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Collapse: How Societies Choose To Fail Or Succeed (2005)

Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed (2005)

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Rating
3.9 of 5 Votes: 1
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ISBN
0143036556 (ISBN13: 9780143036555)
Language
English
Publisher
penguin books ltd. (london)

About book Collapse: How Societies Choose To Fail Or Succeed (2005)

Although I only gave this book three stars, I can recommend it a little bit over that. I found it interesting, but not quite as compelling as I might have if I wasn’t already familiar with some parts of the story. I took graduate classes in International Relations, specializing in China as well as international political economy, so I didn’t find any surprises in the abstract background to Collapse.Some very intriguing parts were the stories of collapse of vanished societies, as many have noted in other reviews. But also quite enjoyable were the explanations for why others did not collapse, especially the near-miss of the Tokugawa Shogunate as prosperity almost led them to devastate their forests — it is almost an accident of history that the Japanese home islands aren’t as barren as Easter Island.The chapter on modern Australia was also quite eye-opening. After reading this litany of miseries, all I can say to my Australian friends is “Good luck, mate. You’re gonna need it.” I think everyone living on the edge of the Pacific Ocean needs to spend more time studying the ENSO — El Niño Southern Oscillation. It will certainly have a major impact on California, too.Perhaps my favorite portion of the book were Chapters 14 and 15, in which Diamond explores societal responses to these threats.Chapter 14 is titled “Why Do Some Societies Make Disastrous Decisions?” and begins with a tidy discussion of decision theory and cognitive biases. I suspect a professional Decision Theorist might scoff at the oversimplification and lacunae of his explanation, but Diamond can place it in a riveting real-world context that cements how a careful analysis can help us understand such twisted and paradoxical situations. (In this I am reminded of the fascinating classic Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis.)This chapter allowed him to answer a question he was asked by a student: “When that person cut down the last palm tree on Easter Island, what on earth could they have been thinking?” turns out to have a rather obvious answer: by the time that last palm was cut down, centuries of deforestation had already taken place, and the crucial cultural importance of those trees would have long since disappeared.Chapter 15, “Big Business and the Environment,” is also quite absorbing. Diamond contrasts the very different environmental impact of two oil fields, and continues with the particular problems of hardrock mining, coal mining, logging and fisheries. His inquiry into why some corporations and industries are are more amenable to social pressure casts a minor hopeful note into the symphony of despair.There are a few complaints that need to be aired.First, Diamond could really use a forceful editor with an eye towards clarity. The professor is very prolix, with a pedantic tendency to repeat himself. For example, every time Diamond referred to palynology, he felt compelled to explain it again. In such a large book which undoubtedly took many years to compose, this is understandable — but not in the final draft. That’s why editors are supposed to employed. Perhaps asking him to be succinct is asking too much, but it would be nice to nudge him in that direction.Second, while his “Further Reading” appendix is welcome, it doesn’t excuse the lack of a bibliography, especially since index doesn’t seem to cover that appendix.Finally, the book starts out on a weak note in Montana. His affection for the Bitterroot Valley is understandable, but its problems are nowhere near as engrossing and dramatic as those that follow, and the relevance of a struggling rural community tucked deep inside the world’s wealthiest nation makes it hard to understand its relevance. It would have been best left to personalize and clarify a concluding chapter, perhaps, although the chapter on Australia did a more than adequate job of showing how pressing the threats of collapse can be in a modern first-world society.In the end, while this book was adequately absorbing, it didn’t bring me much closer to my quest. No book I’ve yet found has adequately discussed the question “How likely is it that the entire global civilization will collapse in the coming century, leading to centuries of a new ‘dark age’ of reduced life expectancy, welfare and technology?”­

The halfway point review:One question I've been wrestling with as I read, as I watch these societies move slightly past sustainability, as I read about societal collapse and the squandering of resources by the wealthy and then the inevitable cannibalism that always seems to show up in the last act, I keep asking myself how the environment became a "political issue." There's no question that environmental resources aren't infinite, yet it seems like the majority of people…or at least the loudest faction…care less about human life on earth than their own comfort and status. Or else, how can they justify placing jobs, business interests, or anything else ahead of the environment in their values?Is it because environmental damage is such a gradual process? If so, we need to come up with some way to drive home the importance of creating a sustainable way of living. Politicians hedging around environmental issues--while placing these issues on the same level of importance as gays in the military--is clearly not getting us anywhere. Literature on the dangers of global warming and about the human effects on the environment isn't going to get the point across to those who willfully avoid learning about the topic. Does the environmental movement need more advertisements? More celebrity endorsements? I hate asking rhetorical questions, even if my goal is to generate conversation, so my hypothesis, without any evidence to support it, is YES: we need a much fucking better PR department, and we need it quickly. If we are going to keep the global society from reaching the point of some real collapse, we need to change the rhetoric with which we talk about the "environment." The environment is an abstract "out there" that doesn't necessarily include human babies or grandchildren. The way we abstractly think of "the environment" makes this separation of humans from their environment easier. We need rhetoric that makes it clear that when we speak of "the environment," what we are really concerned with is the continued ability for humanity to survive on this planet. What we're talking about isn't separate from people, physically or ethically. I'll end my halfway point review by bringing up the personal guilt that reading these pages has reawakened in me. Reading about the way the Easter Islanders squandered resources building the tremendous statues and headpieces for the glorification of rich people has reminded me of my own complicity. I've always thought of myself as an environmentalist: I take the light-rail whenever possible, recycle, eat with an awareness of where my food comes from. But, even as someone passionate about the environment, I've spent several years working at a bank. I've spent my time too focused on my own education to dedicate much time to preservation…which is what I'm complaining about others doing. What have I truly done to rebel against a society that places greed and opulence above sustainability? I've found ways to reduce the damage that I inflict, but I have done nothing to challenge my society's destructive way of being. So, what right do I have to climb up on my soap-box?

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I considered giving this book 4 instead of 5 stars simply because it can be over-dense in its detail and the style can be rather dry - but then I figured that says more about my stamina and laziness than about the quality of the book, so the book gets 5 and I get a 4 for effort. We're all winners.So despite the headline-grabbing title, the author Jared Diamond - a cross between an Amish garden gnome and avuncular Glastonbury festival supremo if you go by his picture - tries its darndest to avoid sensationalism, and the author opts instead for what is sorely needed in the environmental debate: sober, empirical analysis. But don't let that put you off - once you put your brain into the right gear this book can be completely consuming and fascinating, and the message and lessons it gives are electrifying.Diamond examines in turn a number of societies, ancient and modern, successful or unsuccessful, and forensically examines what were the factors in their collapse or survival before turning to our modern, global society to ask what lessons we can apply from those past cases to the predicament we face today. We learn about the Easter Islanders (about whom one of Diamond's pupils asked: "What was going through the mind of the man who chopped down the last tree on the island?"), the Anasazi, the Maya, the Greenland Norse and Greenland Inuit, modern day Australia and Montana, shogun-ruled Japan and others.He identifies common environmental problems which collapsed societies have tended to share (deforestation and soil erosion as well as resource depletion cropping up again and again), as well as cultural factors such as systems of government and contact with other societies. He cites some incredible studies such as the examination of ancient middens, of crystallised rodents' piss and of pond sediments to show how we can unravel the mysteries of some of these collapses by using the study of, for example, pollen in sediment or animal bones in middens to paint a vivid picture of climates, deforestation and diets at precise times in these societies' stories. It was this quite academic precision that gave me a quiet thrill and which gives this book its calm authority.Diamond ends by looking at our modern global society and assessing its chances of overcoming the sheer number, breadth, scale and interconnectedness of the ecological problems facing us, and although he insists he is an optimist - and argues that our globalised society gives us advantages in finding solutions as well as giving us zero escape routes if we fail - by the time you finish reading, you feel that as a planet we've got a sheer cliff face to climb, and his optimism sounds a little disingenuous. But educating yourself to understand these issues is a necessary step to doing your bit, and this book will certainly arm you with the sobering facts. If only the debate were always conducted in these civilised (in the best sense of the word) terms.
—Gaff

In Collapse, Jared Diamond draws our attention to the following problems, which have "plagued" humanity throughout history.1. Deforestation and loss of habitat2. Overhunting3. Overfishing4. Soil degradation5. Water management problems6. Population growth7. Increased per capita impact of people8. Impact of non-native speciesAnd now we face four more:9. Human-caused climate change10. The build up toxic waste11. We're approaching the limits of the Earth's photosynthetic capacity12. Energy shortagesThere are societies that failed to resolve these problems and they collapsed because of it. Perhaps the best example of this is Diamond's discussion of the isolated Polynesians on Easter Island. They used all of their trees, which led to soil erosion, which led to food shortages, which led to cannibalism. We now live in a "globalized world," but perhaps we should say that we're finally realizing that we live on an island. It seems that we have yet to realize the demands we make on our island.(Is this a bad time to point out that NASA, which apparently costs less per year than the American military spends per year on air conditioning, retired its fleet this week?)I wish that I could just knock off one or two of those problems from Diamond's list, but I can't. Many of them are linked, so if we fail to respond to one, we fail to respond to several. At other times, we lean too hard on solving one problem and end up causing new problems. For example, many forests (Diamond refers to Montana, but I've read about this dynamic elsewhere) have been developed as cottage areas, so we do not allow fires or any logging. The buildup of old forest and underbrush makes for a tinderbox, which means that when fires do happen, they are massive. And putting them out is not free, either.How do you gather political will to deal with a problem like this? We could try to log sustainably and selectively, but what company can we trust to log in such a way? Sure, many companies will claim to do good, but we've been tricked before, haven't we? So the environmentalists are out. The cottage owners are certainly not going to recommend logging or allowing fires of any sort to threaten their investments. So basically, every stakeholder is stuck.Diamond quickly moves on from Montana and illustrates the role of ecological problems in societal collapses by comparing past societies that collapsed (as opposed to declined) throughout history. In each case, he methodically outlines how these societies destroyed themselves by failing to resolve ecological problems. It's pretty convincing, if you need convincing.I think there is a common concern for the environment. I'm not even 30, so perhaps I can't speak with a great deal of authority on the subject, but it feels to me that North America is obsessed with post-apocalyptic settings right now. If there is a "spirit" of a society that is translated in its literature, then I think it's safe to say that the bearded guy holding a "the end is nigh" sign is finally getting the mainstream audience he dreamed of.It seems to me the real problem is that it is very difficult to minimize our impact on the environment. We can call upon America to lead the way, but they can't even manage their debt. In fact, the societies that Diamond relies on to illustrate that it is possible to limit deforestation, tend to be autocratic (though so were the societies that Diamond relies on to illustrate failure). Now, some NGOs have set up certification procedures that identify wood that was harvested sustainably, but other corporate commissions have set up their own certification bodies to confuse consumers.Nevertheless, Diamond outlines reasons to be cautiously optimistic before concluding. Unfortunately, this may have been the least convincing part of Collapse.So I'll close with the cynical words of Danny Archer from Blood Diamond."When was the last time the world wasn't ending?"Usually, I find these words very soothing. Now I feel like the world always has been ending. It's just that until recently, humanity could only end one specific part of it at any given time. Now we're a global society.
—Ryan

Fascinating work by the same author who won a Pulitzer prize for Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies. This exhaustive study in Malthusian economics as applied to several societies in history that have failed, such as the Easter Islanders and Greenland Norse, details the thematic traits common to each example. Most notably is how deforestation and imprudent population control applies to modern societies in trouble as well. I find myself thinking about this work frequently, his ideas resonate with our times, mirroring as they do, and as he shows us, with failed societies of the past. Haunting and thought provoking and a damn fine book.
—Lyn

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