The Great Disruption: Book by Paul Gilding. A useful guide to constructive pessimism

The key message of The Great Disruption that although the world’s eco-systems (and hence economies) are going down the tubes rapidly, the crisis can be resolved if radical, concerted action is taken within the next few years, as Gilding believes it will be. 

Paul Gilding comes with impressive credentials: he has been executive director of Greenpeace Australia and International, and later worked as a consultant with large multinational businesses.  His book is generally well-argued and well-researched, but with a few blindspots: see more later.  Gilding says that, “Every major grouping of qualified scientists that has analysed the issue comes to the same conclusion” regarding climate change: that we are in a major crisis, which can only be resolved by dramatic cuts in human pollution. 

He draws a useful distinction between focussing on what is necessary  to resolve a problem, not what is politically possible; and he makes a strong case that what is really needed is to limit global temperature rise to 1^o C above pre-industrial levels. 

Gilding explains that he got much more attention from business audiences when he spoke about economic impacts, not environmental.  The global economy already puts more demands on the planet than it can sustain, and this is continually exacerbated by population growth: hence he believes the world has to face a fundamental crisis soon that continued economic growth is simply not sustainable.  We have to readjust to a steady state economy.

Gilding points to 2008 as an example of how this will happen in practise: in that year, economic growth led to resource shortages in food, energy and commodities, which produced big price rises, which then deflated the economy.  He expects this cycle to continue until fundamental systemic changes are made.

Whereas many experts, such as James Lovelock and Richard Heinberg, believe the global eco-system is broken beyond repair, Gilding disagrees, and his book includes modelling which he undertook with Professor Jorgen Randers to model how climate change could be pulled back to a one degree rise.  He believes this would require a war footing, with radical initiatives by the governments of major countries around the world, and he quotes World War II as a relevant precedent.  For example, his model includes rationing electricity, forced reductions in air travel, limiting use of gas-guzzling cars, and massive investments in renewable energy.  His model assumes that the ‘One Degree War’ starts in 2018, and that by then, climate changes impacts will become so severe that they force a tipping point in public opinion and government action.  I really hope he is right.

In a chapter titled ‘Are we finished?’, he says, “The attitude we adopt...hope versus despair – is perhaps the most profound issue we will face.  I think it will be more influential on our future than technology, politics or markets.”  He believes that a key to getting beyond denial of a problem is belief that a solution is possible.  Whilst his book helps somewhat, it leaves lots of questions unanswered, and I believe there is huge work urgently needed both to figure out in detail how solutions could work, and then to publicise this. 

Gilding sees two main phases in the big changes ahead.  The first will be government-directed, focussed on climate change.  The second phase is where the end of economic growth will be confronted.  Gilding quotes the book The Spirit Level and other surveys which show that average annual incomes above $15,000 per year do little to increase happiness, and that even the richest people are happier in societies with smaller income differentials. 

In the latter sections of his book, I find numerous blindspots and Utopian thinking: for example the belief that because of this research, governments worldwide will reduce differentials and both nationally and internationally, thus ending world poverty almost at a stroke.  Although the global economy may become steady state, differentials between countries will continue to change, and these tensions are not considered.  Gilding assumes that declining average incomes will be handled smoothly by everyone working part-time, which looks naively optimistic.

The Great Disruption, the One Degree War, and whatever follows it will have absolutely massive impacts socially and economically, which are hardly touched on in this book.  It would be good to see much more detailed consideration of the adverse impacts and how to mitigate them, and with the positive impacts, and how to encourage and accelerate these.  Gilding observes that the skills of personal and community resilience are now urgently needed, and this book gives at least brief glimpses of the impacts those skills will have to cope with.