Cary Neeper's Blog: Reviewing World-changing Nonfiction - Posts Tagged "solutions"

The story of 40 years developing fiction that portrays solutions to secure the future,including award-winner The Webs of Varok. Social issues in an alternate 21st century solar system.
http://archivesofvarok.com/articles/t...

Hot, Flat and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution and How It Can Renew America by Thomas L. Friedman, New York, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008.

Unlike many valuable books reminding us why we Americans must pull back on our overuse of the planet, Hot, Flat and Crowded focuses on the observation that the world’s economies are so interconnected (i.e. The Earth is flat.), the more we depend on high energy usage the more we support those who hate us. His message is a simple challenge—we know how. As Shawne teaches in our novel soon to be released (The Alien Effect) “You in America were the first to build too rich a life. Now you must do better. You know how to become the example to the world you used to be—an example of a much simpler, time-rich life that will preserve and enhance Earth’s beauty and diversity for all its natural time.”

Friedman’s anecdotes are precise, his challenges direct, and the consequences of failure frightening. We know what we have to do to pick up the lead being taken by Japan and Europe, to devise what he calls a “Code Green” now. This book was published in 2008.

New York, Henry Holt &Co.,2014.
The solution is clear now--Elizabeth Warren points the way, along with other books I have referenced in my work: Dietz and O’Neill’s Enough Is Enough: Building A Sustainable Future in a World of Finite Resources and Tom Friedman’s Hot Flat and Crowded. We need to ‘fix what’s broke’ first—usury, dishonesty and subterfuge in business, law and politics—then, with the excess money saved, perhaps we will support (even subsidize!!) education, infrastructure renewal and honest research instead of overpaying CEO’s, rock stars and ball players.

As the steady state experts say, a small difference in income should be enough incentive to inspire creative work or compensate those doing less desirable jobs. Once the playing field is reasonably level, excess money from football tickets or other popular endeavors can be made available to create jobs repairing roads and bridges, supporting motivated students, and exploring new information and technologies.

Even the tougher problems could be tackled—like the relocation needed as the oceans rise and harsh weather forces us to move north. Maybe some excess money could be directed toward rebuilding efficient rail transport and sustainable energy systems, creating jobs while curing addiction to fossil fuels that now threaten our safe and healthy existence.

I suggest reading Elizabeth Warren’s A Fighting Chance first. Her story begins with her fight against the horrifying effort to tighten bankruptcy laws and ends with her equally horrifying battle to win a seat in the U.S. Senate. She makes her points clearly by sharing the details of her personal experiences, feelings and ideas as if she were talking to a close friend. There is no doubt that her axes to grind are hewn with deep concern, honest emotion and conviction.

Most of us care about our personal ethics. We don’t lie and cheat as a matter of policy. Neither should our politicians, bankers and businessmen, Warren insists. We are better than that. We deserve and should expect integrity.

Once we regain American integrity, we can embrace Tom Friedman’s “Code Green.” We can reverse the trend away from democracy that occurs in countries flooded with too much money. He makes a strong case that it has happened with too much oil money. We can also reverse our bad example and provide the world a good example in how to create a good life for all, without using up the world’s resources.

It will take a new paradigm that gives human well-being and a healthy Earth top priority above “money uber allus.” The guidelines are crystal clear in books like Enough Is Enough. We might even find solutions to social and religious dilemmas—like education and equal rights for women—that keep the human population growing at an alarming rate.

I have decided not to review The Collapse of Western Civilization: A View From the Future by Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway (Columbia University Press, 2014). Though I agree with the authors’ worry about what they call “anti-intellectualism” in current Western thinking, I will neither read this book nor recommend it. Rather, if you are still curious, I suggest doing a close read of Michael Shermer’s August 2014 Scientific American Skeptic article.

Then concentrate on reading the many thorough nonfiction studies that suggest real solutions to our many concerns, including our health problems, malnutrition, population stress and limited resources. Many such books appear in the previous reviews in this blog.

Or read our series The Archives of Varok, where solutions to our dilemmas are portrayed as realistically as possible in a fun setting so you can see what might be required to secure a long-term future. Two more books in the series will be coming out in November. Let’s focus on solutions. We don’t need more poorly presented dystopias. We can do better than they portray. The guidelines to an equitable humane future are rational and clear, though not easy.

The series is now up to date. E-books are available for the rewrite of A Place Beyond Man. It is called The View Beyond Earth, and includes a new beginning and corrections in copyediting, as well as updates on how we might actually relate to friendly aliens who live too close to ignore. Start with this one if you like backstory--who are these characters?

The award-winning book The Webs of Varok is the second book in the series. It focuses on issues portrayed on an alien planet--issues that could impact our long-term future. They do not deny our need for facing very tough choices. Falling back on old -isms won't work; we need to recognize the limit to resources.

The Alien Effect is the third book in the series. Like the others, it follows the mixed alien-human family in time, but is a standalone if you don't need extensive backstory. Set on Earth, the family faces some of our most troubling cultural issues.

The Honor code: How Moral Revolutions Happen by Kwame Anthony Appiah, New York, W. W. Norton, 2010.
How are human beings motivated to discard ancient or long-term practices that do harm? In this thoroughly researched, notated, and indexed book, Princeton professor Appiah tells three compelling stories of how codes of honor gone awry were finally brought down by the one thing that could undermine their powerful, damaging hold on human society—shame.
The first story tells how dueling in defense of honor was brought down. The second story, the binding of women’s feet in China, ended for a similar reason. The war against women in Pakistan is still being fought. Here again, historical honor plays a huge role. In all cases a sociological sense of honor trumps compassion or common sense.

This brings to mind our current situation—our obsession with the need for economic growth in an overpopulated Full Earth. Can we Americans face the fact that we have used up resources at a great rate? Can we be shamed into changing our ways and cutting back—demonstrating to the world how to Not overuse the Earth?

by Paul Gilding, New York, Bloombury Press, 2011.

Gilding’s thesis is that the bottom line is clear. In 2011 he says that a “...global crisis is no longer avoidable.” To minimize the “...loss, suffering, and conflict...in the coming decades...” we will “bring out the best” in humanity and win the war to avoid catastrophe.

The Great Disruption “...is not just debt, or inequity, or a recession, or corporate influence, or ecological damage. It’s the whole package...beyond incremental reform...We are quite capable of building: an economy that feeds, clothes and houses all. ..fulfills lives [and] treats the planet like it’s the only one we’ve got.”

In reviewing the CO2 problem, Gilding notes that climate change is a symptom of the larger problem, which is our “addiction” to growth—both biologically and in the market place. He notes all the usual clichés and outlines in detail the disruption in our businesses as usual. But when we understand that we must accept our planetary boundaries and the careful regulation that can enhance business ventures, we will gradually transition—through considerable trauma—to a prolonged steady state that enhances our lives.

Gilding is good at reviewing all the objections to sharing and localization, the difficulties with capitalism, communism and complexity. His prediction of the refugee problem we now experience is chilling, as he points out horrific details of the Disruption. When denial is no longer possible, he lands squarely on the obligatory solution, no-growth economics. A Full-Earth Economy (steady state was introduced by Herman Daly in the 1970s and is still presented and developed by the Center for the Advancement of Steady State Economy (http://steadystate.org) as the prescription for a pleasant long-term future for Earth and humanity.

Fields of Courage: Remembering César Chavéz...by Susan S. Drake, Santa Cruz Press, CA, 1999.

The author's dedication could be for those brave souls today who dare to work for lasting peace and human well-being. She wrote her dedication of this book "...to the people who plant, nurture and harvest, especially you brave ones who persist with nonviolence to make your place in the sun a healthy, safe and economically viable one."

"Planting, nurturing, and harvesting" could be metaphors for our current efforts to find solutions to today's frightening dilemmas. Are we limited to choosing between oligarchy (government by a small fraction of people), plutocracy (government in which the wealthy rule), socialism (collective or government ownership of means of production and distribution of goods), capitalism (in which production and distribution are owned privately or corporately and not regulated (the so-called free market), or democracy (in which common people are the source of political power that has principle of social quality and individual rights).

In the 1960's and 70's, Cesar Chavez fought hard to correct unjust working and living conditions for farm workers. Susan Drake's book is a memoir in poetry describing the man and his work organizing "minority races" as Community Service Organizers. They worked on one particular problem at a time: need for water, sewage, police protection and police brutality. He felt a need for some alternative to labor unions, but his efforts in organizing eventually became the United Farm Workers, AFL-CIO.

Today we are threatened by situations that drive us to irrational extremes., for we see no easy way out. We want instant answers, demand simple fixes, spout 140 character wisdom.

A self-educated man with both temper and "great compassion," his story of persistence and integrity "changed the face of California agriculture," at least in the way the farmers saw themselves. That same kind of persistence and integrity could also change the face of our future.

Getting Green Done—Hard Truths From the Front Lines of the Sustainable Revolution by Auden Schendler, Philadelphia, Public Affairs Perseus Books Group, 2009.
Author Auden Schendler, an "outdoorsman" for 15 years, worked for the Rocky Mountain Institute, and is now Executive Director of Sustainability at the Aspen Skiing Company. He states up front that his book "...represents a departure from business as usual...and yet we need to do this on a global scale." The inside cover summarizes his thinking by saying, "...many...are still fiddling with the small stuff while the planet burns. Why? Because implementing sustainability is brutally difficult [,even though] "...business consultants say going green is easy and profitable."

Schendler applauds individual efforts because government needs examples of what to do. He goes on to note that "...only government action—on a global scale—can drive the level of change at the speed we require." "Climate change threatens every business on the planet, and business is the primary cause of it." Therefore, "...what is needed is government leadership and comprehensive economic policies."

Solutions mentioned include Green Energy and LEED, which doesn't emphasize energy enough, so should not be used as a guide. What is needed, he believes, is to raise local building codes so that homes can be remodeled to save 50% energy. An Environmental Service Corp makes sense, as does education in passive solar possibilities—insulate, face south and add thermal mass. It's not difficult.

Unfortunately, when the economy tanks, the environment is the first to get cut. The U,.S. should lead in putting efficiency to work at every level and "force markets to reflect the true price of power". The author goes into some detail about nuclear power and its problems, its cost, and its "insoluble waste problem."

In the end we need to face the question "How will we become—and then remain—inspired for the long slog ahead? This battle will take not just political will and corporate action—it will also require an unyielding commitment and dedication on the part of all humanity...Most of our grandparents lived in a sustainable world...what we need to do is that close, that real, that personal...that possible."

The End of Normal: The Great Crisis and the Future of Growth by James K. Galbraith, New York, Simon and Schuster, 2014.
This book came out at the same time steadystate.org was making a strong case that "Enough Is Enough." A book with that title by Rob Dietz and Dan O'Neill was published at the same time we released our fictional portrayal of how no-growth economics might work—the award-winner The Webs of Varok (http://archivesofvarok.com).

My shelves are full of excellent non-fiction written in the last four decades by experts in many fields that agree that we must learn to pull back, stabilize populations, and conserve resources—that economic growth is not sustainable in the long run.

Nowadays, no one dare talk about population limits, but it cannot be reasonably separated from our concern that resources are limited. We are already seeing water shortages. Surely we can now agree that classical economics is faulty in neglecting to apply resource availability and scarcity in their equations. Galbraith makes the detailed case, sharing how the equations lead to false conclusions.

He reviews the Soviet Union's demise and how it sends a shadow of parallel concerns with America's loss of post-World War II's booming economy. Things have changed, and we cannot expect to see business as usual. In the end, Galbraith preaches "slow growth," assuming that some economic growth is necessary because human greed and power drives must be assumed.

Given that assumption, I don't see much hope. I believe he is wrong. We are smarter than that. We know that nothing real grows forever. Given the chance for a decent existence, the human being is a remarkable creature, capable of selfless reasoning and brilliant creativity. Capable, even of saying, "Enough is enough."

We can understand how a population of germs can grown and prosper in a closed test tube filled with liquid nutrients. We seed the test tube with a few multiplying bacteria. We watch the population grow until the resources—the nutrient broth—is used up. We can understand why the population growth of the bacteria then slows, then drops to zero as the death rate increases. For a while a few mutants survive on the wastes, then they wink out.

Earth is our test tube, but we are know now that our resources are finite. Therefore, with willful restraint, we can keep them available over millennia by recycling and keeping count, by being watchful, resourceful and efficient in maintaining a comfortable status quo.

Already our population overload may seem overwhelming. It's true that technology will help, but only if it adds to our efficiency. It can't save us if we squander what Earth supplies. Growth—even slow growth—is not a long-term solution.

Neither is escaping to some other planet, for all but very few of us. Again, realism raises hard-to-grasp concepts. The time, energy and distances required to travel through the galaxy--even if we invent speed-of-light buses—are huge. We must take care of planet Earth, and tame our baser instincts to reproduce beyond reason.