Time To Act: Continued Constant Economic Growth Will Lead To Collapse

Time To Act: Continued Constant Economic Growth Will Lead To Collapse

The earth is full. It’s full of us, full of our stuff, full of our waste, full of our demands; yes, we are a brilliant and creative species, but we’ve created a little too much stuff—so much that our economy is now bigger than it’s host, our planet…” – Paul Gilding, independent writer and adviser on sustainability. The above and following quotes are from Gilding’s TED talk on sustainability. A Familiar Message With Little Regard Given To It It is nothing new that advocates and scientists are warning that consumption is out of control on our planet. However, little is done to educate us, the various populaces of the planet, that our current levels of consumption are detrimental to the future survival of our species, other species, and the planet as a whole. As Gilding says, We’re burning through our capital, or, stealing from the future… what this means is our economy is unsustainable … when things aren’t sustainable they stop.” In Love With A Crazy Idea When we think about economic growth stopping we go, ‘that’s not possible,’ because economic growth is so essential to our society that it is really questioned… it is based on a crazy idea, the crazy idea being that we can have infinite growth on a finite planet… I’m here to tell you the Emperor has no clothes, that the crazy idea is just that: It is crazy.” Gilding states a counter argument: But we need growth. We need it to solve poverty. We need it to develop technology. We need it to keep social stability.” His reply: I find this argument fascinating, as...
Can Africa Continue Booming In A ‘Global Crisis Economy’?

Can Africa Continue Booming In A ‘Global Crisis Economy’?

Africa As Other ‘Emerging Markets’ Is Still In An Upward Swing, Especially Compared To The Stagnating Western Economies An article, “Africa’s Big Boom” on the pages of Project Syndicate discusses the recent positive developments on the “forgotten continent.” Africa is undergoing a period of unprecedented economic growth. According to The Economist, six of the ten fastest-growing countries in 2011 were in Africa. Average external debt on the continent has fallen from 63% of GDP in 2000 to 22.2% this year, while average inflation now stands at 8%, down from 15% in 2000. This positive trend is likely to persist, given that it is based on structural geographic and demographic factors, such as rising exports, improved trade conditions, and steadily increasing domestic consumption.” Is Local Development, Continuing Growth & Progress Possible In An Otherwise Struggling Global System? One of the biggest problems and reasons  that no solution has been found for the global economic crisis is that isolated outlooks on all kinds of situations, including the economy of single nations or continents, still prevail. In other words, outlooks that do not take the full, global picture into account. Thus, there is a lot of talk about “emerging markets,” China and India, and now also Africa, regions and continents that were either suppressed, or were dormant up until recently and that have now started to catch up to the more developed part of the world. This, however, does not mean that the system being used, which copies the Western model, is a fruitful one. It simply means that they now have a lot of growth potential in relation to where they were...