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Time to end the multigenerational Ponzi scheme

By Kim Stanley Robinson

22 February 2009

First, we need to trust our science. We do this every time we fly in a jet or rush to the doctor in hope of relief from illness; but now there is some cherry-picking of science going on in the various kinds of resistance to the news about climate change, and this double standard needs to be called out. The so-called climate change skeptics are now simply in denial. All science is skeptical, and the scientific community has looked at this situation and found compelling evidence for anyone with an open mind.

Science is telling us that if we keep living the way we do, we will trigger an unstoppable and irreversible climate change that may de-ice the planet and acidify the oceans, causing mass extinction. It took tens of millions of years for Earth to recover from previous mass extinctions. It is certain that human beings would be devastated by such an event, despite our intelligence and technological power—and there are instabilities in the climate system that include tipping points that we are closing in on fast.

That’s what our science is telling us. The most rational way to act is to believe that and then to act on that belief.

Above all, we need to decarbonize our power and transport systems, and, more generally, to build a carbon-neutral or even carbon-negative civilization as quickly as possible. It’s not a matter of technology. We already have good starter technology for lithium-ion batteries in cars; clean, renewable energy generation; cleaner building methods; and so on. The technical solutions are being improved all the time in research labs.

The main problem is making these changes happen more quickly than they can in the false pricing system that we have created and enforced within our hierarchical power structure. There is conflict over how to pay for decarbonizing, which is deemed “too expensive” to execute quickly. There is both a defense of the destructive carbon burning we are engaged in and a resistance to the most obvious solutions among people who remain frightened of the idea of government-led economic programs. But now we simply must have such programs because the market is not capable of taking action.

Am I saying that capitalism is going to have to change or else we will have an environmental catastrophe? Yes, I am. It should not be shocking to suggest that capitalism has to change. Capitalism evolved out of feudalism. Although the basis of power has changed from land to money and the system has become more mobile, the distribution of power and wealth has not changed that much. It’s still a hierarchical power structure, it was not designed with ecological sustainability in mind, and it won’t achieve that as it is currently constituted.

The main reason I believe capitalism is not up to the challenge is that it improperly and systemically undervalues the future. I’ll give two illustrations of this. First, our commodities and our carbon burning are almost universally underpriced, so we charge less for them than they cost. When this is done deliberately to kill off an economic competitor, it’s called predatory dumping; you could say that the victims of our predation are the generations to come, which are at a decided disadvantage in any competition with the present.

Second, the promise of capitalism was always that of class mobility—the idea that a working-class family could bootstrap their children into the middle class. With the right policies, over time, the whole world could do the same. There’s a problem with this, though. For everyone on Earth to live at Western levels of consumption, we would need two or three Earths. Looking at it this way, capitalism has become a kind of multigenerational Ponzi scheme, in which future generations are left holding the empty bag.

You could say we are that moment now. Half of the world’s people live on less than $2 a day, and yet the depletion of resources and environmental degradation mean they can never hope to rise to the level of affluent Westerners, who consume about 30 times as much in resources as they do. So this is now a false promise. The poorest three billion on Earth are being cheated if we pretend that the promise is still possible. The global population therefore exists in a kind of pyramid structure, with a horizontal line marking an adequate standard of living that is set about halfway down the pyramid.

The goal of world civilization should be the creation of something more like an oval on its side, resting on the line of adequacy. This may seem to be veering the discussion away from questions of climate to questions of social justice, but it is not; the two are intimately related. It turns out that the top and bottom ends of our global social pyramid are the two sectors that are by far the most carbon intensive and environmentally destructive, the poorest by way of deforestation and topsoil loss, the richest by way of hyperconsumption. The oval resting sideways on the line of adequacy is the best social shape for the climate.

This doubling of benefits when justice and sustainability are both considered is not unique. Another example: world population growth, which stands at about 75 million people a year, needs to slow down. What stabilizes population growth best? The full exercise of women’s rights. There is a direct correlation between population stabilization in nations and the degree to which women enjoy full human rights. So here is another area in which justice becomes a kind of climate change technology. Whenever we discuss climate change, these social and economic paradigm shifts must be part of the discussion.

Given this analysis, what are my suggestions?

Believe in science.
Believe in government, remembering always that it is of the people, by the people, and for the people, and crucial in the current situation.
Support a really strong follow-up to the Kyoto Protocol.
Institute carbon cap-and-trade systems.
Impose a carbon tax designed to charge for the real costs of burning carbon.
Follow the full “Green New Deal” program now coming together in discussions by the Obama administration.
Structure global economic policy to reward rapid transitions from carbon-burning to carbon-neutral technologies.
Support the full slate of human rights everywhere, even in countries that claim such justice is not part of their tradition.
Support global universal education as part of human-rights advocacy.
Dispense with all magical, talismanic phrases such as “free markets” and promote a larger systems analysis that is more empirical, without fundamentalist biases.
Encourage all business schools to include foundational classes in ecology, environmental economics, biology, and history.
Start programs at these same schools in postcapitalist studies.

Does the word postcapitalism look odd to you? It should, because you hardly ever see it. We have a blank spot in our vision of the future. Perhaps we think that history has somehow gone away. In fact, history is with us now more than ever, because we are at a crux in the human story. Choosing not to study a successor system to capitalism is an example of another kind of denial, an ostrich failure on the part of the field of economics and of business schools, I think, but it’s really all of us together, a social aporia or fear. We have persistently ignored and devalued the future—as if our actions are not creating that future for our children, as if things never change. But everything evolves. With a catastrophe bearing down on us, we need to evolve at nearly revolutionary speed. So some study of what could improve and replace our society’s current structure and systems is in order. If we don’t take such steps, the consequences will be intolerable. On the other hand, successfully dealing with this situation could lead to a sustainable civilization that would be truly exciting in its human potential.

Comment [27]

Agree? Disagree? Let us know what you think. Please include your full name with your comment. Comments may be edited.

Dean Loomis wrote,

“capitalism … improperly and systemically undervalues the future.” This is true, but not because capitalism is evil, any more than feudalism is evil, or communism is evil. But to get beyond ideological accusations of good and evil…”

Forgive me for pointing this out, but the word “evil” was not used at all in the entire article, let alone to describe capitalism.

The article doesn’t say capitalism is evil, but that capitalism is no longer an adequate answer to the social, economic, and environmental realities we now face.

Posted 30 March 2009, 16:42 by Paul Gutches
Derrick, you wrote…

“even climate advocates like Al Gore live in 10 room mansions.”

I think this statement is indicative of a common misconception people have about efforts to reverse climate change.

While moving in to smaller more energy efficient houses is certainly one laudable way to approach it, it sort of misses the bigger picture. It isn’t necessarily the amount of energy that we use which is the crux of the environmental problem. It’s the sustainability and carbon footprint of our energy sources that is the problem.

I live in a small earthen home I built myself and spent all of $50 the entire winter to keep it warm. Yet, I don’t care if you live in a 20 room mansion if you can heat and cool it and provide electricity to it in a manner that leaves your carbon footprint neutral or negative. An earth home just happened to be more within my means.

Posted 30 March 2009, 16:34 by Paul Gutches
Ask yourself if you place too much value on the future. Given that we know that entropy increases and protons will decay, is there a future to save our decedents for? Intelligent life going extinct now, in 1000 years or in 10^14 years hardly seems to make any difference if there is no chance of not going extinct.

Since we invented agriculture, has there ever been a human civilization that was sustainable by the then known technology?

Posted 28 March 2009, 11:55 by Zach B.
Makes sense, but riddle me this: Oil companies around the world are investing huge amounts of money to find ever more oil. Huge amounts of money are being invested. To reduce carbon, these investments would need to switch to carbon neutral energy sources. What ways could this huge switch of investment occur? What would ever convince oil companies to NOT look for more oil sources?

Posted 27 March 2009, 22:30 by Ian Wells
Of course none of that explains the current lack of sun spot activity, unless we humans caused that as well. Or the idea that we might be on the end of a 1500 to 2000 year cooling cycle.

The fact is, that no one knows just what “normal” is. Or really that the earth is in constant change and we needn’t go back millions of years to see advances or retreats of glaciers. There is plenty of evidence that humans inhabited the parts of greenland that are now uninhabitable.

The problem with any “science” or observation and records is that none of the data goes back far enough to establish any baselines.

Certainly we must do better with our environment, but that is just because it is the right thing to do

Climate change is a fact, that man caused it is just one of many theories. What we need is less talk about what we might do to put it all back, and more talk about how to predict and cope with the probably changes that are coming.

Posted 27 March 2009, 21:39 by mike
We can reduce fosil fuel(oil, gas)and nuclear by at least 75% and be fully independent of energy if we do the following: Not installing solar panels on roof tops of houses because of inefficiency and waste(labor, time, resource, capital) but concentrate all of the above into turning the deserts of America into solar power station from the sun. That include state like California, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, and Nevada. Tie these solar stations into the current grids or create a national grids that can be share by all states. Desert lands are just not use, why not fully exploit its potential. Our energy fees should be less each month because of the free sun.
Then we build many massive electric rail ways power by these solar stations. These electric rail ways is strategic in ways that communities, commercials, and farms is develop around this new transportation system. Towns will built around rail station. Commercial or factories will do the same. Farms will be surrounded by rail ways. Therefore when people go to work they will jump on the rail. All shipping from factories and farms will be from rails. Very quick and efficient. What’s best, no pollution from any source. No carbon cap crap. Next we need to standardize the auto industry. Example reduce the variation of tire sizes. There’s no need for the hundred different sizes because that generate huge amount of waste. More example like, lug nut patterns, Rims sizes, Shock, struts, Ball joint, power steering pumps, Alternator, and ect….All these components do the same job but all made specific to the model therefore not interchaneable for the sake of generating profits at the cost of resources resulted in more pollutions. If we continue to standardize other industries we can achieve our goals. There’s a catch!!! Washington must to take the initiative in all energy, waste and pollution management without giving, contracting, subsidizing private company to take on the work. The government should develop it into a giant government work entity to compete with the private companies. It’s the government’s job to watch over the health of it’s citizens. Our health really depends on this requirement or else we are all doom for sure. It ain’t no joke.

Posted 22 March 2009, 03:50 by Kent
It’s all too late in my opinion.

There just isn’t enough time to change global policy and belief systems before it’s too late.
Factoring in the lag time between pollution and result just adds to the sense that we have already blown it.

My only aim now is not to be eaten by cannibals at worlds end.

Posted 22 March 2009, 01:01 by Steve
I found your article most entertaining though hardly educational. It is fine to pontificate about the excesses of this generation robbing future generations.
Let me assure you that the unbridled greed which has become perfectly acceptable amongst the smallest minority in any culture, from the mega rich in western societies to the corrupt dictators of third world banana republics, has already robbed THIS generation of its share.
Just like the obese person is driven to find experts to give them legitimate excuses for their gluttony, so too both sides of climate change and resource depletion argument look for legitimate reasons to excuse the excesses of today – even climate advocates like Al Gore live in 10 room mansions.
Why talk about the future when we can ignore the injustice in Myanmar for the last 40 years, in Zimbabwe, in Darfor, the Congo?
Does the Human Race deserve a future when we put the future before the present?
I say let the dolphins have a go in about 10 million years!

Posted 21 March 2009, 19:14 by Derrick Windsor
“Science is telling us that if we keep living the way we do, we will trigger an unstoppable and irreversible climate change that may de-ice the planet and acidify the oceans, causing mass extinction.”

This statement is totally correct.

The evidence supporting my statement is:

Statements by the world’s national academies of science and the editorial boards of scientific journals (e.g. http://royalsociety.org/document.asp?latest=1&id=3222)

the published literature (for a review see Naomi Orsekes’ article in Science DOI: 10.1126/science.1103618)

and of course the IPCC (which is not politicians but about a group of 2000+ scientists who put in a huge amount of work review and synthesize all available scientific literature) (take a look at http://www.ipcc.ch/)

All support the quoted statement.

Opinions to the contrary are grossly misinformed.

To understand the long history of the science of climate change take a look at the book the discovery of global warming – an extended version of it is online at: http://www.aip.org/history/climate/

Posted 20 March 2009, 10:28 by peterson
Kim et al,

Thank you for sharing such geniuine and heart felt thoughts about the state and the fate of the planet at this moment in history.

“Science is telling us that if we keep living the way we do, we will trigger an unstoppable and irreversible climate change that may de-ice the planet and acidify the oceans, causing mass extinction.”

This statement is incorrect. Science is not telling us this, the IPCC and Al Gore are telling us this.

Kim, science is a very specific discipline. Scientific theories are plentiful, but it only becomes science when a theory is submitted for peer review and their results also confirm the theory. This has not happened in the case of the theory that carbon emissions are responsible for any observed climate change on our planet. You may find this statement incredible, incredulous or inconsiderate, but because I really care I needed to find out for myself. Carbon emissions are not even the leading candidate for potential causes of observed climate change today among the world’s elite scientists and climatologists. If carbon emissions were believed to be the cause by these experts, then someone would need to prove the connection before, “science”, could be telling us this.

If you care about climate change then keep an eye on the upcoming tests at the CERN LHC facility in Switzerland where they will attempt to prove a connection between cosmic rays and cloud formation. Pray that those tests aren’t postponed or canceled to protect the vested interests of the politicians at the IPCC. Clouds affect the temperature of our planet more than any other single climate phenomena and did you think that climatologists understand how and why they form? They don’t yet, but there are promising theories…….

BTW, some great content about postcapitalism here. Again, thanks for sharing.

Posted 19 March 2009, 20:38 by Tom Concannon

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