Earth Plan

March 8, 2004

Hank Stone

hstone@rochester.rr.com

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INTRODUCTION

Humankind faces serious problems. Yet there is a shortage of serious solutions from governments and corporations. The time is right for discussion among citizens of what a successful human future would look like, and how to bring it about.

We need a plan to solve the Earth's problems. The ideas offered here are suggestions for such an Earth Plan. They offer a perspective for thinking about global issues.

Our society is used to believing that only “experts” can think about big problems. This isn’t true. These big problems need everyone’s help. Ready or not, we citizens are involved in the world, and in our own future. It’s up to us to get the direction right, and we can do it. Let experts fill in the details. Difficulty and frustration will result if we consider only small solutions, when our problems are big ones.

So get ready to think on a big scale. Let us consider all of humankind. Let us consider the whole Earth. Let us consider the past, the present, the future we want. From there, we can discuss what needs to be done.

IN THE BEGINNING

Scientists believe that our solar system was formed some four and a half billion years ago. Our Earth and Sun reside on an arm of the Milky Way galaxy. This galaxy is one of billions, all of which are still speeding outward from the original “Big Bang.”

Over billions of years, the Earth cooled, and oceans formed. Three billion years ago there were single celled bacteria: life had begun!

By one million years ago, the process of evolution had produced the first humans. They walked upright, lived in communities, and used tools.

Cultural evolution proceeded slowly. Then language was invented, and agriculture, and writing, enabling increasingly complex societies. Over time, technologies were developed, giving people increasing control over their lives and their environment. Still, technological advances were very slow, and each generation lived very much like the last.

History records the development of societies over about the last six thousand years. It is the story of evolving social institutions, and the interaction of different cultures. There were wars, and over time increasingly sophisticated agreements to keep the peace. Human society wrested food and shelter and clothing from the environment, which seemed constant and inexhaustible.

We humans saw the grandeur and abundance of the natural world, and developed religions to explain and celebrate our place in it.

In the last 200 years, science has advanced markedly, bringing with it a cascade of technological marvels. The telegraph changed society, then telephone, radio, television, satellite communications, computers, faxes, and the Internet. Automobiles have shrunk distances over land, and jet aircraft have made global travel commonplace, all quite suddenly by historical standards.

Throughout history, most people died young. Poor sanitation was not understood to cause disease until the invention of the microscope led to the discovery of germs. After that came major successes in controlling a host of deadly diseases.

Having large families had been a social good, providing labor and security in old age. With high infant mortality, not all children would survive to adulthood. If land became scarce, the young could settle new land, with new resources.

However, by 1900, there were no new continents to settle. The world had run out of frontiers. People continued to have large families, and successes in medicine extended life. This upset the balance between births and deaths, leading to rapid population growth and opened questions of carrying capacity, sustainability, and quality of life.

THE PRESENT SITUATION

Our societies operate according to tradition, which is to say the same way they used to, historically. Through most of human history, each generation adopted the lifestyles of their parents, and social changes came gradually. Now changes are occurring with dizzying speed; tradition is being overwhelmed and history is failing to warn us of new dangers.

We now face two fundamentally new threats: 1) nuclear weapons can now put whole societies at risk anywhere in the world, and 2) human population has overtaken the abundance of nature. Each of these threats brings a complex of related problems.

The Nuclear Weapons Threat. In our long historical past, there have always been clans, tribes, city-states, or countries needing protection from one another. War was the default process for resolving territorial disputes. Though always brutal for those participating, war tended to involve just a fraction of the societies: the soldiers. But in the Second World War, firebombings and nuclear bombs brought threats to civilians to new heights. Then during the Cold War, the concept of Mutually Assured Destruction put every man, woman and child on the front lines. Tens of thousands of nuclear warheads, mounted on intercontinental ballistic missiles, make absurd the idea of war as a means of protecting society.

Nuclear weapons are part of a complex of problems. Nuclear-weapon states feel that the devices, though dangerous, cannot be eliminated while there remains a need to protect themselves against aggression of any kind. But arms buildups in one country stimulate arms buildups in other countries. The military system worldwide spends some $860 billion every year, much of which goes to multinational corporations, who reinvest some of it into governments to promote further weapons programs. Since raw materials for nuclear bombs are a byproduct of nuclear power production, they are inherently hard to control.

As the Iraq War has popularized, chemical and biological agents, like Sarin gas and anthrax, can also be “weapons of mass destruction.” A country that feels threatened, but that can’t afford nuclear weapons, might pursue such alternatives.

The Population Threat. Experts estimate that the world’s population was only 300 million people in the year 1 AD. It took until 1800 for the population to reach one billion. But in just 200 more years, human numbers have exploded to over 6 billion. During much of this time it has been possible to farm larger areas, mechanize farms, create new crop strains, apply more fertilizer and pesticides, and irrigate. In these ways food production has kept up with the growing population. Many mistakenly believe that the lesson of history is that technology can accommodate any increase in population, because it always has.

Scientists do not share this optimism. They point out that oil, gas and coal are nonrenewable resources. These resources are running out, and even if their supply were infinite, burning them would threaten the environment through buildup of greenhouse gasses. Our very productive agriculture is based on oil for tractors and trucks, natural gas for fertilizer, and nonrenewable ground water for irrigation. Modern farming techniques degrade the land by the erosion of topsoil, and pollute groundwater with fertilizer and pesticide runoff. Agriculture has kept up with a rapidly growing population, but only by using up stores of fossil fuel, polluting air and water, and compromising the fertility of the land.

The most fertile land throughout the world is already in production. Farming marginal land leads to erosion and topsoil loss. Destruction of rainforests for more cropland causes the extinction of species, and is therefore not acceptable even as a temporary solution.

The levels of fresh water in aquifers around the world are dropping, in some places by more than 4 feet a year. Growing populations require more food, which has led to diverting river water and pumping ground water for irrigation at unsustainable rates. Some believe fresh water shortages pose a more immediate threat than oil shortages.

Either way, we face global limits to the abundance of nature for the first time in history.

This broad complex of problems connected with overpopulation and environmental limits may prove more destructive to humankind than the warfare complex. Clearly the world’s population cannot continue to grow indefinitely, because its land area and resources are finite. We hear talk of "sustainable development" and "economic growth" as solutions to the problems of hunger, poverty, and ignorance. But in the poorest countries, population growth swallows up any gains in productivity, while the environment deteriorates. And in the richest countries, "growth" helps economic problems at the expense of the ecology.

In the next decades, as the world’s supply of oil runs out, the way of life we are used to will end, and the development of renewable sun and wind energy, and energy conservation, will have to support the whole human population. Society does not yet know how the present 6.3 billion people, much less a larger future population, can survive the end of the fossil fuel era.

So we see a complex of problems associated with war in the nuclear age, and another arising from overpopulation. There are additional problems of injustice as well: human rights abuses, racism, income disparity, and policies of the powerful toward the powerless.

What can be done?

MUDDLING THROUGH

One of the lessons of science, and of industry, is that big problems can be addressed by breaking them down into smaller problems, which can then be solved more easily. This thinking leads to the idea of incremental change, in which big problems yield to the persistent application of small fixes. Arguably, our global societies are now attempting to "muddle through" the global problems, by taking whatever small incremental steps seem justified at the moment, to deal with current symptoms. But fighting symptoms does not fix what’s wrong.

The global problems form an interlocking web. For example, using more nuclear power helps reduce global warming by reducing carbon dioxide added to the air, but increases long-term radioactive poisons, targets for terrorists, and raw materials for nuclear bombs.

People theorize that world population will stabilize because of the “demographic transition.” That is, Third World countries will become richer, which will lead to decreased child mortality and more investment in education, which will lead to lower birthrates. But they don’t ask where the resources to support the new prosperity will come from.

The web of global problems is the present day result of all the piecemeal fixes applied to human problems throughout history. The fixes being applied now have the effect of allowing the basic problems to continue, while insulating those with the most money and power from the worst effects. Inner cities and developing nations now stagger under a burden of poverty, joblessness, drugs, homelessness, and violence. But decision-makers in our societies live elsewhere.

World society is beginning to experience a "crash" of growing world population against environmental limits. The effects of this crash will be felt worldwide and for many generations to come. If left to themselves, decision-makers in rich countries will allow this crash to continue, putting their trust in the ability of their money to protect them. This is the nature of "muddling through".

Because the planet’s interlocking problems cannot be solved piecemeal, we must apply global solutions. A chasm cannot be crossed in small steps. We need a plan for the whole Earth, for the whole future.

But what is the future we want?

EVERY CHILD DESERVES A FUTURE THAT WORKS

Most people would agree, if they think about it, that they want a world of peace, justice, and prosperity, with clean air, clean water, wilderness protected, species preserved, and children educated. Just as important, we want this world to be sustainable indefinitely.

People want the "good life" for their children. We live in a competitive society, and see around us that those with money can buy pretty much what they want. Many of those without money live in high crime areas, without good prospects, with too little of everything. So people see their best hope for now, and for generations to follow, as an individual question. They want enough money, and housing, and education, and clean air--for their own family.

It is important to provide for our families. But some kinds of needs can only be met collectively. To give every child basic prosperity and security will require a new global culture. How can we bring this about?

We will consider in turn religions, corporations, the U.S. government, and the United Nations as possible paths to a future that works.

RELIGION

The major faith traditions offer teachings about how the world works, and how to live successfully in community. Religious faith can give people a sense of identity and meaning, and can encourage spiritual growth. Can religions point the way toward a successful future?

It is said that killing is wrong, and war is wrong, and killing of innocents is wrong. Yet in the name of national “defense” the most profoundly brutal killing systems have been developed and used. Some faithful have found this wrong, and spoken out against it, but most people who profess religious faith participate in the system.

It is said that if people would only share their wealth with those less fortunate, everyone on Earth would have food to eat, clothing, shelter, education, and so forth. This thinking is especially popular with the poor, and not the rich. But it is no longer true. There are already too many people for redistribution of wealth to solve the problem. Each person’s “share” would be too little to support an adequate lifestyle.

Religious thinking can lead us to ignore future threats. Some interpret the message of religion as a pact between humans and God, where God created us, and is responsible for Sun, the Earth, and our societies. If the people obey God, all will be well. But scriptural instructions may be thousands of years old, appropriate only to an earlier time. Practices such as slavery in the Bible, or having large families, were “good enough for grandpa,” and carry a lot of tradition. But they threaten our future.

Some argue that science and technology are the religion of modern times. If so, do we believe that high technology will save us from the global problems? This technological superstition ignores the warnings of most scientists, including many Nobel laureates, that we need to change our behavior as a species to avoid catastrophic damage to the environment.

Religions offer us a sense of awe, and appreciation for the amazing Creation. None of us can live fully without deeply held beliefs. But failure to examine our beliefs, especially in changing times, threatens our future.

MULTINATIONAL CORPORATIONS

Some corporations have become far richer than national governments, and have influence throughout the world. What sort of path into the future are multinational corporations showing us?

Even though corporations need healthy suppliers and customers to survive, they are structured to deliver the greatest return to shareholders in the short term. This prevents them from investing in their own long-term health. They can make money faster by using up resources than by protecting them, and by polluting rather than by cleaning up after themselves.

A renewable energy revolution would bring enormous profits, but long-term investment is hard for corporations.

Multinationals can profit by influencing governments to forgo environmental or safety regulations. The “military-industrial complex,” warned of by President Eisenhower, involves using corporate money to lobby the U.S. government to buy destabilizing and expensive new weapons, including nuclear weapons. A $20 billion government contract might yield $2 million for the reelection campaigns of politicians. Retired military personnel get lucrative jobs in weapons industries, lobbying congress to buy more weapons.

Corporations also tend to homogenize the global culture. It’s cost-effective to develop a McDonalds once, then to replicate it globally. Movies and television made in America are exported widely, where they serve to advertise an individual lifestyle and social model based on consumerism. But current consumption levels are already unsustainable.

THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT

In the United States, we have a government that takes care of many large-scale questions for us. There is the commerce system, the military, transportation, health, mail, and a host of other services. Why not simply rely on the government to provide for our future?

Our government has election cycles of 2 to 6 years. These short cycles come from a more stable time, when the key concern was preventing the tyranny of a king. But now much of the time elected officials are in office is spent asking for campaign contributions, to get reelected. Those contributions come largely from the richest and most powerful corporations and individuals. They have the most direct interest in the decisions made by government, and the means to affect those decisions. Almost by definition, they like things the way they are. Their interests are in profits, one year at a time (or even one quarter at a time). Even the most moral legislator will be under pressure to make business happy short term, and that means pork barrel projects generating profits for corporations in the home district right now. The next thousand years, or the next 100 years, have no meaning to business, and so have no meaning to government.

There is also a patriotic idea that interferes with preparing for the future. Many citizens believe that in planetary matters one country’s success must come at the expense of others. Ours is the country we love, so we should regulate our affairs to give ourselves benefits. Let the patriots of every nation get what they can for their own country.

Of course, staggering amounts of money, as well as pride and belief, are invested in the status quo. The military system, capitalism by multinational corporations, political careers, jobs, and every person’s self identity are threatened by the suggestion that the success of the human experiment may require a change of direction.

For now, the U.S. government is not equipped to prepare for the future. And no country has jurisdiction to address global problems.

THE UNITED NATIONS

After the First World War, the League of Nations was created as a way to promote peace. It failed.

After the Second World War, the victors created the United Nations, to “end the scourge of war.” But it was intentionally made weak, so as not to challenge the sovereignty of its member countries. As such, it could not prevent the Cold War, or some 100 million deaths from wars and genocide since World War II. However, the U.N. has coordinated peace talks, administered disaster relief and a host of aid programs, and demonstrated that widely disparate factions can work together despite barriers of language, geography, religion, and ideology.

But the United Nations is not a government. It has no authority independent of its member countries. It cannot create a peacekeeping force, or try an international terrorist, or make binding demands on any country. It has no power to tax, and cannot defend itself against member countries that withhold their dues.

The U.N. has been unable to reform itself to deal with war, or the relatively new threats of genocide, global warming, and overpopulation.

A PACKAGE DEAL

We have discussed forces that keep the world on its present course. We will need a new Earth plan, a sustainable plan based on peace, justice, prosperity, and ecological protection for all. But this new plan, once implemented, must also be stable. In other words, it must provide more benefits for more people than the present system.

Eliminate war. Wealthy countries need safety from terrorism and nuclear attack. To get this, they will have to give up their own nuclear weapons, and the “sovereign right” to wage foreign wars, even with conventional weapons. Weapons of war must be systematically eliminated, globally, under international supervision.

Eliminate poverty. “Peace” is no prize for countries whose citizens are at risk from hunger, disease, or shortages of fresh water. Where poverty leads to failure of education, child mortality, and breakdown of society, resources from the rich countries must pay for development of sustainable systems.

Optimize population. Wealthy countries will not be forthcoming unless there is at least a plan for sustainable population. All countries must debate and document what they believe to be the optimum population for their long-term future, and adopt a fertility norm consistent with it. Governments need not coerce couples to have small families, but can empower them with information, reproductive services, and tax incentives.

Protect nature. Burning of fossil fuels must be phased out in every country. Rainforests must be preserved. Species must be protected from extinction.

Adopt sustainable technologies. To meet the food and energy needs of the present, sustainable technologies must be developed and adopted. Wind and large-scale solar plants will make electricity, to be converted to hydrogen and other clean fuels. Sustainable farming methods must be developed and implemented globally.

Pay the price. Short term, these changes will cost money, which will have to be supplied by the wealthy countries. Long term, peace and health and sustainability will be markedly less expensive than the present course, and less dangerous!

Teach global citizenship. To protect the planet we must recognize ourselves as citizens of the world, not just of our countries. This requires that children everywhere be taught a new cooperative global culture. We must think globally and act locally. But through communications we must also act globally.

DEMOCRATIC FEDERAL WORLD GOVERNMENT

There is no realistic prospect for the global changes mentioned above without protection for the countries involved. For example, no country could reasonably destroy its aggressive military capabilities if that left its citizens unprotected. Also, no country would give up its ability to exploit resources on its territory, or pay significant amounts for development in other countries, unless it were guaranteed benefits in return. An agency is needed to get agreement on what must to be done for global protection, with enough authority over individuals in every country to guarantee the results.

The U.S. government works on the premise that sovereignty belongs to the people. But to achieve group goals such as the maintenance of the schools and roads and fire departments, citizens invest some of their authority in government. This restricts individual freedom, but enables the government to provide valuable services.

Federal government is arranged in layers. Citizens invest enough authority to support the services required from each layer, but no more.

For example, suppose the governor of New York State decided to invade Pennsylvania, to capture its coal reserves. There would be no army to do the job. Furthermore, everyone who heard of the plan would laugh, because besides being illegal, war between states is unnecessary. Our Supreme Court resolves disputes between states.

But the U.S. government has no authority over other countries, and no binding legal recourse if mistreated by another country. Adding a world layer of government would protect countries from one another, keep the peace, and prevent actions by anyone that would threaten the planet.

Like our government, a world government would have to be representative and democratic, with checks and balances to prevent abuses. It would need a constitution and a bill of rights. Without those features, it would not win, or deserve, the support of the world’s people.

Democratic federal world government would protect individual freedoms, and local culture. World government would not require everyone to speak the same language or dress the same way, or adopt the same beliefs. But if an Adolph Hitler (or anyone else) conspired to wage war, the individual conspirators would risk jail, and there would be no war.

The United States has more military power than any other country in the history of the world. Together with our allies, we spend some 80% of the world’s $860 billion military dollars every year. If the United States were to decide it wanted to use its power to end war, it could work toward a supra-national law and dispute settlement system for its allies. Russia, China, and every other country would be invited to join this federation, and share its protection.

THE PACE OF CHANGE

Historically social change takes a long time. It took about 75 years for human slavery to be outlawed in the United States. The Nazi Holocaust convinced many that genocide must be ended once and for all. The killing of millions in China and Cambodia followed. Over time, societies will band together to outlaw genocide, and take effective steps to prevent it. The world has been slow to make up its mind, but the Internet can speed things up.

Edwin Cornish, president of the World Future Society, says people overestimate how much effect their actions will have in the short term, and underestimate their effect in the long term. He says people get a vision of how things should work, promote it widely, and give up on it when "nothing happens." But ideas are not lost. They circulate in society until circumstances are right, and then emerge, perhaps in modified form, to be implemented with surprising speed. The collapse of the Berlin Wall happened very quickly when the time was right. President Kennedy’s program to land a man on the moon took just ten years. In 20 years, says Cornish, "almost anything" can be done.

Some Israelis and Palestinians believe that peace has to take a long time because their struggle has roots going back a thousand years. These beliefs were taught to them as children. But we get to decide what to teach the children of today.

There is the Utopia problem. "Everyone knows" that you can’t solve the world’s big problems. Even thinking about that is "utopian", meaning impractical, impossible, unrealistic. It would be quixotic--tilting at windmills like a crazy person-- to try to make human civilization work. But civilization already works for the well-off of the world. We shouldn’t be surprised to find powerful people ridiculing new ideas rather than debating them.

So “We the People” need a louder voice.

NEEDED: DEMOCRACY IN THE UNITED STATES

In the U.S., we will need to restore majority rule in order for the government to protect our future.

Campaign finance reform. First, we need 100% public financing of elections. Most Americans support democracy, and understand that money can distort the electoral process. Broadcasting companies using the public airwaves must accommodate some political advertising as a public service.

Instant runoff voting (IRV). When there is a third party candidate, voting for him or her may have the effect of electing a candidate we dislike. Instant runoff voting levels the playing field. Voters rank the candidates. If one candidate is first choice of most voters, he wins. If not, the least-preferred candidate is dropped, but votes for that candidate are not lost. Instead they are transferred to the voters’ second choice candidates. This process repeats until one candidate has a majority. IRV addresses a current bias against new ideas in government.

Council of elders. To address the short-term focus of elected officials, we need people whose job is to recommend actions to protect the long-term future of our country and of humanity. The council would draw respected thinkers from different fields, who might be paid for a year of their time using public money. Not being politicians, and not having to be reelected, they would be free to speak their minds. The council would decide what issues to consider, be given technical and editorial help, and report their recommendations in print and on television, possibly using advertising companies.

THE TRANSITION

The status quo is dysfunctional. The steps suggested to achieve American democracy would help break the stranglehold of big money on politics. The council of elders would empower citizens with information and recommendations for the long term. And the long-term fate of our country is tied to the long-term fate of the world.

But the status quo is stabilized by the profits and power it delivers to decisionmakers in industry, government and the military. Advertising, our society’s main storyteller, supports it. Our educational system reinforces the status quo. Everyone in the society is immersed in messages about the American dream, how good it is, and the advantages of not waking up.

Our society is like an upside-down life raft, very stable the way it is, but leaving us all in the water. If we can turn it over, we can climb in and protect our future. So we need some triggering event—some “wave” to come along to help get the raft right the raft.

Politicians can’t lead the effort, because change would offend their rich constituents. “We the People” need to stand together and demand change. This can happen if enough of us are sufficiently disgruntled, and sufficiently organized. Unfortunately, the unraveling of our future may make us disgruntled, without making clear what to do about it.

A single wealthy man might be able to start the wave to right the boat. Suppose a billionaire decided to convene his own “council of elders.” He could pick people with credibility, vision and integrity, have them make recommendations for the future, and put the results on TV. Then ordinary citizens could elect politicians pledged to make it happen.

What do we ordinary citizens do in the mean time?

LINK, LEARN, AND SPEAK

We link up, bone up, and speak up!

Link. Linking up with like-minded people to solve real problems can be uplifting and joyful, as well as important. We all know people who are apathetic, in denial about problems, or afraid to look at them. Indeed, avoidance makes sense if one believes a problem can’t be solved. But facing problems in community is encouraging because we have people to talk to, and the ideas and energy of the whole group.

Different organizations do different work. Find people trying to do what you want to see done. The makers of this video offer websites with suggestions for action. Email is a powerful way to get connected with others.

Learn. Information gives you leverage. Email distribution lists and discussions and Internet web surfing give extraordinary access to information. Looking at the world’s problems directly is empowering.

Speak out. If we are informed and rational, we can contribute to the worldwide global discussion on how to proceed. Simply discussing concerns you may have with friends, family and co-workers can be powerful. A lot of people are concerned by global problems, but feel isolated because the commercial media tend not to cover the issues. You can empower the people around you!

In our society, we enjoy the freedom to be heard, without fear of retaliation. We can communicate widely and inexpensively through letters to newspapers. We can communicate by email, and have our own websites.

We can influence politics with letters and phone calls to the President, our Senators, and our Representatives. Because so few people take the time to communicate their views, each letter is thought by legislators to represent the views of 1000 of their constituents. Re-election requires money, but it also requires votes from people like us.

We do not need to "save the world" on our own. We stand together with people everywhere who want a future that works for their children, sustainably, with justice, peace and prosperity. But we must take a share.

“Everyone knows” the world has to be run the way it is, the same way they “knew” human beings could never fly, and could never walk on the moon. Everyone knew they were safe from military attack in castles, until gunpowder and cannons came along. Everyone knows there will always be war, and they will continue to know it until war is abolished.

THE LONG VIEW

The Earth has circled the sun for billions of years, and will probably do so for billions more. Its orbit will be unaffected by the presence or absence of the biosphere, that thin film at its surface in which we humans and other animals and plants now live. Dinosaurs evolved, prospered for millions of years, and went extinct. And the Earth still circles the sun.

Human life is a million-year long chain. We are born, grow up, fall in love, marry, have children, grow old, and die. We live only a short time--just long enough to add our progeny to the chain, and ideally to catch a glimpse of the grandeur of the Creation. But the chain goes on. We will not live to see it, but we hope our children, and their children, and a succession of generations will witness the glory we have witnessed, and experience love, and through love give life to the next generation in turn.

Now human beings have evolved, and have taken over the planet. We have developed social institutions based on the notion that our species is more important than the other animals, so we may destroy their habitat. Our country is more important than other countries, so we may wage war. Our race is more important. Our religion is more important. Our family is more important.

And so our one planet is divided against itself. The global problems cannot be solved by one country. Science, technology, medicine, and industry have given us mastery of the wilderness, and have allowed our societies to grow in numbers and influence. But our very progress threatens our future.

Past generations have been able to assume that the human chain will go on, unbroken. But we are at a fork in the road. What happens next will depend in some measure on how those of us alive today want the future to unfold. Unless we know what we want to happen, we will not know what we need to do. For the first time, humanity needs to decide on its plan for planet Earth.

Our children’s future requires it.

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