“Burning Questions” for Environmental Management

The six readings considered for this paper, reviewed on beginning with the paragraph starting with “The ‘Frameworks’ readings,’ and references at end, are about climate and related social systems. The need for systems change to achieve harmony between the human and non-human world is clear, but the approach is difficult, visionary, and technically complex. Shifting to a global economic system that aligns with environmental health requires coordinating among thousands of nations, with different languages, cultures, hostilities and alliances. This is, of course, the goal of the United Nations. But, how do we do more, better?

As described in the book The World After Us, our species has caused the extinction of nearly all of the megafauna around the world since migrating from Africa, either by hunting to extinction, habitat modification, or both (Weisman, Alan, 2007). This is commonly known. The record of human environmental policy starts in 10,000 BCE, when humans began cultivating rye and wheat from the waters of the Tigris, Euphrates, and Nile Rivers. In 350 BCE, at Aristotle’s urging, Greek city-states began regulating wood use and protecting forests. Since then, humans have constantly course-corrected when they notice the harmful impacts of unregulated environmental management, such as lost old- growth forests or polluted air (Cousins, 2003). Humans had already modified large swaths of the planet by the time the nineteenth century rolled around, when homo sapiens in the UK began mining coal and burning it to generate mechanical energy (Kool, 2020). This is the time when atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are measured to have begun rising (NOAA, 2016). The anthropocene would have started here, at the point at which industrial-scale extraction and combustion of subterranean minerals began.

With the clear and present impact of our species on the material makeup of the planet’s oceans, lands, and atmosphere, some of us have protested the destruction of all non-humanity on Earth using compactly stored energy, or fossil fuels, with one barrel of oil being roughly equivalent to 11 years of human labor (Hagens and IIER, 2020). World War II had an enormous impact on the world’s extraction and production of petroleum materials and agricultural systems, as well as the world’s mental state (Robinson & Sutherland, 2002). In 1972, the first UN Conference on the Human Environment was held in Stockholm, which represents a step forward in human-environmental systems development. However, since WWII, “Acceleration” economics has dominated, in which growth-at- whatever-cost is adopted as the mantra (Osaka, 2020). In the USA, the agricultural industry became more consolidated and more subsidized, a trend that continues today, especially impacting small dairy farms (Weingarten et al., 2021). Economic expansion has bought with it environmental degradation and modification, with economic operators content to look the other way, and distract from their feelings by consumer culture (McKnight & Block, 2016).

The creation of the United States of America came with the destruction of the inhabitants of this land, Turtle Island, who had been with their land for hundreds of generations. These native peoples were mistakenly called Indians because Christopher Columbus thought this land was near India, and they continued to be called Indians, even though the tribes have distinct cultures and languages, and this land is not near India. As European settlers seeking a place to practice Christianity (Protesantism) expanded into this land, they over time forced the destruction of the Indigenous tribes (Davis, 2010). When the United States of America declared independence from Great Britain and fought the Revolutionary War in 1776, its budding agricultural and land management sector used forced African labor in its fields and to dote on its wealthy aristocracy. The land management policies of the early United States considered this land to be its “manifest destiny” to conquer, with the planet being a provider of limitless resources (Lewis, 1988). These historical issues live within our collective memory and trauma. Success in bottom-up resistance efforts by Indigenous people and allies around the world demonstrates that exploitation of land and species can be tempered by popular resistance (Piven, 2008).

The “Frameworks” readings for this Synthesis paper demonstrates the theory and practice of designing sustainably, such that future generations have at least the access to resources that we do today. It is my perspective that the objective is now regeneration more than sustainability – that is, ensuring that future generations have relationships that are even better than today. Where we are today is a 4,000 page report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (the IPCC), describing the physical science basis of climate change in 2021. The Summary for Policymakers is readable at 41 pages, and clearly states what is known, and with what certainty (Climate Change 2021, 2021).

Our world is a complex system, as described in the introduction to Donella Meadows’ book Thinking in Systems (Meadows, 2008). Though, within its complexity, scientists and researchers are showing us clear trends, such as, that the energy transition reflects the dominant system trait of winners and losers. Poor people tend to pay more of their income toward energy bills, live in less-efficient homes, and have less access to low-energy products (Carley & Konisky, 2020). Black and brown people live near polluting facilities at a higher rate and have higher rates of illness than European- descended people (Bullard, 2001). To design for successful outcomes, we are invited to utilize frameworks for urban and community systems design, and the five dimensions of community systems: Relationships, Institutions, Production, Organisation, and Governance (Nayak, 2019). The Social- Ecological systems (SES) framework developed by Elinor Ostrom is enhanced by researchers at the University of Colorado Denver, who add Infrastructure as a dimension (SEIS), allowing for transboundary, multifactor, multitheory approaches for integrated models that comprehensively inform urban policymakers (Ramaswami et al., 2012).

These systems analysis frameworks are necessary because, as economist Rebecca Henderson says, the free market works when prices reflect the actual cost of goods, which is not what we have today, where the cost of environmental damage is not factored into goods (Henderson, 2020). Linking environment and health appears to be a distant possibility, but perhaps it is closer than it has ever been before. Frameworks, case studies, and economic perspectives exist to aid in the Work. It is worth mentioning that the work involves play, and in Derek Sivers’ 2010 TED talk, we reflect on the experience of the solo dancer, who is followed by a second, a third, and finally, a crowd of dancers; a small movement (Sivers, 2010).

For me, the question that remains is, how might we motivate and empower every person to act within their means to be an agent for systems change? The answer is a call to action, a call to design, a call to live: to dance the dance, and do what we can to get others to join in too, and join in ourselves. The dance is a dance of particles, of waves of light, of sparks of electricity, synaptic connections traveling within and between bodies. It is also a dance of law and subsidy readjustment.

I’m with Greta. I’m with Vandana Shiva. I’m with Alexandra Ocasio Cortez and the other Green New Deal architects. I’m not the same as them – I dance my own dance, but I am with them, on the same team, the same clan, on this Spaceship Earth.

REFERENCES

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Carley, S., & Konisky, D. M. (2020). The justice and equity implications of the clean energy transition. Nature Energy, 5(8), 569–577. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41560-020-0641-6

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