Wednesday, January 24, 2018

On The Verge




We live in a complex civilization, writes George Monbiot. And we are on the verge of tearing it apart:

Certain western governments are engaged in a frenzy of self-destruction. In an age of phenomenal complexity and interlocking crises, the Trump administration has embarked on a mass de-skilling and simplification of the state. Donald Trump may have sacked his strategist, Steve Bannon, but Bannon’s professed intention, “the deconstruction of the administrative state”, remains the central – perhaps the only – policy.
Defunding departments, disbanding the teams and dismissing the experts they rely on, shutting down research programmes, maligning the civil servants who remain in post, the self-hating state is ripping down the very apparatus of government. At the same time, it is destroying public protections that defend us from disaster.

The madness has not only infected the United States:

In the UK, successive governments have also curtailed their ability to respond to crises. One of David Cameron’s first acts was to shut down the government’s early warning systems: the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution and the Sustainable Development Commission. He did not want to hear what they said. Sack the impartial advisers and replace them with toadies: this has preceded the fall of empires many times before. Now, as we detach ourselves from the European Union, we degrade our capacity to solve the problems that transcend our borders.
The rise of demagoguery (the pursuit of simplistic solutions to complex problems, accompanied by the dismantling of the protective state) is everywhere apparent. Environmental breakdown is accelerating worldwide. The annihilation of vertebrate populations, insectageddon, the erasure of rainforests, mangroves, soil and aquifers, and the degradation of entire Earth systems such as the atmosphere and oceans proceed at astonishing rates. These interlocking crises will affect everyone, but the poorer nations are hit first and worst.

And the drive behind it all is hiding in plain sight:

The forces that threaten to destroy our well being are also the same everywhere: primarily the lobbying power of big business and big money, which perceive the administrative state as an impediment to their immediate interests. Amplified by the persuasive power of campaign finance, covertly funded thinktanks, embedded journalists and tame academics, these forces threaten to overwhelm democracy. If you want to know how they work, read Jane Mayer’s book Dark Money.

We see disaster coming -- and we seem incapable of doing anything about it.

Image: YourNewsWire

21 comments:

Steve said...

The Bookends of total destruction are Reagan and Thatcher. Sadly no one links their revolution to today's calamity.

Someone has to tell the truth. Government is us, and we are very very fallible. Lets build strong institutions that mitigate that. Government is going to be filled with fat, but the mission can use lots of blubber to succeed over the long run.

Case in point. Di-spite offering no tax cuts or money Toronto remains in the race to land Amazon second HQ. Somalia should be the hottest investment location in the world, they have zero taxes and no winter.

What make me sad is the incredible public waste of the Liberal gov of Ontario. That said the Mike Harris goverment set new records for stupidity. My favorite missed opportunity was buying a electrified transit system worth 10 billion from Mexico for only 2 billion, oh yeah and spending half a billion to fill in the Ellington subway. Dont start me on the 407.

My message is compare waste, goverment is always going to have a layer of fat.

Owen Gray said...

There is waste in government, Steve. And it can be cut -- but not at the expense of the institutions themselves. Monbiot's point is that rather than cutting fat, today's masters are cutting safegaurds.

Steve said...

One other aspect of the world today that people who have never experienced History ignore is the failure of truth to change power.

Gulivers Travels changed the world. No book, no expose, no utube post has any effect on the masters of the universe today. They have Trump at a steady 40 percent average and to quote Maxwell Smart loving it.

Owen Gray said...

The stupid are immune to Truth, Steve.

Lorne said...

Monbiot is to be commended for his tireless crusade for the truth, Owen, but one has to ask the question: Is anyone really listening?

Owen Gray said...

That's what's really depressing, Lorne. Monbiot's message does not appear to be getting through.

The Mound of Sound said...


Their approach to knowledge-based decision making and institutional memory recalls a movement that swept Cambodia in the 70s ahd 80s. Granted neither the US or the UK are remotely in the league of the Khmer Rouge - no Killing Fields, no forced labour/re-education camps (at least not yet). What they do share is a distrust of knowledge and its moderating and restricting power. Trump, in particular, occupies an alternative reality, one very much of his own invention. His reality is simply incompatible with fact and knowledge. The way the State Department diplomatic corps has been gutted is a telling example. Career professional diplomats have left in droves and there is no one available who can restore their institutional memory - how things get done, who to call and not to call in another country's embassy when you need co-operation. Eventually those slots will be filled but the policies hammered out by the new kids will reflect the instincts and foibles of the new leader, not the accumulated experience and wisdom of centuries of leaders past. It's government under attack by insurgents - from within.

Owen Gray said...

Wisdom is not something that is easily come by, Mound. But it can be exiled in the blink of an eye.

The Mound of Sound said...


Monbiot's article promises readers that he'll be back next week with a prescription to fix what ails us. I mentally groaned at the prospect. He'll probably be on target or close to right - as far as he takes it but he has this habit of stopping. Monbiot never addresses what we must do if special interests or our less-than-representative political caste refuse to act as he advocates.

To be meaningful the solutions must address both the magnitude of the problem/challenge/threat and the time available to implement effective remedies. Time we do not have in surplus. Let's say a viable, truly safe and clean "fast" reactor was developed tomorrow and we decided that was a useful alternative energy option. The whole project from policy to planning, funding, designing, contracting, construction to implementation can easily consume 30 years. Where are we to find that 30 years?

Monbiot will also not address coercive tactics should his proposed solutions be blocked by special interests of their political minions. Do we just lay down and die and say we gave it our best? Do we say we have to step this up a bit, bring on pressure to change their minds? What sort of pressure? Civil disobedience is great for making statements and protests but it's pointless if it doesn't help achieve the desired outcome within the limited time available.

Bear in mind it's not just special interests and their political agents that have to be moved. It's also a poorly informed, easily distracted and generally lethargic public. Those are the frogs in the boiling pot. How do you capture their imagination and support? How can you achieve anything without it?

Do you imagine we would have had such success with curbing hydroflourocarbons attacking our ozone layer if we left it to the public not to buy those damaging aerosols? The Montreal Protocol would never have gotten off the ground without a strong consensus at government levels. Those products had to be banned or we would still be using them. Asbestos is another example.

Ultimately all of our problems/challenges/threats are rooted in our modes of organization - economic, industrial, political and social. We have to change most if not all of that to reconfigure civilization to withstand the 21st century. If we fail we'll simply go the way of all previous civilizations only ours is on a truly global scale.

Owen Gray said...

It's the classic conundrum, Mound. Everyone wants to get to heaven, but nobody wants to die. The costs of change -- in money, time and energy -- are monumental. The only chance of getting people to commit to those costs is if -- and when -- they understand the catastrophe that awaits. And that understanding is not there.

Steve said...

we could solve the green house gas problem tomorrow with smart neighborhoods using solar cells and batteries.

Scott in Montreal said...

I agree with Mound on the uncomfortable parallels with the Khmer Rouge ideology. I find the immediate concern, however, is the motivations for a teetering US military under Mattis and this cornered, feral beast that is President. Erdogan's Turkey, a NATO ally, with dozens of US nukes on its territory, is thumbing its nose at the US by invading the YPG in Afrin; while South Korea is apparently hedging its bets that snubbing the US and working with their northern neighbours (not to mention their TPP trading partners). The US is caught in the middle (literally/geographically), with their policy undefined until the POTUS sees something on FoxNews that he fancies.

Tomorrow's Atomic Clock announcement by the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists might get our collective attention. Or not.

Owen Gray said...

You really think it's that easy, Steve? You're looking at things from a narrow technocratic perspective. The problem is a problem because it's very difficult to get human beings motivated to do something.

Steve said...

Someone needs to do the math. I know I can buy 10Kilowatts of solar panels for about $6000 and fully kit up for around 30 thousand. If everyone did this, in Ontario at least Nukes and Hydro could handle industry.

Owen Gray said...

Interesting, Steve. But things are so much more complicated than that. That's Monbiot's point.

Trailblazer said...

Monbiot's article promises readers that he'll be back next week with a prescription to fix what ails us.

To repeat myself; again...
Years ago Monbiot suggested that we should ALL have an energy consumption quota.

Be you Bill Gates or Fred Smith you are no more human than anyone else and are allocated X amount of energy per year.

If you want more ; you buy it from someone who needs less!

It's possibly the new economy; unless you are the rich bastard that thinks he can have it all and fuck the rest of us.................

TB

Steve said...

Is this the kind of thing that complicates?
https://archpaper.com/2016/11/florida-anti-solar-energy-law/

Owen Gray said...

The problem is always the same, TB. We listen to our darker angels much more frequently than we listen to our better angels.

Owen Gray said...

Precisely, Steve.

Unknown said...

We are witnessing the destruction of the welfare state, being replaced by the market state. This has accelerated under Trump. The powers that be know how to manipulate his stupidity to support their elite interests. Neoliberal policy is on the fast track. How do you stop a speeding train? This process, starting mainly with Thatcher and Reagan has been ongoing for close to 40yrs. It's coming to its end of days in the West and with it the end of democracy.

The public in these Western countries, particularly in the U.S. have remained blind to their governments fleecing of their's and others wealth and their destruction domestically and globally of their democracy. I fear they will remain ignorant, right up to the point where they realize that they are no longer free and no longer have rights and are now governed by tyrants.

When a culture abandons the pursuit and acquisition of knowledge, abandons reason, their very survival then becomes dependent on the whims of autocrats.

Owen Gray said...

I concur wholeheartedly, Pam.