintenance and electrical grid/transmission technology, especially when compared to Europe and Asia.

• Education: The authors go to great lengths to emphasise just how far America has fallen behind the educational over-achievers (such as Singapore, Japan, China and South Korea) – the U.S. has fallen to 31^st in Maths, 17^th in Reading and 23^rd in Science according to the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) Rankings – and what policy decision must be made to reverse the trend.

• Immigration: The authors highlight how over 40% of the start-ups in Silicon Valley are started by first-generation immigrants and argue for a robust change of immigration laws as anti-immigrant sentiment is on the rise in and the country begins to close down its borders.

• Regulation: The necessary safeguards to protect against financial collapse in the private sector are crucial to any free market, and unless you’ve had your head in the sand since 2008, you’ll know that smarter (which does not necessarily dictate more or less) regulation is needed to protect against a minority of market actors who have the power to adversely impact the majority. Traditionally, the U.S has had a strong record in terms of harnessing the dynamic power of growing markets for the public good without major collapse.   However, more recently, the power of lobbyists and private interests have prevented the appropriate amendment and modernisation of such protections (which I would argue started with “Reaganomics” and then the partial repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999 under the Clinton administration).

• Government support for Research & Development: In the 1960s, investment in NASA’s space missions created a hub of scientific expertise in Florida that drove their economy and sparked innovation for decades.  However, more recently government research grants have been diminished and misplaced.  While the U.S. (and Europe to a lesser extent) continues to heavily subsidise fossil fuels, the Chinese government is investing in clean technology.

But wait, Friedman and Mandelbaum can see light at the end of the tunnel.  Their solution is one they term, “political shock therapy.”  In an attempt to jolt the country out of its two-party political malaise, the authors call for an independent presidential candidate, who would run on the following platform:

• Raise taxes across the board (raising taxes on only the highest income earners will not address the deficit, nor is the most equitable way to approach the problem).

• Cut spending (Social Security and Medicare programs will have to significantly cut their spending as baby-boomers approach retirement age – the authors recognise this is painful but necessary).

• Invest in the Formula (see the five factors outlined above) – focus on creating an economy in which education is paramount and risk-taking, within the appropriate framework, is rewarded.

In my opinion, this is a poignant political message and one that we are beginning to come to grips with here in Europe (the authors could quite easily be referring to the UK or France when writing this book). 

I support their broad message that individual sacrifice (higher taxes and a reduction in the social welfare budget) is necessary to embolden a country in this economics climate, however the discussion about where to cut spending is one that I think needs to be more democratically and openly debated (though the baby-boomer problem is very similar in most developed countries at the moment).  In addition, I whole heartedly agree that government worldwide have been overly distracted by short-term economics to the detriment of environmental issues (which undermines a country’s long-term economic outlook).

Unfortunately, I also agree with their analysis that America (and I would add, Europe) has been slow to react to the new world.  The world is hyper-connected and hyper-competitive now and no country or continent has an inherent right to monopolise jobs or wealth.  We are entering the age of international meritocracy and that is a good thing, and a necessary thing, for the developing world.  However, it does mean that Europe and America need to renew their vitality and invest with both eyes on the future, educate like there are no safe jobs and protect the planet as if we are all going to live here for a while. 

I only hope that we can look back in a 20 years’ time and say, “that used to be us.”

Score: 80/100

Cradle to Cradle (2008)

Re-making the way we make things is the order of the day.  A short history of manufacturing will teach you that if you don’t evolve your manufacturing and design processes you will get left behind.  In its day, the Model T Ford was a revolution in automotive manufacturing, but the process would obviously be viewed as horribly inefficient by today's standards.  Consequently, it’s never a bad time to rethink how we design and manufacture mass goods – especially given the extent to which these goods pollute our atmosphere and then pack our landfills.

Authors Michael Braungart and William McDonough take this relatively obvious truism and deliver a relatively short, but potentially revolutionary book about taking the next step in evolving beyond cradle to grave manufacturing and design.  Braungart and McDonaugh are architects by trade and with this in mind it is not surprising that they have chosen to view the issue of environmental sustainability in a holistic nature: from start to finish, via the products and services of the world. 

The title, Cradle to Cradle, encapsulates the central tenet of this book: that we must stop thinking of products, processes, buildings and resources as having expiration dates.  Rather, the authors work backwards from the logical assertion that the world has finite resources and that we cannot afford to treat resources as expendable and space as incalculably vast.  Instead, they advocate viewing the purchase or use of any and every resource as essentially a lease.  This is the first point to commend in this book; realising that it is impossible to truly own a resource, will inevitably lead to a greater duty of care and increased utility when in possession of that resource.

Braungart and McDonough are down-to earth architects with impressive careers.   With clientèle ranging from commercial giants, Nike and Ford, to niche organisations, such as the Environmental Defence Fund.  Cradle to Cradle’s authors propel the book with their credibility and expertise.  The book doesn’t brim over with personality, but what they lack in style they make up for in substance.

The book briskly covers the evolution of manufacturing trends and the history of commercial resource use, leading into a sound critique of modern methods.  Chief among the culprits of unsustainable modern practice are the ideas that:

•  Efficiency is King: less of something bad does not necessarily make it good if the process or material you are using in the first place is not appropriate.
•  Activity equals prosperity: this is exemplified in the book by the saying, “if brute force doesn't work, you’re not using enough,” which the authors argue is an all too common approach in manufacturing at present.  Heat, beat and treat are words that are far too common on the engineer’s tongue in the 21^st century.
•  And “one-size-fits all”  design solutions: the most memorable, though perhaps not the most easily transposed example, being that detergent is usually manufactured in the same way and in the same concentrations for all markets across the world despite the hardness of a community’s water being a decisive factor in the effectiveness of a detergent.   

The most interesting and ecologically sound part of the Cradle to Cradle (C2C) philosophy is the idea that “waste equals food.”  That is, when we are finished with a commercial product, whether its components are biological (able to biodegrade) or technological (metallic or synthetic), it should have been designed with its end-use in mind.  Mindlessly, many products are inadvertently designed to be what they refer to as “monstrous hybrids,” combining biological and technological components so that neither component can be extracted and reused at the end of its life-cycle.   Instead, C2C provides a multitude of good design rules that can ensure products do not become obsolescent after their original incarnation.

But what propels C2C philosophy is the concept of eco-effectiveness, which is the idea that once a system is designed with an effective “closed loop system” we find that, not only do we have almost zero waste, but also net outputs that are advantageous to the surrounding environment.  To achieve this design, the three principles must be considered and carefully balanced:

1.    Ecology,
2.    Equity, and
3.    Economy.

And the proof is in the pudding, with the authors providing evidence of car and textile factories they have worked on that have been transformed from wasteful, polluting and harmful places into factories who work harmoniously with their surroundings.  In order to do so, the entire system is redesigned to ensure that products and by-products nourish the surrounding ecosystem as they are made with biodegradable material.  Alternatively, if biodegradable material cannot be used then the technical materials must re-enter the work flow instead of being dumped, burned or buried.  This has the consequence of creating car factories that are net producers of energy and textile factories that use dirty water in their processes and then amazingly output clean water.  Such design requires expertise, investment, long-term planning and commitment, but when the result is such a prosperous, fertile and profitable system, the decision should become inevitable.

I really enjoyed this book because of it accessibility and common-sense approach.  Before reading Cradle to Cradle, I viewed recycling as an important, but not particularly interesting, part of the environmental agenda.  However, Braungart and McDonaugh have shown that when we think holistically and begin to consider the entire life cycle of services and goods (particularly buildings), not only can we design more aesthetically and environmentally friendly things, but we generally create unanticipated economic advantages and eco-system services as well.

I hope by now that readers are noting this recurring theme in my reviews: that becoming environmentally sustainable leads to long-term economic profitability (please see Natural Capitalism as a prime example).  Businesses and regulators alike should stand up and take notice.

Score: 70/100