Richard Heinberg schools Vancouver on the new economic reality
How much do regular folks really know about the economy? Richard Heinbergwants you to understand one crucial thing about it. It’s finished.
About 300 people showed up to hear Heinberg speak last night at Langara college where he presented the argument that makes up the basis of his latest book, The End of Growth. The first half of Heinberg’s message is that the growth economy as we know it is played out. There will be no recovery. It’s done. Kaput. According to Heinberg, the idea that a global economy can grow forever on a finite world has always been flawed, a case of baseless wishful thinking propped up by a couple hundred years of cheap energy and various financial bubbles.
Even a decade ago his was a radical point of view. Today there are hundreds, probably thousands, of notable books, articles and spokespersons echoing the same basic message: There’s no normal to get back to. Burning millions of years of stored energy from the sun in just a couple generations isn’t a baseline of normalcy... it’s a one shot deal.
This could be incredibly depressing, but Heinberg is quick to follow up with the second half of his message: While it’s true that our power of consumption has peaked, our power of creativity is limitless. As the economic growth that we’ve adopted as our collective measure of success now fizzles, we can choose a different kind of growth. We can grow resilient and vibrant local communities.
Heinberg frames this transition as a new chapter, full of possibilities and choice. But he’s careful not to sugar-coat it. He’s clear that it will be difficult. How difficult depends on how quickly we adapt to the new reality.
Heinberg’s talk was co-sponsored by Village Vancouver (part of the Transition Town movement that Heinberg endorses) and Co-Development Canada. It kicks off The World Community Film Festival, B.C.’s largest social justice film fest - running Feb10-12 at Langara college.
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(4) Comments
Economics 101 says resources are limited. Books like this are needed, but it's unfortunate that our society constantly needs a positive message to finish it off, in this case that were'smart and can figure it out. It may be dangerous to thin an idea or technology will get us out of this jam..
Economics 101 says resources are limited. Books like this are needed, but it's unfortunate that our society constantly needs a positive message to finish it off, in this case that were'smart and can figure it out. It may be dangerous to thin an idea or technology will get us out of this jam..
Thanks for commenting and adding your good points. To clarify, what I hear Heinberg saying is not that an idea or technology will get us out of this jam. On the contrary, he's very clear that the world has changed irreversibly and our thinking must now catch up. The upshot is that the transition can have a silver lining if we let it. The shift to locally scaled activities and community resilience can make people happier and more connected to each other.
My personal take is that the quantifiable growth we've used to measure well-being has always been rather off-base. So while THAT type of growth (basically the power to mindlessly consume vast quantities of resources) might be over, the deeper qualities of our lives and relationships have lots of room to grow!
It doesn't have to be genetic engineering or terraforming. It's also using cotton and castor beans to make backsheets for solar panels, as BioSolar does. (They could hit the trifecta and grow the cotton and castor bean plants on vacant lots in need of soil remediation; the plants would sequester the heavy metals and the like into their own tissues and then into the backsheets, keeping them out of harm's way.)
Technology is a stone axe or a knitting needle as much as it's a (oooh, scary!) test tube or a gas chromatograph. Technology is indeed the answer -- the only question really remaining is which technologies we will use.
My personal take is that the quantifiable growth we've used to measure well-being has always been rather off-base. So while THAT type of growth (basically the power to mindlessly consume vast quantities of resources) might be over, the deeper qualities of our lives and relationships have lots of room to grow!
Exactly. The oncological model of capitalism -- of capitalism as cancer -- is done. It was never intended to benefit more than a fortunate few; the accidents of history that have allowed some benefits to trickle down to the masses were just that, accidents. And now the folks at the top will have to learn how to share.