I have just begun to read a new book
called The Bridge at the Edge of the World
by James Gustave Speth (Yale University Press, 2008). It is subtitled
“Capitalism, the Environment, and Crossing from Crisis to Sustainability.” The
book’s message is that the Earth’s current crisis is caused by modern,
unquestioning, environmentally destructive growth-at-all-costs capitalism. Speth calls what is happening “the Great Collision,” where the global economy is
crashing against the earth, creating enormous damage. Aside from the direct
results of global warming, he describes how we have plundered the earth’s
resources: Half the world’s tropical and temperate forests are now gone. The
rate of deforestation in the tropics continues at about an acre a second. Half
of the wetlands and a third of the mangroves are gone. An estimated 90 percent
of the large predator fish are gone, and 75 percent of marine fisheries are
overfished or fished to capacity. Twenty percent of the corals are gone and
another 20 percent severely threatened. Species are disappearing at rates about
a thousand times faster than normal. Persistent toxic chemicals are present in
every one of our bodies. And so on.
But Speth doesn’t see the problem as just one of
economics. He wisely understands and articulates the connections between
environmental problems and other human challenges such as health, freedom,
peace, stability, and community. And those interconnections are becoming more and
more apparent. Increasingly, wars are fought over scarce natural resources, food
shortages are emerging as a result of the single-minded planting of foodlands
with biofuel crops, extreme weather events are challenging the grip of militant
governments, and increases in air and water pollution are fostering new
infectious diseases.
I would take Speth’s analysis a bit deeper
because I think one of the biggest challenges – and the one with the biggest
potential for creating change – is education. In order to create the profound
transformation that is required in our values, culture, and worldview, I believe
we need to examine our attitudes toward what may be the last oppressed group in
our society: children. We must re-evaluate not only how we educate them, but how
we birth them, nurture their ability to think creatively and independently,
respect their rights, shape their values, learn from their instinctive kinship
with the natural world and with each other. Those are at the root of the
problem, and that is where we must begin in order to reverse the destructive
momentum of the last few centuries. When we get that right, we will have, I
believe, created both the changes and the hope that will allow us to proceed
with the transformation that is required.
Natural Life Editor
Wendy Priesnitz
