Richard Heinberg describes the growing awareness that the American way of life – I’d call it unsustainable consumption – is dysfunctional. These leaders of the transition are growing food locally, investing in local economies, rebuilding skills, and preserving local ecosystems.
Link: MuseLetter #204 / April 2009: Post Carbon Institute Manifesto – The Time For Change Has Come
The winds of social change are upon us. Consumerism as we’ve known it is at death’s door—not because everyone has joined the Sierra Club, but because suddenly nobody can afford to buy much of anything. Our new historical moment requires different thinking and strategies, but it also opens new opportunities to solve some very practical problems. Ideas from the environmentalist community that for decades have been derided by economists and politicians—reducing consumption, re-localizing economic activity, building self-sufficiency—are suddenly being taken seriously, and people want to know more about them.
Quietly, a small but growing movement of engaged citizens, community groups, businesses, and elected officials has begun the transition to a post-carbon world. These early actors have worked to reduce consumption, produce local food and energy, invest in local economies, rebuild skills, and preserve local ecosystems. For some citizens, this effort has merely entailed planting a garden, riding a bike to work, or no longer buying from “big-box” stores. Their motivations are diverse, including halting climate change, environmental preservation, food security, and local economic development. The essence of these efforts, however, is the same: they all recognize that the world is changing, and the old way of doing things, based on the idea that consumption can and should continue to grow indefinitely, no longer works.
Alone, these efforts are not nearly enough. But taken together, they can point the way towards a new economy. This new economy would not be a “free market” but a “real market,” much like the one famed economist Adam Smith originally envisioned; it would be, as author David Korten has said, an economy driven by Main Street and not Wall Street.
Thus far, most of these efforts have been made voluntarily by exceptional individuals who were quick to understand the crisis we face. But as the collapse unfolds, more and more people will be searching for ways to meet even basic needs. Families reliant on supermarkets with globe-spanning supply chains will need to turn more to local farmers and their own gardens. Many corporations—unable to provide a continuous return on investment or to rely on cheap energy and natural resources to turn a profit—will fail, while local businesses and cooperatives of all kinds will flourish. Local governments facing declining tax revenues will be desperate to find cheap, low-energy ways to support basic public services like water treatment, public transportation, and emergency services.
What we need now are clarity, leadership, coordination, and collaboration. With shared purpose and a clear understanding of both the challenges and the solutions, we can manage the transition to a sustainable, equitable, post-carbon world.
Elements of a transition strategy have been proposed for decades, with few notable results. Usually these have been presented as independent—sometimes even contradictory—solutions to the problems created by fossil fuel dependency and consumerism. Now that business-as-usual is ceasing to be an option for mainstream society, these strategies need to be re-thought and re-articulated coherently, and to become the mainstream. But this will require coordinated effort on the part of those who understand both the problems and the solutions.