State of the World 2010: The Rise and Fall of Consumer Cultures

In 2006, the 65 high-income countries where consumerism is most dominant accounted for 78 percent of consumption expenditures but just about 16 percent of world population. People in the United States alone spent 9.7 Trillion on consumption that year-- about $32,400 per person-- accounting for 32 percent of global expenditures with only 5 percent of global population. It is these countries that most urgently need to redirect their consumption patterns, as the planet cannot handle such high levels of consumption.
Indeed, if everyone lived like Americans, Earth could sustain only 1.4 billion people. At slightly lower consumption levels, though still high, the planet could support 2.1 billion people. But even at middle-income levels-- the equivalent of what people in Jordan and Thailand earn on average today-- Earth can sustain fewer people than are alive today. These numbers convey a reality that few want to confront in today's world of 6.8 billion, modern consumption patterns-- even at relatively basic levels-- are not sustainable.
A 2009 analysis of consumption patterns across socioeconomic classes in India made this particularly clear. Consumer goods are broadly accessible in India today. Even at annual income levels of about $2,500 per person in purchasing power parity (PPP), many households have access to basic lighting and a fan. As incomes reach about $5,000 per year PPP, access to television becomes standard and access to hot water heaters grows. By $8,000 a year PPP, most people have an array of consumer goods, from washing machines and DVD players to kitchen appliances and computers. As incomes rise further, air conditioning and air travel become common.
Not surprisingly, the richest 1 percent of Indians (10 million people), who earn more than $24,500 PPP a year, are now each responsible for more than 5 tons of CO2 emissions annual-- still just a fifth of American per capita emissions but twice the average level of 2.5 tons per person needed to keep temperature rises under 2 degrees Celsius. Even the 151 million Indians earning more than $6,500 per person PPP are living above the threshold of 2.5 tons per person, while the 156 million Indians earning $5,000 are nearing it, producing 2.2 tons per person.
As the Ecological Footprint Indicator and Idnian survey demonstrate, even at income levels that most observers would think of as subsistence-- about $5,000-6,000 PPP per person a year-- people are already consuming at unsustainable levels. And today, more than a third of the world's people live above this threshold.
The adoption of sustainable technologies should enable basic levels of consumption to remain ecologically viable. From Earth's perspective, however, the American or even the European way of life is simply not viable. A recent analysis found that in order to produce enough energy over the next 25 years to replace most of what is supplied by fossil fuels, the world would need to build 200 square meters of solar photovoltaic panels every second plus 100 square meters of solar thermal plus 24 3-megawatt wind turbines every hour nonstop for the next 25 years. All of this would take tremendous energy and materials-- ironically frontloading carbon emissions just when they most need to be reduced-- and expand humanity's total ecological impact significantly in the short term.
Add this to the fact that population is projected to grow by another 2.3 billion by 2050 and even with effective strategies to curb growth will probably still grow by at least another 1.1 billion before peaking. Thus is becomes clear that while shifting technologies and stabilizing population will be essential in creating sustainable societies, neither will succeed without considerable changes in consumption patterns, including reducing and even eliminating the use of certain goods, such as cars and airplanes, that have become important parts of life today for many. Habits that are firmly set-- from where people live to what they eat-- will all need to be altered and in many cases simplified or minimized. These, however, are not changes that people will want to make, as their current patterns are comfortable and feel "natural," in large part because of sustained and methodical efforts to make them feel just that way.
In considering how societies can be put on paths toward a sustainable future, it is important to recognize that human behaviors that are so central to modern cultural identities and economic systems are not choices that are fully in consumers' control. They are systematically reinforced by an increasingly dominant cultural paradigm: consumerism.

Paul Hawken: Blessed Unrest

       
    Nature recycles not only information, nature recycles everything; nothing is wasted, nothing is thrown away because there is no "away." All natural processes are cyclical, and every scrap of matter, atom, and molecule is reused and repurposed into new flows of life. Industrial society behaves like a spoiled child casting away its unwanted toys in every direction, the only creature that leaves a wake that cannot be recycled by nature or industry. The movement doesn't merely advocate recycling, it actively imagines a system of human production that is as elegant, frugal, and abundant as what we observe in nature. One of the first people to have discussed human production in biological terms was economist Kenneth Boulding, a native of Liverpool who became a brilliant acameician on two continents. In 1965 Boulding introduced the concept of "spaceship earth" in a lecture as a trope to help people understand that our prowess in development and subduing nature was changing our perception of a limitless earth into one that was a "tiny sphere, closed, limited, crowded, and hurtling through space to unkown destinations."
     In his book Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth, published four years after Boulding introduced the trope, Buckminster Fuller commented that spaceship earth had been so extraordinarily designed that human beings, who had been traveling on it for at least two million years, had yet to recognize they were on a spaceship. And indeed, how would one design a spaceship to support biological life for two million years, or four billion?

     This is a question I have sometimes posed to the corporate managers who could not see the practicality or necessity of transforming their business practices into ecological ones. One event at a large company that specialized in agricultural chemicals was particularly instructive, because it was pre cipitated by a vice president's sharp retort to a colleague's statement that there needed to be equitable distribution of resources as a prerequisite for moving toward a more sustainable world. His exact reply: "That is communism, socialism-- it has nothing to do with ecology or the environment." Sixty of the company's chemical engineers were then divided into four teams, each with the same taask: in two hours, design a spaceship that could leave earth and return in one hundred years with its crew alive, healthy, and happy. A biome was called for-- an ecosystem that would provide food, clean water, medicinal plants, and fiber for a century. Each team also had to design the entire culture of this society-- who would be on the ship, what they would do, the lines of authority, and all the messy details of creating and maintaining a society. The spaceship could be as big as necessary, and it could recieve light from outside. But it had no escape hatches, and what happened on the spaceship stayed on the spaceship for a century.

       All four proposals were sophisticated, but one stood out as the preferred ship for the long voyage out and back. The winning designers set up some unsual features. Instead of bringing caches of DVDs and display screens for onboard entertainment, they decided that a significant proportion of the passengers should be artists, musicians, actors, and storytellers. To endure for one century, the passengers needed to create a culture rather than simply consume one. They brought onboard a large variety of weeds, not just "useful" seeds, to enliven the soils and bring minerals to the surface. They brought mycorrhizae and other fungi, bacteria, insects, and small animals-- everything their company poisoned on the earth for profit. (The company's number one product was pesticide.) Of the several thousand products this company made, none were invited along on the trip. The designers realized they were too toxic to be released in a small environment, that being a spaceship five miles in diameter. Essentially, the winning team created a diverse ecosystem within which a socially just and equitable society practiced organic agriculture and designed all objects for disassembly, reuse, recycling. When the participants were asked it if was fair that 20 percent of the passengers received 80 percent of the fruits, vegetables, and medicines produced onboard, all of them, including the vice president who had been disgusted with the idea of equity, shouted the idea down and agreed that it would be unacceptable. Then the VP realized what he had said. After the exercise, a group of employees began an organic garden at the headquarters, and several engineers quit their jobs.

        The power of the spaceship model is not only metaphorical but also pedagogical. It reaches systems thinking, a holistic approach to the interaction and interdependence of constituent parts and how they function together over time. How we came to believe that the earth could support disposables, heavy-metal contamination, Superfund sites, and nucleaer testing is a question I leave to cultural historians. Despite centuries-long practices of despoliation and pollution, almost every resposonsible corporation in the world is moving away from destructive practices and trying to institute more sustainable ones, and all of them have turned to NGOs to assist, teach, inspire, and urgen them on. The stereotype of civil society is groups resisting corporations, and that is true as outlined in previous chapters. What is also true, however, is that nonprofit groups have formed productive relationships with corporations to help them develop in more benign ways. Wal-Mart, which has been in the crosshairs of nonprofits for just about every possible issue for more than a decade, has made a commitment to sustainable practices in every aspect of its business. These include tripling the efficiency from 6 to 18 mpg in what is the biggest truck fleet in the world, converting to 100 percent renewable energy, and going to a zero-waste system in which nothing is thrown away. To achieve these goals, Wal-Mart actively consults doezens of NGOs on topics tht include seafood, organic food and farming, textiles climate change, China, electronics and waste, jewelry, chemicals, green chemistry, logistics, forest products and certification, green buildings, trasportation, packaging, and renewable energy. (It is important to note than an equally large group of NGOs continues to oppose Wal-Mart's siting, labor, and business practices).

DIY Recumbent

DIY Front Wheel Drive (No Weld) Recumbent Bicycle

DIY FWD 'Bent

Pine molded with a $10 filing kit, finished with linseed oil to prevent weathering

Plumber's Tape wrapped around a reversed saddle makes for a surprisingly sturdy backing

Dual-Suspension MTB (front and rear shocks) from Craigslist = $7.50
Donor: Dyno GT BMX Bike = Free, Family Relic
Misc. Hardware & 6'x9" Pine Board= ~$17
New Chain= $15
Brake Pads=$15 (could easily be reduced to $5/free if you took the time to search for a deal)
Total = $55

Tools:
Power Drill/Bit Set
4 in 1 Metal File
Adjustable Wrench
Hacksaw
& Various Bike Repair Tools as Needed:
Hook Spanner
Cotterless Crank Puller
Steel Wool
Allen Key Set
Light Lubricant
etc.


Essentially I just took a hacksaw to the rear triangle pf the bmx and made it fit in the front fork of the MTB, then used wire rated at 350lbs to attach the BMX seat post to the MTB stem, wrapping multiple times to take pressure off the ferrule stop I used to secure the wire. The seat was cut from a cheap Pine board filed to fit the MTB top tube, and coated with linseed oil for a finish. Honestly, it's a simple as it looks. I'm looking into adding high density foam to the seat and a waterproof/cordura cover, well as an underseat rack & rear rack for panniers.

Lessons Learned: For a donor bike, you want not only dual-suspension & the angled top tube that comes with it, but also a threadless stem as opposed to a quill. Quill stems just aren't strong enough take the force required to balance the FWD. A front fork disc brake, obviously, will not work with this set up. Lastly, certain MTB donor bikes have multiple adjustment points to which you can screw in the rear suspension- these are excellent spots to secure the seat.