Looking at ecological and economic realities, time has come for demanding a new development model, one that fits our time and circumstances. The current model – the economy in particular – was designed and developed in a relatively empty world, with a population between 1 and 2 billion people. This was a time when the bounty of natural resources on this Earth seemed endless, ie during the time when the European Enlightenment unfolded and the Americas looked like places where settlers and entrepreneurs could endlessly find new space to use.
Today the world is full, with a population soon to reach 8 billion. We have to change our thinking as well as our economic doctrines to avoid accelerating climate change, a future collapse of major ecosystems and the global economy. This is one of the main conclusions in a new book – Come On! – co-authored by myself and Ernst von Weizsäcker - in the form of a report to the Club of Rome.
One source of inspiration for Come On! was another report to the Club of Rome – Limits to Growth. The central message of the report, published in 1972 and much debated since, was that the quest for unlimited growth in population and material goods on a finite planet – and thereby a gradually increasing footprint – is not possible and would eventually bring the economic system down.
In the new book an update is offered to the report. In addition, it addresses a host of new challenges such as irresponsible financial markets, the digital economy and other disruptive technology trends, an increasingly skewed distribution of income and wealth and the crisis of democracy.
In today´s world the limits are palpable in almost everything people do. A host of studies has recently supported the Limits predictive relevance. A new term illustrating the phenomenon, and refining it, is that of the planetary boundaries introduced by Johan Rockström and Will Steffen et al. in Nature 2009. And yet, almost 50 years after the Limits to Growth became a public issue, the world is still pursuing more or less a business-as-usual development – stemming as it does from a less-crowded world.
When the Limits report was published, many people, notably in the political domain, feared that the implication would be that humanity had to give up on prosperity and agreeable lifestyles. But that was never the main proposition by the Club of Rome. Our main concern was the growing footprint of mankind and the fact that economic activity must assume radically different forms.
Almost fifty years have passed, and exponential growth of population as well as production and consumption has made the equation increasingly difficult to solve. Decades of exponential growth in both population and consumption is now hitting the limits of the Earth’s biosphere. The climate system is destabilizing, half of the topsoil on Earth has been depleted in the last 150 years, nearly 90 percent of fish stocks are either overfished or fully fished and the sixth mass extinction event is well underway. About half of the world´s tropical forests have already been cleared.
It is hard to see how material growth can continue to be the overriding objective for development in the industrialized countries. Both with regard to “sinks” – the capacity of the planet to absorb all residue materials - and “sources” – the quest for new materials – the rapidly increasing demand in developing countries has to be taken into account. Their populations have a right to development and, as is evident when it comes to emissions and the overuse of many resources, the rich countries already occupy a large part of both the sink and source capacities.
Looking at ecological and economic realities today, the time has come for a total rethink of both the ethics and the development model guiding us – one that fits the full world. Economic theory must be updated to adapt to the conditions of the full world. It is insufficient to incorporate environmental and social concerns by simply translating them into mere monetary expressions of capital. Nor is it sufficient to simply refer to various forms of pollution and ecosystem decline as “externalities” – the notion being that what is at stake is some marginal disturbances. Furthermore, it is high time to do away with the notion of “homo economicus”, ie that human beings are only interested in maximizing their utility, often at the expense of nature. Moreover, time should be over when linear economic models are applied to non-linear ecosystems and the climate system.
This comment by the way, is a timely critique with regard to the decision to award the Economics Prize (often referred to as the Nobel Prize in Economics) to economist Bill Nordhaus from the United States. The DICE model developed by Nordhaus to address climate change is linear in nature and does not account for the possibility of tipping points. To most climate scientists it is the non-linearity of the climate system – and the likelihood of tipping points, like melting glaciers and sea ice and reduced methane leakage from melting tundra – that constitute increasing concerns. Nordhaus, no doubt, is conscious about the challenges posed by tipping points but he still seems to maintain the position that the optimal level of mitigation would be one where warming would be constrained to 3.5°C. Such a rate of warming is looked upon as extremely dangerous by most climate scientists and confirms yet again the huge gap that does exist between leading climate scientists and economists.
Luckily, the human footprint does not have to grow. There is some – albeit rare – historical evidence confirming that in mature stages of development, human happiness can improve and be maintained while the consumption of energy, water or minerals stays stable or is even reduced. Economic growth and technological progress can be accompanied by an increase of efficiency of resource use, possibly in a “cradle to cradle” manner. Today's linear material flows – take, make and dispose - can and should be changed in favor of extending product life and the promotion of circular material flows. Such a development would greatly reduce demand for virgin materials and lower carbon emissions.
At this moment in time, however, nearly all the trends of resource consumption, climate change, biodiversity losses and soil degradation go in the opposite direction, reflecting the inadequacy and misdirection of public policies, business strategies, economic models and the underlying social values. At a more basic level, these prevailing trends also reflect the inadequacy of the system of education.
The cumulative implications of these trends must oblige all of us to dramatically change the direction of progress and to work hard for a new development model. Such a model should reinvigorate the spirit of inquiry and bold visions, and a kind of humanism that is not in a primitive manner anthropocentric but allows also for compassion for other living beings, while incorporating far more attention to the long-term future.
We need a better balance between man and nature, between the short term and the long term, between private consumption and public goods and between compensation for excellence and justice. Moreover, we need to leave the “silos” behind and approach decision making in a far more integrated and systems-oriented way.
Anders Wijkman is co-president of Club of Rome, chair of Climate-KIC. The author contributed this article to China Watch exclusively. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of China Watch.
All rights reserved. Copying or sharing of any content for other than personal use is prohibited without prior written permission.
Anders Wijkman
Looking at ecological and economic realities, time has come for demanding a new development model, one that fits our time and circumstances. The current model – the economy in particular – was designed and developed in a relatively empty world, with a population between 1 and 2 billion people. This was a time when the bounty of natural resources on this Earth seemed endless, ie during the time when the European Enlightenment unfolded and the Americas looked like places where settlers and entrepreneurs could endlessly find new space to use.
Today the world is full, with a population soon to reach 8 billion. We have to change our thinking as well as our economic doctrines to avoid accelerating climate change, a future collapse of major ecosystems and the global economy. This is one of the main conclusions in a new book – Come On! – co-authored by myself and Ernst von Weizsäcker - in the form of a report to the Club of Rome.
One source of inspiration for Come On! was another report to the Club of Rome – Limits to Growth. The central message of the report, published in 1972 and much debated since, was that the quest for unlimited growth in population and material goods on a finite planet – and thereby a gradually increasing footprint – is not possible and would eventually bring the economic system down.
In the new book an update is offered to the report. In addition, it addresses a host of new challenges such as irresponsible financial markets, the digital economy and other disruptive technology trends, an increasingly skewed distribution of income and wealth and the crisis of democracy.
In today´s world the limits are palpable in almost everything people do. A host of studies has recently supported the Limits predictive relevance. A new term illustrating the phenomenon, and refining it, is that of the planetary boundaries introduced by Johan Rockström and Will Steffen et al. in Nature 2009. And yet, almost 50 years after the Limits to Growth became a public issue, the world is still pursuing more or less a business-as-usual development – stemming as it does from a less-crowded world.
When the Limits report was published, many people, notably in the political domain, feared that the implication would be that humanity had to give up on prosperity and agreeable lifestyles. But that was never the main proposition by the Club of Rome. Our main concern was the growing footprint of mankind and the fact that economic activity must assume radically different forms.
Almost fifty years have passed, and exponential growth of population as well as production and consumption has made the equation increasingly difficult to solve. Decades of exponential growth in both population and consumption is now hitting the limits of the Earth’s biosphere. The climate system is destabilizing, half of the topsoil on Earth has been depleted in the last 150 years, nearly 90 percent of fish stocks are either overfished or fully fished and the sixth mass extinction event is well underway. About half of the world´s tropical forests have already been cleared.
It is hard to see how material growth can continue to be the overriding objective for development in the industrialized countries. Both with regard to “sinks” – the capacity of the planet to absorb all residue materials - and “sources” – the quest for new materials – the rapidly increasing demand in developing countries has to be taken into account. Their populations have a right to development and, as is evident when it comes to emissions and the overuse of many resources, the rich countries already occupy a large part of both the sink and source capacities.
Looking at ecological and economic realities today, the time has come for a total rethink of both the ethics and the development model guiding us – one that fits the full world. Economic theory must be updated to adapt to the conditions of the full world. It is insufficient to incorporate environmental and social concerns by simply translating them into mere monetary expressions of capital. Nor is it sufficient to simply refer to various forms of pollution and ecosystem decline as “externalities” – the notion being that what is at stake is some marginal disturbances. Furthermore, it is high time to do away with the notion of “homo economicus”, ie that human beings are only interested in maximizing their utility, often at the expense of nature. Moreover, time should be over when linear economic models are applied to non-linear ecosystems and the climate system.
This comment by the way, is a timely critique with regard to the decision to award the Economics Prize (often referred to as the Nobel Prize in Economics) to economist Bill Nordhaus from the United States. The DICE model developed by Nordhaus to address climate change is linear in nature and does not account for the possibility of tipping points. To most climate scientists it is the non-linearity of the climate system – and the likelihood of tipping points, like melting glaciers and sea ice and reduced methane leakage from melting tundra – that constitute increasing concerns. Nordhaus, no doubt, is conscious about the challenges posed by tipping points but he still seems to maintain the position that the optimal level of mitigation would be one where warming would be constrained to 3.5°C. Such a rate of warming is looked upon as extremely dangerous by most climate scientists and confirms yet again the huge gap that does exist between leading climate scientists and economists.
Luckily, the human footprint does not have to grow. There is some – albeit rare – historical evidence confirming that in mature stages of development, human happiness can improve and be maintained while the consumption of energy, water or minerals stays stable or is even reduced. Economic growth and technological progress can be accompanied by an increase of efficiency of resource use, possibly in a “cradle to cradle” manner. Today's linear material flows – take, make and dispose - can and should be changed in favor of extending product life and the promotion of circular material flows. Such a development would greatly reduce demand for virgin materials and lower carbon emissions.
At this moment in time, however, nearly all the trends of resource consumption, climate change, biodiversity losses and soil degradation go in the opposite direction, reflecting the inadequacy and misdirection of public policies, business strategies, economic models and the underlying social values. At a more basic level, these prevailing trends also reflect the inadequacy of the system of education.
The cumulative implications of these trends must oblige all of us to dramatically change the direction of progress and to work hard for a new development model. Such a model should reinvigorate the spirit of inquiry and bold visions, and a kind of humanism that is not in a primitive manner anthropocentric but allows also for compassion for other living beings, while incorporating far more attention to the long-term future.
We need a better balance between man and nature, between the short term and the long term, between private consumption and public goods and between compensation for excellence and justice. Moreover, we need to leave the “silos” behind and approach decision making in a far more integrated and systems-oriented way.
Anders Wijkman is co-president of Club of Rome, chair of Climate-KIC. The author contributed this article to China Watch exclusively. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of China Watch.
All rights reserved. Copying or sharing of any content for other than personal use is prohibited without prior written permission.
