Richard Heinberg, author of ‘The Party’s Over’ suggests in an article at Hopedance it really is up to us how we react to the unravelling of the global economic system based on cheap oil. The oil is running out, this depression is likely to be like nothing seen before.
The implication is clear: if we hope to survive as a species, and if there is to be hope for millions of other creatures, we need to shrink the human enterprise. Economic contraction may be bitter medicine, but it’s part of the cure for what ails our planetary home.
However, we can manage this contraction either foolishly or intelligently.
Undoubtedly many governments and corporations are going to be unwilling to let go of the worldview of global economics – a system which has made a very small percentage of the human population incredibly rich, at the expense of the vast majority of humans, at the expense of our non-human neighbours and whole eco-systems. And many in the more industrialised nations simply dont know where to begin to live a different way, more respectful and in harmony with the natural world.
Those of us who see that there can be an intelligent way to bring on the changes, certainly have our work cut out for us. As well as learning ourselves how to grow food, co-operate, manage with less ‘stuff’, and be more rooted to our landbases, we have to somehow help eveyone else to see that this depression could actually save the human species from extinction (along with many other species that our current business activities are pushing into extinction).
A foolish management of economic contraction would entail burning the biosphere for alternative fuels; propping up the banks and other financial institutions that created the mortgage mess, without ever re-examining the wisdom of growth-based economics; and responding to human privation and misery with repression and war.
Intelligent management would start with an explicit commitment to redesign the global economy to run with less. We would assess ecosphere resources and identify a humane, equitable path toward gradual reduction in population and total consumption levels. We would focus on those aspects of life that bring us increasing satisfaction without requiring more inputs of energy and materials. We would re-acquaint ourselves with the values and virtues of community, self-sufficiency, and modesty. We would redesign our cities to eliminate cars, while developing renewable energy sources and educating a new generation of ecological farmers.
If we handle this well, the medicine of contraction will leave Nature intact and humanity in a state of greater happiness, equity, and peace.
We don’t have much choice regarding whether a Depression will ensue. But a great deal depends on how we respond. It’s not too soon to start that discussion.
If we handle it well, it will still be difficult. Change often is, and oil has allowed us as a species to overshoot the earths carrying capacity. There will, in the not too distant future, be a lot less people on the earth. It is up to us, though, what kind of world those who survive inherit. We have a choice, allow the global elites to continue turning our planet into a dead lump of rock, or ‘just say no’ and start collectively rebuilding, rewilding, replanting – reconnecting with this amazingly bountiful world, and relearning how to live with it, not against it, as our ancestors did, and many indigenous cultures around the world still do.
http://www.richardheinberg.com/
