The essential question of the Anthropocene is whether the most powerful, affluent, technologically advanced and interconnected societies to have ever existed on Earth will deliver on their shared aspirations for a better future for people and the planet.
There is obvious concern about rapid changes in the climate caused by burning fossil fuels — an unprecedented threat to human societies — as well as growing frustration with the insufficiency of the global response. Yet in one critical way, societal challenges of the deep past reveal the way forward. When faced with environmental crises, like prolonged droughts, some societies have collapsed while others have adapted to, learned from and transformed themselves, going on to thrive for centuries or even millenniums. Though all such comparisons are fraught with complexities, the difference generally comes down to how their governing elites responded. In the case of extreme drought, elites of some societies, such as some ancient Egyptian and Chinese dynasties, responded by building large-scale irrigation systems, public granaries, and other institutions and infrastructures supporting the public good of their populations. Some scholars have even argued that the need to adapt to extreme challenges is what enabled these societies to thrive over the long term. Others, such as the Akkadians, were unable or unwilling to address the needs of populations threatened with drought and famine, and disintegrated and dispersed in the face of extended unrest and warfare. As I write in my guest essay, the lesson from deep history is clear: Societies that can deliver on their collective aspirations for the common good, especially in the face of unprecedented social or environmental challenges, tend to endure and to thrive, while societies that can't tend to experience conflict and collapse. Indeed, challenging conditions can even select for higher levels of social cohesion among groups, collective aspiration, and societal control in achieving those aspirations for a better future. The question that matters now, as Earth's climate races into unknown territory, is whether those who have benefited the most from the fossil-fueled Industrial Revolution that generated their prosperity — and the environmental crisis that now challenges us all — will deliver on their responsibilities to protect the common good of their societies.
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Saturday, December 9, 2023
Opinion Today: Will Earth’s wealthiest societies do their part?
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