Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future [ハードカバー]

"Deep Economy" may be the most disturbing and challenging book published this year.

Disturbing? It's like the doctor telling you that you have cancer. And not just you --- you and everyone you know.

The good news: There is a cure. And with the energetic support of business and government, you and everyone you know can be saved.

The bad news: Our economic system is based on a crude, outdated model: More = better. Blinded by the mantra of growth, our leaders will try to make that model last as long as possible --- even if they destroy the planet in the process.

The challenging action item: You want to help save the world? Think local. Think community.

Your reaction is mine: No way. Shopping at a farmer's market: nice, but unimportant. Better bus service: handy, but inconsequential. Solar panels and wind turbines: of anecdotal importance. At best, the "economics of neighborliness" will divert us as the temperature and water rise.

On the other hand, this is Bill McKibben talking. And only a fool doesn't pay attention to this guy. In 1989, he published "The End of Nature," the first book to call attention to global warming. He's written about population control and television and the challenge of remaining human as the world becomes digitized. (And he's not just a brainiac. In "Long Distance," the 37-year-old McKibben put himself through Olympic-intensity training to see how good a cross-country skier he could become.)

McKibben has the ability, rare among writers, of identifying a problem, reporting on it, thinking it through and proposing solutions --- all in 225 pages. Here the problem he sees is unchecked growth. The usual suspects say we're in no danger of draining the planet's resources. McKibben points out that we --- that's Americans --- suck resources out of all proportion to other countries.

McMansions: Until 1970, Americans lived in houses about the size of today's garages.

Food: 75% of the apples sold in New York come from the West Coast or overseas, even though New York produces ten times more apples than its residents consume.

Energy: Americans use twice as much as Europe.

McKibben's argument gains force when he gets down to examples. His idea of name-dropping is charming: "When I was last in Bangladesh...." Other stops on his travels: Brazil, China, India. And in each place, he discovers some brilliant innovation that saves energy and boosts the quality of life. (But that doesn't take America off the hook. If rich countries don't change, he says, the poor ones won't --- they take their dreams from us.)

The great sociologist Philip Slater points out, "The first cure for illusion is despair." These pages give you plenty to mope about; our earliest prophet of global warming unleashes some gloomy predictions here. One hundred eighty million dead Africans by century's end if we don't change our wasteful ways. Twenty per cent of the global economy sheared off. The rich in bunkers, the poor at the gates --- it's not a pretty picture.

But life wants to live. And so, like grass pushing through the cracks in cement, people --- nameless, uncelebrated people --- find a way to sane living and greater satisfaction. After he scares the hell out of you, Bill McKibben shows you where to look for those people and tells you why you'll be happy if you join them.

Prepare to be very, very excited.

This is a promising but ultimately disappointing book.

Among its strengths: it is very well-written. Compared to books with similar themes by Herman Daly (e.g., "For the Common Good", written with John Cobb), Michael Shuman ("Growing Local"), and Gar Alperovitz ("Making a Place for Community", with Imbroscio and Williamson), this McKibben book is written in an accessible, engaging style, with plenty of real-world stories of interesting individuals.

Another strength: This book is much fairer than the non-fiction essays by Wendell Berry on similar economic issues. McKibben at places does make a real attempt to acknowledge the arguments of economists about the benefits of economic growth and about the potential for economic adjustments to deal with some of the problems he identifies. This is particularly true in chapter 1, which critiques the mainstream view of economic growth.

A third strength: chapter 3 contains some powerful arguments for putting a greater value on local communities in considering economic policy issues.

However, ultimately I think McKibben shies away from really confronting the difficult issues he raises in a manner that would be convincing to a broad audience. As a result, I think the book is likely to be more of a comfort and support to readers who already agree with the views he expresses, rather than a powerful challenge to readers who disagree.

For example, one of McKibben's key arguments against economic growth is that economic growth will overuse energy, increase global warming, and damage various natural economic systems. The mainstream view of most environmental economists is that these problems of growth can be dealt with by various specific solutions such as imposing caps on carbon emissions, allowing energy prices to rise or even taxing energy resources, and rigorous environmental regulations to protect ecosystems. These measures may reduce per capita economic growth, but do not require that it be eliminated. McKibben acknowledges these arguments, but does not really confront them.

In fact, McKibben does not really acknowledge the existence of environmental economics as a field within economics. He writes as if the only economists who seriously consider environmental issues are ecological economists. This is a much smaller group of economists who happen to agree with McKibben that economic growth is inherently and inescapably destructive of the environment.

His discussion of "happiness research" is also disappointing. One of McKibben's arguments against per capita economic growth is that some research on subjective perceptions of happiness indicate that individuals do not seem to become significantly happier beyond about $10,000 per year in per capita income. However, is it true that the only goal of public policy is to make people happy? What about increasing the options of individuals? Happiness research also shows that most people quickly adjust to physical disabilities that may restrict their mobility or other activities, so that most people are just as happy a year or two after becoming disabled as they were before. (See, for example, the work of Daniel Gilbert, for example in "Stumbling on Happiness") Does this mean that society should not try to reduce the incidence of physical disabilities?

Finally, McKibben's discussion of solutions is interesting but sketchy. He is interested in promoting more local economies, and spends some time describing some specific programs and experiments in local food production, local energy production, etc. I am not really convinced that most of these options would take off and become prevalent even if we tripled the price of gasoline. I suspect that truly relying on local production would require too great an economic sacrifice in standard of living for most people, even if we "got the prices right" for various environmental goods and natural resources.

If I were promoting a discussion group on the issues raised by this book, I might use McKibben's book, but pair it with a book that gives the other side of these issues, such as Benjamin Friedman's "The Moral Consequences of Economic Growth".

I've been a fan of the author since I read his book on The Age of Missing Information, and I then lost touch with his work. I was reminded of him by Paul Hawken, whose book Blessed Unrest: How the Largest Movement in the World Came into Being and Why No One Saw It Coming I will review this afternoon.

DEEP ECONOMY is a very fine personal effort with a very straight-forward prescription for localizing food production, energy production, radio, and currency. The author is a gigantic intellect, and writes clearly.

The core point in the first part of the book is an emphasis on a need to restore humanity to the process, to reduce industrial era efficiencies in order to enable more intangible values such as community. The opening chapter is a great review of the literature the author is familiar, but I take off one star because the other books I list below are not mentioned, hence this great book is incomplete in that sense.

The author puts forward three areas where life as we know it is going downhill:

1) Our political systems continue to emphasize industrialization and consolidation that is not affordable by our current rates of depleting energy and water;

2) There is not enough energy for China, let alone Brazil, India, Indonesia, Iran, Russia, Venezuela, and Wild Cards like Turkey and South Africa, to follow in our steps.

3) All this "more" is not making us happier. Indeed the author documents, as others have, that the US was happiest in 1946, and it's been downhill from there. He pegs financially-stimulated happiness at $10,000, after which more money does not bring more happiness in relation to self, community, and eternity.

He educates in pointing out that 50% of the global economy is tied up in food systems; that 50 acres can support 10-12 families; that a gallon of gasoline releases five of its six pounds of weight as emissions.

He introduces Bob Constanza and the calculated value of the ecosystem we are destroyed at $33 trillion annually. I learned of the Earth Stakeholder Report and about Behavioral Economics from this author. To that I would add the World Index of Social and Environmental Responsibility (WISER) and the inspiring works of Paul Hawken with "true cost" metrics and Jon Ramer with local currencies, Interra.

The middle book focuses, as others have, on the loss of community, on hyper-individualization, and on how Wal-Mart can save someone roughly $58 a year, but cost them their entire local economy. He uses this to emphasize the urgency of restoring our sense of community so we can make decisions as a collective, for the common good.

Like Al Gore, but with less pomp, he rails against advertising as the engine for unnecessary consumption.

I was surprised by, and then in agreement with, his voiced need to restore local radio stations that actually focus on local needs and concerns and news. His critical comments on the conglomerate shows that feature Rush Limbaugh and morons talking about pornography are properly devastating.

Take home message: localization is the only way to achieve resilience--the federal government is not going to be effective in the short or long term as things now stand. We learn that the ideal community size for participatory democracy is no more than 500 voters, of whom 40% can be expected to show up for a town hall meeting.

We learn that Anthony Lovins has reported to the Department of Defense that if they spend $180B over the next ten years--$18B a year--that can cut US oil imports in half, and save $70B a year in addition. Now that is what I consider to be a key piece of public information.

He is generally negative on Tom Friedman, with which I agree, and Jeffrey Sachs, for whom I hold out more hope.

Below are the books that teach us beyond and before the scope of this book, which I am very happy to have read and added to my library.

Manufacture of Evil: Ethics, Evolution, and the Industrial System
Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge
The Future of Life
The Ecology of Commerce
Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution
Pandora's Poison: Chlorine, Health, and a New Environmental Strategy
Water: The Fate of Our Most Precious Resource
Resource Wars: The New Landscape of Global Conflict With a New Introduction by the Author
Betrayal of Trust: The Collapse of Global Public Health
Blessed Unrest: How the Largest Movement in the World Came into Being and Why No One Saw It Coming