Between Disaster and Prosperity

Societies and economies around the world are being transformed dramatically and irrevocably. The Great Transition from an agrarian to an urban-industrialized society lies behind the extraordinary improvements in our standards of living. It lies also behind the existential challenge facing humanity today. This Great Transition began in Europe and North America in the late 18th century, but even today only 40% of the world’s population has completed the transition or are very close to completion. The remaining 60% of the world are at the early stages of catching up and becoming urban-industrialized. This helps us understand the global challenges we face today and offers a reliable guide to how the next 100 years will unfold. From this perspective, there can be no doubt that the future looks bleak, and we need to better understand the Transition, so as to prepare for the future and perhaps mitigate the worst risk – the risk of civilizational collapse.

Societies and economies around the world are being transformed dramatically and irrevocably. The Great Transition from an agrarian to an urban-industrialized society lies behind the extraordinary improvements in our standards of living. It lies also behind the existential challenge facing humanity today. This Great Transition began in Europe and North America in the late 18th century, but even today only 40% of the world’s population has completed the transition or are very close to completion. The remaining 60% of the world are at the early stages of catching up and becoming urban-industrialized. This helps us understand the global challenges we face today and offers a reliable guide to how the next 100 years will unfold. From this perspective, there can be no doubt that the future looks bleak, and we need to better understand the Transition, so as to prepare for the future and perhaps mitigate the worst risk – the risk of civilizational collapse.

The multiple transitions that form the Great Transition

This Great Transformation is formed of multiple smaller transitions, the most important of which are the economic, demographic, dietary, and energy transitions. And for each of these transitions, we have provided some indicators which allow us to readily recognize where a country finds itself in the Great Transition today and what to expect when the entire human population completes the transition. Let’s go through the transitions and their indicators one last time.

Countries begin their transition as agrarian societies, whether or not they began their Great Transition 20 years ago or 250 years ago. The following indicators show the difference between agrarian and urban-industrial levels of development.

We have an economic transition from millennia-long stagnation to GDP growth. As an economy goes through the Transition, it moves from almost zero growth to 10-15% during the Transition to back below 2% or possibly lower once complete. GDP per capita increases from below $1000 GDP per capita to over $20,000. So, a country with a per capita GDP of $20,000 is likely to have completed the economic transition.

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There is a demographic transition. The death rate falls from 40 per 1000 people to 10 per 1000, and the number of children per woman (fertility rate) falls from 6-8 children to 1-2 children. Since the birth rate falls more slowly than the death rate, countries experience a demographic boom. This demographic boom saw the world’s population increase by 4.4 billion in the 20th century. The same boom is still ongoing, and this century will see our population again grow by more than 4.5 billion to reach 11 billion or so in 2100.

There is a dietary transition. In agrarian societies, people eat 300-400 kilograms of food per year per capita, including 200 kg of cereals, starches, and pulses. This rises to closer to 900 kilograms in urban industrialized societies with cereals less than 200 kg. These diets are more varied. They are no longer 90% carbohydrates but instead formed of 20% carbohydrate, 40% vegetables, and 40% animal products. This sees their calorie intake increase from 1.5 thousand kilocalories-per-capita-per-day to 3.5 thousand kilocalories. Varied, richer diets lead to healthier and more productive lives.

There is a transition from isolated small settlements to cities. This is measured by an urbanization indicator for the percentage of the population living in cities. The urbanized population increases from between 5 to 20% in an agrarian society to 75% or more in an urban-industrialized society.

We have an energy transition, without which no other transition would be possible. This crucial transition sees societies no longer depend simply on human and animal muscle and biomass. The transition brings access to new energy technologies. This can be measured by energy consumption per capita increases from as low as 500 kWh per capita per year to 30,000 kWh per capita or more.

There are of course many, many more transitions and indicators. All these transitions have environmental costs including the byproduct of greenhouse gas emissions. The urban-industrialized society produces around 10 tons of C02 equivalent per capita per year. We do, at least, hope that this course has provided the framework for you to identify the Great Transition at work in your own sector.

What the Great Transition tells us about the future

When we look at the world today, we see that not all countries have the same level of human development. What we can also see is that this is not because some countries are doomed to forever remain agrarian. Some countries simply start later than others and we can group countries based on where they are on each of the transitions. Europe, North America, and other early industrial countries form the 1st Wave. China is the largest 2nd Wave country, but it is in fact a latecomer to the 2nd Wave, formed of East Asian, Latin American, Middle Eastern, and North African countries. India is the largest 3rd Wave country and is joined by the remaining Asian countries. Meanwhile, Sub-Saharan Africa forms the 4th Wave.

Recognizing the still early stage in the Great Transition many countries are in, we can see that closing the gap between the 1st Wave and the other waves will result in enormous increases in global consumption this century. The urban population will increase by another 4 billion, double what it is today. We will need to double steel and cement production. Food consumption will also double, as will energy consumption. Other sectors will see even higher growth. We can expect the number of cars to increase by possibly as much as 5 or 6 times, from 1 billion today to 5 or 6 billion. These indicators show our progress; they show a society achieving a far higher standard of living for its citizens. It also shows the unbearable pressures we are placing on our planet.

This transition cannot be stopped or reversed. Nor should the fact that the 1st Wave had a 200-year head start on the 4th Wave make any of us believe the 1st or even 2nd Wave have any innate characteristics that mean only they can complete such a transition. All countries will complete the Transition, it is only a matter of time. The 2nd Wave is already 60 to 80 percent of the way to completion. We can expect them to complete the process by the middle of this century. Meanwhile, the 3rd Wave is well underway, about 30 or 40 percent complete. We can expect the 3rd Wave countries to complete their transition in the final decades of this century. And any visitor to the 4th Wave, to countries such as Nigeria or Tanzania, will see the Transition has begun there as well. Most 4th Wave countries’ transitions are between 10 and 30 percent complete. Their journey will only be complete by the beginning of the 22nd century.

We cannot deny that improved living standards for each and every individual is a victory and desirable. But at the global level, multiplied by billions, all these improvements only bring us closer to collapse. There are those who doubt that the 4th Wave, Sub-Saharan Africa can make the transition. There were similarly those who doubted China and other 2nd Wave countries; yet, over the past 60 years, they have made incredible progress and almost closed the gap. Few now doubt India and other 3rd Wave countries’ ability to do the same. There are multiple historical, social and political reasons why some countries begin later than others; they have been covered very well by others.

Both 1st countries now are experiencing natural population decline as the birth rates fall below replacement rates. This leaves these countries facing ever more questions about caring for older populations with ever fewer working-age people. What happens to their stock markets when people no longer believe that growth is possible? This is entirely uncharted territory.

The remainder of the century will be driven by the remaining 60% of humanity moving from an agrarian to an industrialised society. They are almost certain to do so following the blueprint laid out by the 1st and 2nd Waves. This should be cause for celebration. Every death is a tragedy and so it is clear decreasing child mortality rates is in itself a good thing. To those that have known real hunger, you cannot but support the desire for everyone to have access to a healthy, varied diet. So too for each of the improvements brought on by the Great Transition. Yet these megatrends also predict a looming catastrophe.

What can be done?

So what do we propose? First, we need to radically change our perspective. We must stop viewing the challenge of the 21st century from the perspective of Climate Change. We need to focus on the broader picture across the next 100 years. The megatrends that have driven the past 250 years are not yet complete and so we can reasonably expect them to continue, allowing us to make strong assertions about the next 100 years:

1. 6 billion from the 3rd Wave and 4th Wave countries, including 3 billion yet to be born, will go through the Great Transition and build the urban-industrialized societies. Even 2nd Wave countries have another 20-40% of their transition to complete. The world’s urban population will double. The transition will cause a tremendous increase in demand for the planet's limited resources, including natural resources such as agricultural land, soil, and freshwater. And we have already run out of one of these resources, such as agricultural land.
2. When we talk about the challenges facing humanity, we seem to only talk about the fight against climate change and decarbonising the economy. Climate Change is a negative byproduct of the Great Transition and sadly not the only one. Our planet is under pressure in far more ways than one. The 20th century is full of challenges from acid rain, desertification, soil erosion, holes in the ozone layer, nuclear disasters, mass extinctions, and more. Climate Change could well cause human civilization to collapse, but so too could several other symptoms. Biodiversity loss and 6th mass extinction, for example, is also seen by many experts as an equally serious risk to human civilization as Climate Change. But even this terrifying list of environmental disasters does not show the full extent of the challenges we can expect in the next 100 years.
3. In the same period, a new history of mankind will unfold. 1st Wave countries and then 2nd to 4th Wave countries will begin to enter a new period of degrowth, a decline in consumption of energy, resources, materials, and food.
4. During this period, primarily 1st Wave countries will actively seek opportunities for bringing their greenhouse gas emissions to zero and reducing concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. New technologies will be developed and new policies agreed. There will also be ever more effort made to ensure those new technologies’ rapid penetration into 3rd and 4th Wave countries. Yet despite this, the climate will continue to deteriorate and we will witness ever more disturbing impacts as a result. While leaders around the world may continue to claim we cannot permit an increase of global temperatures of more than 2 degrees, really we have already failed to meet that target. We must instead focus on ensuring there are not far greater increases in global average temperatures.
5. We need decades more to develop all the necessary technologies, make those technologies work at scale, and replace existing infrastructure. Some technologies do exist, but they cover only a fraction of the emission-emitting technologies and techniques. They fail to address issues such as cattle farming, crop burning, or fugitive emissions. Fewer technologies still are ready for scale. But while these technologies are being developed, the infrastructure is already being mostly built in the 3rd and 4th Waves, following the same blueprint as in the 1st and then 2nd Waves. We must therefore be prepared for a 3 or 4 – or quite possibly a 6-degree increase – in global average temperatures.
6. Many techno-optimists claim that people are very creative and that we have already solved serious problems before and we can solve these problems too. But, as explained, replacing all the infrastructure built and building the necessary new infrastructure in the 3rd and 4th Wave in time to prevent a 2-degree increase would be more than miraculous. Such changes in themselves will cause economic crises, lead to the collapse of many existing industries, large-scale unemployment, etc.
7. As the climate situation worsens, we can expect an increase in demand for more “severe but effective” solutions, including geo-engineering, directly cooling the planet, and direct air capture to remove carbon from the atmosphere. These approaches may help, but risk further destabilizing the situation on the planet.
8. During this period, there is an opportunity to radically change the situation with the world's forests by completely prohibiting deforestation of natural forests and securing large-scale aforestation. Such activities will take decades, so they are not a quick fix. However, as we explained in the course, we have no other option. Perhaps this is the most important, strategic part of the program in the struggle for climate stabilization.
9. We have entered a period of increased turbulence. For decades we will live in a period where everything needs to be replaced and many problems fixed. Disruption is a destructive as well as a creative process and we can expect disruption in all basic industries and technologies. Particularly in the 1st Wave countries, we should expect significant changes to people’s “way of life”, even a decrease in the standard of living. This will be the direct result of having to reduce consumption of everything from travel to electricity, clothing, furniture, meat, and milk. All these changes are not a catastrophe, but a movement towards a “more modest lifestyle, consumption”.
10. As discussions about human extinction increase, we would need to see the development of a new cross-disciplinary science focussed on identifying how to avoid destroying any of our planet’s systems essential to supporting life on Earth.

If the UN, politicians, and business focus their attention on the long-term, the next 100 years, all these processes and challenges will become visible. Climate will be one of the issues on the agenda, but not the most important one. All these processes can be collectively addressed in a new long-term 100-year roadmap, agreed at the UN or a new world body. Such a plan could become the basic document for the world for the next 100 years.

Both political and business leaders are coming under increasing pressure from activists across the planet. Yet without a long term perspective, it is hard to either identify or evaluate the resulting actions. Our understanding of the Great Transition and the 4 Waves allows us both to understand where growth in consumption will take place and why it is needed.

It also shows us that there are essentially three scenarios for 2100. Firstly, there is a “Prosperity for All” scenario, in which everyone is able to make the Great Transition and somehow, we find a way to not make the Earth uninhabitable in the process. This is what many techno-optimists strive towards. In this scenario, we can achieve a new technological transition and fix all environmental challenges at unprecedented speed. It would be nothing short of a miracle.

There is a less positive outcome: a “Rationing” scenario. In this scenario, we find we can reduce the very worst environmental disasters, but only by rationing the limited resources we have in an equitable way. This would certainly require 1st and 2nd Wave countries to reduce their absolute consumption. Such reductions would need to remain until the world population falls to well below today’s levels, that is in the 22nd century. If we look specifically at meat consumption; today humanity consumes 360 tonnes of meat and we can expect demand to double or even triple. If we limited meat consumption to 30kg per person per year that would be enough to allow everyone a varied diet without increasing today’s global production, but it would be four times less than consumption in the US. This would mean we would not need more cattle, pasture, crop feed, and fertilisers, or even to scale new technologies such as artificial meat. We are in urgent need of new policies. Whether or not this scenario occurs, we will hear evermore about degrowth. Not sustainable growth, but real and absolute reductions in food, energy, and resource consumption. We need to restrict our lifestyles to become more modest.

Then there is the “Collapse” scenario, where over the course of a hundred years or perhaps more quickly, society collapses much as human civilizations have collapsed in the past.

Final thought

Humanity faces an unprecedented challenge to its survival in the 21st century, the result of its own success. In our lifetimes, we will be faced ever more frequently with the negative impacts of the Great Transition. We cannot prevent that. What we can hope and work to prevent are those impacts becoming so great our civilization does indeed collapse. If we recognize the roots and scale of the challenge, then we can become informed activists. Now that you have studied the big picture, with the help of the 4Waves Framework, what do you think should be done? How can we together avoid disaster and achieve prosperity?