Those Were the Days
One of my favorite geographers, David Lowenthal, has written two great books that touch on the power of nostalgia: The Past is a foreign Country, and Possessed by the Past.
In environmentalism, the notion of an idealized past has long manifested itself in various ways. For example an early strain of contemporary environmentalism–known as the Back to the Land movement in the early 1970s–was propelled, in part, by a healthy dose of nature romanticism.
Ecology, too, has similarly been in thrall to a false ideal, argues Greg Breining:
Even modern ecologists and conservation biologists, though they would deny it, have internalized a sense of Eden. They don’t call it that, of course. Their Eden is a vision of the New World as it existed before the arrival of European settlers. So they restore prairie and rip out exotic species in an effort to restore nature to a pre-Columbian ideal. Modern restoration ecology becomes an effort, as Joni Mitchell sang of Woodstock, “to get ourselves back to the garden.”
So it makes sense that some British greens worried sick today over global warming would hark back to the halcyon days of…1972. No, I’m not talking about the life of Austin Powers, just the average bloke, according to George Marshall:
The early 1970s marked the first time in Britain when people’s basic needs were largely met. Yes, there were still pockets of absolute poverty, but by and large, people were housed, fed, clothed, and in work. They had weekends off, annual holidays and spare cash for entertainment and leisure. It was not a time of great plenty ““ but of ample sufficiency.
What does that mean? Thursday was meat day? School kids had ring dings with their pp & J (okay that was my typical American lunch)? The little urchins had enough quarters for pinball (yeah, me again). Cause I gotta tell ya, I’m not pining for my mother’s Oldsmobile Cutlass, though I’m sure all the leaded gasoline fumes I inhaled from the every other day trip to the gas station to fill up the tank did wonders for my growing brain.
Well, whatever your lovely life was like (if you were around then), Marshall’s point is this:
For every sector, the figures tell the same story ““ had we chosen to keep that standard of living and applied our ingenuity to making it better, fairer and more efficient, we would not now be facing catastrophic climate change.
Wait, I thought that 2010 was infinitely better, fairer, and more efficient than the early 1970s? (Then again, it seems like a week didn’t go by in the 1980s when I didn’t hear my my grandfather lament, “They don’t make things the way they used to.”)
But don’t take my word for it. Read this poignant reminisce from Shaun about those good old days. It was her post that triggered my own trip down memory lane.
What’s your fond remembrances of that quaint, contented era?
Ohh yes, the contented 1970’s.
We had race riots.
One only needed to wipe ones nose with a white handkerchief to determine the air was filthy.
Smokestack industry was booming and one could actually see the black smoke of progress and prosperity.
The easiest way to tune a carburetor was to turn it rich until black smoke poured out the tailpipe and then 1/4 turn lean to ‘just right’.
Rivers so polluted they could be set on fire.
The there was that first father-son project in November 1962. Building a ‘fort’ out of concrete block in our basement and moving all of our canned food into the fort and filling every container we could find with water.
Ohh yes, the past was so much better, if you didn’t gag on the air, the water would surely poison you, and if you managed to survive that there was always the possibility that some glorious leader would decide that playing thermonuclear war would be a fun thing to do today.
Of course our parents saw it as a vast improvement over the 1930’s depression and the ravages of WWII.
My two earliest memories (from the 1960s, not 1970s) are (1) of getting chilblains from rising at dawn every day to sit on the floor with my siblings and have a good natter with our feet held to an electric fan-heater and (2) of a nightmare or hallucination that visited me when I had pneumonia – Father Christmas trudging towards me across the wallpaper carrying a large and very sharp axe. The hyggelig morning huddle was fun but I can’t recommend the pneumonia.
Very important post, Keith.
It highlights the schizophrenia in the green movement.
The type A greenie yearns to travel backwards in time to a fantasy middle-earth life of cheerful toil on the organic farm. 15th century Amish.
Type B greenies want a hi-tech future of wind-powered websites – about …. windpower. Geo-engineered sun shades in the sky and other technology has given the UN a “Global Thermostat” to control the weather to within 0.1C.
Both these visions are insane and the real problem is that most greenies believe in both at the same time.
Yeah, back in the old days we didn’t have MTV. We had to take hallucinogens and go to concerts. Polyester! Bell Bottoms! The indignity of it all…
I remembered it snowed in the Bay Area once back then. Freaked everybody out…
LoL…..the “good ol days” !!
I was in High School for the mid – late 60’s.
As cars were the “thing” for boys, taking apart and rebuilding car engines was normal fare.
I helped out at a small auto shop for the rights to use the shops heavy equipment for my own use.
I was amazed when one car came in for a ring job and it had over 60, 000 miles on the engine. First one I had seen with that many miles on it before requiring an engine rebuild.
I am driving my third Ford Explorer. The first 2 I traded in with over 300,000 miles each without engine work. I am at about 300,000 mile on the current one and still without engine work.
the “good ol days”….you can keep them. I like today much better.
Wait, I thought that 2010 was infinitely better, fairer, and more efficient than the early 1970s? (Then again, it seems like a week didn’t go by in the 1980s when I didn’t hear my my grandfather lament, “They don’t make things the way they used to.”)
This touches on my guest blog on Michael Tobis’ blog. First of all, it isn’t just about AGW, but about many more global problems.
Second: Keith, 2010 is much bigger, better, faster than the 70’s. But in western society mainly (we exported all the pollution – and the jobs – to Africa and China). And all of it seems to be built on quicksand. If that is Marshall’s point, then it’s a good one.
Unless you don’t really think there are any serious (global) environmental and socio-economic problems. But you haven’t answered that question yet, have you?
Is Marshall harking back to the times when everything was better, or is he pointing out where everything went wrong?
I had a quick skim through Marshall’s piece. Its major flaw in my opinion is that he doesn’t stress the importance of the flawed economic concept of infinite growth. This is what went wrong in the 70’s, when this concept switched from being a means to an end to being an end in itself. And this is what is causing most if not all global problems today. And they cannot be comprehensively solved if the economic concept that growth can and should be infinite is not replaced by something more rational and sane.
@Neven
<i> 2010 is much bigger, better, faster than the 70’s. But in western society mainly (we exported all the pollution ““ and the jobs ““ to Africa and China). </i>
Right. And what was the effect of all that nasty stuff we’ve exported? Maybe you’d like to ask those who got the jobs that weren’t there in the 70s? Do you really think they’d rather not have those jobs – pollution or not?
Fact is, the poor of the world are less poor than they were in the 70’s. Including those in the Western countries.
There will ALWAYS be <i>environmental and socio-economic problems</i> whether global or local. There will ALWAYS be the poor. There will ALWAYS be the lazy. There will ALWAYS be those who don’t care. And there will ALWAYS be those who bemoan what they see as social injustice.
But the bottom line is that even the poorest of nations/people are better off today than they were 40 years ago. And they’ll be better off in 40 years than they are today. IF the catastrophists/environmentalists/pliticians/whoever don’t manage to cut them off from further development.
Neven,
Perhaps you haven’t been reading my blog consistently enough. This post captures my thinking on the complex and worrisome set of environmental problems facing the world today. And I also mention what I consider one of the best ways to address them.
On that note, let me refer you directly to a more recent article on the Resilience concept by Carl Folke, the science director of the Stockholm Resilience Centre at Stockholm University. Here’s a passage that may interest you:
This global resilience perspective stands in stark contrast to development paradigms and global policies that treat environmental issues as external to society, that offer only minor adjustments of current behaviors, and that tend to concentrate on technical quick fixes to get rid of the problems. It also runs counter to the philosophies of many traditional conservationists; they tend to see the world as environmentally stable, and seek to “save the environment” by limiting or excluding human activity. Both perspectives treat human and nature as two separate entities.
Perhaps you haven’t been reading my blog consistently enough.
I haven’t. Thanks for the link.
Neven: ‘Its major flaw in my opinion is that he doesn’t stress the importance of the flawed economic concept of infinite growth.’
Really? Weren’t you more disturbed by Marshall’s claim that by adding insulation to 1972 and modernizing its point sources of hyggelig heat, we could have cut domestic heating emissions by 80%? He plucked that percentage out of the thin, damp air.
Keith, again, for taking the time to reply and provide extra information. I think I have a pretty good picture of where you stand now.
Like I just wrote on Only In It For the Gold you seem to agree with me that there are currently some very big global problems, like climate change and land use (agriculture and urbanisation), that could pose serious threats to our societies.
But despite your providing of extra information through links etc you still haven’t replied to my proposition concerning the role that the economic concept of infinite growth is playing in all this.
In the previous article that you linked to you wrote this:
It also makes me think that a reframing of the climate change debate”“centered on “jumpstarting a clean energy revolution,“ rather than combating future environmental harms”“is the way to go.
If I’m correct this is what you ‘consider one of the best ways to address them.’ I understand how tempting it is to think of it this way – I have been thinking the same for a very long time now – but from my perspective this can only be a real solution if the economic concept of infinite growth is replaced by something more sane and rational. I’m all for clean energy, but without a new economic concept all the clean energy in the world will amount to no more than the ultimate example of Jevons Paradox.
This is obvious when you realize for instance that a clean energy revolution won’t solve the global land use issues. Because it simply can’t. Nothing can solve that if the economic concept of infinite growth isn’t replaced by something more sane and rational. It’s a sine qua non. I truly believe we cannot get around this fact (Joe Romm BTW seems to think we can, another big-time clean energy proponent, but I’ll be engaging him on that some more in 2011).
And again, I thus think that the best tactic for AGW-alarmists, environmentalists in general, and everyone who tries to get attention for his or her isolated problème mondial du jour, is to stress the connection of all these global problems to the economic concept of infinite growth.
Maybe we can discuss that some more in 2011 as well, because you haven’t gone into this other question of mine much either, except for jumping to the details – ‘who will be the new spokesman?’. This isn’t a reproach, BTW , but I’m asking you because recently you were challenging alarmists with thinking up a new tactic as everything up to now has failed or backfired (with the football game half-time analogy). Well, here you have one.
I’ll look into your link to the Resilience Alliance tomorrow (I knew about it but never really looked into it) and comment.
Neven,
Can you identify “infinite growth” in practice, perhaps in your community? Is it excessive consumerism? Is it sprawl run amok? Who is guilty of “infinite growth”? Is it an individual level or societal?
I ask because I don’t think you’re going to make any headway with an argument that suggests economic growth be curtailed to save the environment. That’s why there’s a movement called “Smart Growth,” as opposed to, say, Less Growth.
See what I mean?
The more insidious hankering for fictitious ‘old days’, of course, comes not from the green left, but from the nativist, American-exceptionalist right…whose political avatars are ascendant now.
But writing about them would be off-topic for a climate blog, I suppose…and not nearly as much fun as tweaking the noses of those goofy, swoony environmentalists.
And btw, the one clear advantage of 1972 vs now is that the playlists of ‘rock’ FM radio stations were fantastically more diverse….at least in the NYC area. Now, it’s a wasteland.
I was going to mention some of the great classics that made the 100 billboard for that year, but you know, that would have been off-topic. 🙂
BTW, Felix Hernandez has the best playlist by a million miles (if you like classical soul, funk, and R & B), and runs popular dance parties in NYC area.
By the end of the 70s, I was only 4, so I can’t really say anything about them. But it seems that greedy ‘materialism’ was really what the 80s were about, in a popular way, and then by the late 90s, there was a kind of movement against that- atleast from where I was lookıng out from. I’m not sure what the 00s represent, but maybe it’s more about ‘smart’ materialism, or smart growth- as Keith has pointed out above.
Refrigeration for eg, is much more efficient these days. We’re also about to embrace OLED displays, which are even more efficient than LCD screens. Cars seem less and less important in areas with good public transport (urban areas). People are more interested in the quality and nutritional value of their food (although there is obviously a counter trend there towards more and more processed and sugary foods in some segments of the population). Families are shrinking… etc…
The only place I don’t see improvement/innovation is in the musical realm. But we have a whole century to work on that…
@15 Steven, we may diverge in other areas, but in this we agree. The situation is the same in Oz. The only rock stations worth listening to are the ones that only play “Classics”.
I do wonder how many of todays artists will be remembered 30 years from now. I would bet “not many”. 🙂
I’m not clear what exactly Neven means by our misguided socio-economic model based on “infinite growth,” either. It seems like a re-branding of what we referred to as Wall Street greed as the cause of the current recession. If this diagnosis of society’s woes is accurate, what is the most effective treatment? Is it chronic or terminal? Striving for a stagnant society just doesn’t seem wiser than striving for improvement.
Keith, first of all, all the best for the coming year (hope that cough clears once and for all). I haven’t responded to your last comment so far, because one of my New Year resolutions is not to post on blogs such as yours when I’m not feeling positive. But I feel okay today so I figured I’d write one last reply, and maybe we can pick up the discussion some more this year as we both learn new things?
Can you identify “infinite growth” in practice, perhaps in your community? Is it excessive consumerism? Is it sprawl run amok?
The consumerism is pretty obvious, sprawl less so (but then again, I live in Europe). Some consequences of the economic concept of infinite growth – which I also discuss in my piece on MT’s blog – that I can see in everyday life, have to do with health. Go and visit a playground, any playground, and count how many overweight kids you see. That’s just an example.
Who is guilty of “infinite growth”? Is it an individual level or societal?
Both, but mostly at the societal level. When economists, business leaders and politicians decided the pursuit of growth which is infinite, was the way to go (and mind you, it was a conscious decision), what followed was a slow infiltration of this concept in culture to the point that it has become invisible. Nowadays most people identify themselves through what they consume, they live to consume. But even more poignant is the fact that we relate to ourselves (and this in a way is culture, the context in which relationships and communication are embedded) through what we consume. The commercialization of traditional feasts and holidays comes to mind.
The most guilty of course are the economists and the universities who keep teaching new students that at the core of everything revolves around growth and that this growth can go on forever. That’s very nice in theory, because it makes everything so much simpler, which in turn gives economists more power. But in practice it simply doesn’t work that way, as we increasingly can and will become aware.
I ask because I don’t think you’re going to make any headway with an argument that suggests economic growth be curtailed to save the environment.
It’s slightly disappointing for me to see that my point still isn’t clear enough. My argument is not saying that economic growth be curtailed to save the environment. First, for me it’s not about the environment, but about societal stability and the future of man (and yes, for that we need functioning ecosystems). I’m not even saying that growth needs to be curtailed. I’m saying that our concept of growth needs to be revised, because growth cannot be infinite, and if you nevertheless make it the engine of your economy this will inevitably have consequences for society and the environment as you start bumping into limits. The engine cannot deal with limits, it’s that primitive and inflexible.
Again, I’m not saying growth needs to be curtailed. I’m saying that we have to start looking differently at growth and how we measure it in different ways. From the current economic perspective this would mean that growth gets curtailed, but the whole point is that this isn’t a bad thing. The perspective needs to change.
As long as you don’t do that there is no chance you will conclusively solve or control any of the global problems we currently face. So, as much as I like initiatives like Resilience Alliance and Smart Growth, their power for change is severely constrained by the need for perpetual, exponential growth. In my view it is of paramount importance that organisations such as these stress the fact that they can only be truly effective if the current dominant economic concept of infinite growth is replaced by something more rational and realistic.
In fact, I have decided to take it up with someone from Resilience Alliance to see what their answer will be. I’ll let you know if and when they do.
On a final note. In a first reaction on my piece about all of this Bart Verheggen wrote: “Kudos for discussing such an important taboo-subject!” And a taboo it is indeed. People feel awkward when you question the mantra of infinite growth, and I think that’s because we have been conditioned (4th-5th generation in a row now) to accept the idea that economic growth must and can be infinite as gospel truth. It is a taboo to say that it mustn’t and can’t be infinite. I notice this conditioned response in you too, Keith. It’d be cool if you could see it as well and investigate why this is so. Why is it such a taboo? Why do most people have such a knee-jerk reaction to it?