The sustainability myth is dangerous (on the World Summit)

National Post ^ | Augustus 24 2002 | Philip Stott (The Daily Telegraph)

[knighthawk]

Where conferences on "sustainable development" are concerned, Schumacher's precept, "small is beautiful," has been long abandoned. Tomorrow 65,000 delegates will descend on Johannesburg for "Earth Summit 2002" -- the World Summit on Environment and Development.

These will include 106 government heads, 10,000 officials from 174 countries, and 6,000 journalists. The BBC team alone could top 100. Twenty UN bodies will be represented. A second parallel conference, comprising a kaleidoscope of lobbyists from ornithologists to oil magnates, has already received 15,000 registrations. Sustaining the whole caboodle will be 27,000 police, who may well be relieved that George W. Bush will not be attending.

Auden's Unknown Citizen might well ask: "What on earth is it all about?" The answer is, an empty phrase that Humpty Dumpty could employ to mean anything. "Sustainable development" was born out of the Green agenda of the 1970s and 1980s, including such apocalyptic constructs as the population timebomb and limits to growth, both of which proved false.

It received an initial airing in the World Commission on Environment and Development in 1987, but gained hegemony during the UN Conference on Environment and Development, held at Rio de Janeiro in 1992. Rio generated a program, Agenda 21, for implementing sustainable development throughout the world. The Johannesburg jamboree is effectively Rio+10, a push for a revitalized and integrated UN system for sustainable development.

Sustainable development was defined in 1987 as "development that meets the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs." This was a good motherhood and apple pie sentiment, but how has it worked out?

Today, sustainable development is a ubiquitous, politically compliant phrase, a pleasant-sounding palliative to inexorable and inevitable change. It is dished up as a placebo to eco-chondriacs the world over. Ecological and economic change are the norm, not the exception. Equilibrium solutions are impossible; we inhabit a disturbing, non-equilibrium world, in which volcanoes erupt, earthquakes quake, seas rise and fall, and climate changes, whether under human influence or not.

Sustainable development lurks everywhere -- for business, it is a neat PC word: all PR and ethical investment, but signifying little; for scientists, it means: "Give me funds for research"; for politicians: "Give me your nice green vote."

The biggest problem arises when authoritarian environmentalists hijack the phrase. Then sustainable development becomes either no growth at all or limited growth of a type approved by an elite few -- wind farms, yes: nuclear power no; organics, yes: GM no. This is why, so often, environmental organizations try to portray business as the arch-enemy of sustainable development. Like biodiversity, another key word from Rio, sustainability is thrown into the argument to block development and growth, to conjure up a return to an imagined, usually rural, Utopia.

But, theoretically, sustainability flies in the face of reality. From anthropology via physics to zoology, the world does not function in equilibrium, but rather on chaotic, non-equilibrium principles, whether in the stock market or with climate change. Sustainability is intrinsically an equilibrium idea seeking equilibrium solutions. It is easily employed to soften the fact of change and, in doing so, it undermines human dynamism and adaptability. This is exposed in the much-touted oxymoron -- "sustainable climate."

The Kyoto protocol on climate change also arose from Rio. Climate is the most complex, chaotic, non-linear system. The idea that climate can be managed "in a predictable way" by manipulating one factor, carbon dioxide, out of the millions of factors involved is Alice-in-Wonderland science, with the verdict before the trial. This is the ultimate flaw: The sheer hubris of humans maintaining a "sustainable climate" vividly demonstrates the delusions of the sustainability myth.

Kyoto will do absolutely nothing to halt climate change in any predictable manner. For all we know, it might even play a tiny part in triggering a most unfortunate plunge into another ice age, which on purely statistical grounds is just about due. As we grow economically, the "command-and-control" targets of the type set under Kyoto are utterly impractical.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has just reported that America's increase of 3.2% in carbon dioxide emissions in 2000 resulted from economic growth of 2.5%, with a concomitant rise in the demand for electricity and fuels, compounded by cooler winter conditions and a decreased output from hydro-electric dams.

Sustainability is an unrealistic and potentially dangerous concept. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the June preparatory meeting for Johannesburg, in Bali, ended in deadlock. Since then, inevitably, there has been a crescendo of environmentalist hype, with the planet seen as dying from every imaginary ill. Yet the Earth Summit must succeed -- not for environmentalists, but for the people of less developed countries, who require genuine development and growth, not an eco-imperialist agenda.

Ultimately, we need strong, flexible and growing economies, coupled with a political will to help the poorest, the most afflicted by inexorable and unpredictable change. We should be seeking diversity in energy production, not because of climate, but because diversity is a key to flexibility.

It would be heartening if the vast horde of eco-delegates, parading their wares at Johannesburg, would heed the sentiment of Nitin Desai, the secretary-general of the summit, who declared only this week: "Development is now as sexy as the environment."

[knighthawk]

Ping

[What Is Ain't]

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has just reported that America's increase of 3.2% in carbon dioxide emissions in 2000 resulted from economic growth of 2.5%, with a concomitant rise in the demand for electricity and fuels, compounded by cooler winter conditions and a decreased output from hydro-electric dams.

But the enviro-loonies said we have a global warming problem.

[Mike Darancette]

Sustainable development works under the theory that if my neighbor drives a big car and eats rich food (read meat) that I and my offspring will have a correspondingly lowered standard of living.

The newest phraseology in the paean of the arch-environmentalist is that of the "Human Footprint". The "Human Footprint" theory first attempts to quantify the amount of resources (land) that a single person having a given standard of living requires to maintain that lifestyle. This "Footprint" is then multiplied against future world population estimates and, lo and behold, at some time in the future it is calculated the mankind will have to find similar planets if he wishes to "sustain" his present standard of living.

Calculations of this sort are like doing a study into how big would a Bumble Bee's wings have to be in order to "sustain" its flight capabilities if it weighed 20 pounds, without having the knowledge that, according to science, we don't know how a Bumble Bee manages to stay aloft at it's present size.

This is clearly an attempt to guilt the developed world into turning their resources and sovereignty over to worldwide councils and agreements because we refuse to live responsibly.

[americium241]

This article highlights the essence of the socialist scam on the world's people:

First, convince people they need regulations to protect the have-nots from the wealthy, and redistribute their wealth through taxes to be fair, while hamstringing economic growth, and reiterate over and over again (via education, the press and entertainment) the negative stereotypes of the wealthy and the need for paternalistic government to keep protecting the have-nots.

Second, as business grows and the market fills up with competition, limit its growth with more taxes and regulations, cultivate a welfare class to form legions of voters in favor of shifting taxes to the wealthiest, and expanding government, prohibit resource exploration through litigation, and by raising the cost of entering the market via regulations, use targeted deductions to entice businesses and investors to behave in a predictable manner, so you can keep convincing people (via education, the press and entertainment) about the evils of unbridled capitalism and the wealthy, deminishing the infinite pie into a managable finite pie...

And third, keep reminding people that the market is a finite pie, that resources are very scarse and that's why we need more regulators to protect us from ourselves!

This is a crime as great as slavery and the Holocaust, yet the socialists among us get away with it year after year!

[MonroeDNA]

Well put.

[patj]

Hear Hear!!!!!!

[knighthawk]

Indeed, wel spoken.

[liberallarry]

A nice article.

But, if one scrapes away the poisonous politics, there's another way of looking at it. Every action has consequences. If we drop an atom bomb in an urban area some pretty bad things are going to happen to a lot of human beings. If we continue to change the composition of the earth's atmosphere, pollute the land and the oceans, and kill off other species a lot of bad things might happen to all of humanity. The latter is a much more difficult and problematical assertion than the former but it's worth considering anyway.

...such apocalyptic constructs as the population timebomb and limits to growth, both of which proved false...

...so far. The people who promoted these ideas may be the modern equivalent of the bearded fanatics who've been shouting "Repent! The end is near!" for at least 2000 years. Or they may turn out to be far-sighted visionaries who weren't heeded because their timing was slightly off.

[R. Scott]

6,000 journalists? Isn’t that a bit of overkill?

[RippleFire]

UN Swindle Alert!

World Summit on Sustainable Development
in Johannesburg, Aug. 26 - Sept. 4

UN_List: for United Nations articles. 

Other Bump Lists at: Free Republic Bump List Register

[Cacique]

It means COMMUNISM. Take from the producers and give to the the leeches and parasites.

It means redistribution = theft using the state as a bandit agency.

MOLON LABE

[Bernard Marx]

Or they may turn out to be far-sighted visionaries who weren't heeded because their timing was slightly off.

First, it's nice to have a liberal honestly label himself for once. I respect that.

Few would dispute that the Earth has a finite carrying capacity for human populations. In that sense your argument is theoretically correct: that at some point human demands on the planet may exceed its ability to meet them if present trends continue.

But that Malthusian argument ignores the fact that trends seldom proceed in a continuous line. Technology creates new ways to feed, clothe and house increased populations. It also fails to take into account such things as war, opportunistic diseases, or even voluntary population control of the kind we've seen in affluent Western societies in the past 30 years. (Even that dreaded word "eugenics" i.e. "abortion" has been normalized, probably to your own great satisfaction).

Liberals and conservatives draw entirely opposite conclusions from these facts. Liberals would have us give up our freedom, national sovereignty, liberty and right to self-determination for the illusion of 'safety' under a human-controlled socialist government 'utopia.' They would allow fear to rule us instead of bravery and creative innovation. They somehow have not taken note of what has happened to socialist "utopias" in the world over the past 85 years.

Conservatives (or at least my kind of 'conservatives') accept the fact that the Universe is a dangerous place. We know we're not going to get out of this alive. So why give in to every Chicken Little prediction of gloom and doom that comes down the pike, especially if the alternative is to give up the only things worth living for? (We also know most of these gloomy predictions are politically-inspired and dreamed up by liberals to divide opinion and raise funds for their own socialist jihads).

While we conservatives believe in compassion for the unfortunate and those unable to function well in a competitive society, we also believe that giving up the benefits of being 'the best you can be' is too high a price to pay for a society that provides 'equal results' for all, no matter how lazy or incompetent, while punishing its top performers. (We also know that wealth and privilege finds its way to the top no matter what the stated goals of a society may be).

The liberals who worship 'ecology' and 'nature' aren't very good observers of reality. The Gaia they worship doesn't believe in equal results. They should go watch the birds and bees at work in their own back yards. When viewed realistically the Endangered Species Act is the most reactionary legislation ever enacted because it arrogantly sets out to stop evolution in its tracks.

[liberallarry]

I have no argument with most of what you say. I thank you for your compliment.

We seek to eliminate unwanted by-products of the production process. Pollution in other words. That's best handled by a capitalist system - somehow structured to penalize pollution.

We seek to limit population size to match available resources and technology. I think that's best handled through public education on a country by country, culture by culture, basis.

We seek to prevent the endless destruction of species and wilderness. That's a really tough one.

[liberallarry]

An addendum. We seek to prevent the destruction of the natural world for two reasons. First, because it's very beautiful and very interesting. Second, because it very likely would lead to our own destruction.

[virgil]

I went to BBC site and looked at some comments of people I assume are average Joes ( with good intentions in mind of course) on this subject of the World Summit. I kept seeing references to human life,control of human life, reduction of human life, the use of force to control the amount of comsumption by human life. "The whole concept of living will need to change if real progress is to be made on the issue". Someone referred to the use of "will" to effect change politically. I shift in my chair when I read this stuff. Some visionaries have committed the worst atrocities and people should be careful of what they ask for.

[liberallarry]

Absolutely.

That a person calls himself a conservative or a liberal, a this or a that, is no guarentee of intelligence, wisdom, or knowledge.

There's no short-cut. A person has to be judged individually on his words and actions.

[Bernard Marx]

LL, I suggest you take a look at the "Habitat for Half Truths" thread. The arguments made against so-called 'sustainability' are the same ones I'd make.

[liberallarry]

I thank you. Lomgren has an interesting article on the front page of today's New York Times ( I hope I have that right ) in which he argues convincingly against sustainability and for development. At first reading, I'm in complete agreement. I suspect you will like it even more.

[Tailgunner Joe]

bttt