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                                     Tipping Points and Climate Change

          "What we do in the next two to three years will determine our future" 

    [Rajendro Pachauri, Chair, UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change]

       "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can

                   change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has."

                                                  (Margaret Mead, anthropologist)

The purpose of this chapter is to call attention to two key ideas:

     1) “Tipping points” are fundamental to our coping with climate change and

     2)  “We” are a potential tipping point.

By "tipping points" we refer to points in the functioning of systems where small changes can result in large effects.  Changes in a system have little or no effect until a critical mass is reached.  At that point, a further small change can 'tip' the system.  [For example, the ocean currents that flow around our Earth flow in one direction, but the conditions that determine that direction may be vulnerable to changes that could reverse that direction.  The point at which such reversal could take place is a potential tipping point.]

Not all tipping points are vulnerable to being changed, but some are.  A relatively small amount of effort at some tipping points can cause a large change in a system's functioning.  Those points can be conceived as "leverage points." 

The challenge of the climate change crisis is to identify the leverage points where, by exerting relatively small amounts of effort, we can bring about the kinds of  change we need to mitigate the threats of climate change and, in time, stabilize our Earth's environment at habitable levels.

Tipping Points and Climate Change

There are many ways to go about the process of reversing climate change, but few of those remedies will matter if human behavior remains unchanged. With the same behavior, sooner or later, we will return to the same untenable position.

Some in public policy circles have proclaimed, "lifestyle is not on the table," meaning that states should not consider trying to change the way people behave. And yet, our human behavior is at the crux of our climate problem.

On January 15, 2006, Rajendra Pachauri, Chairman of the UN's Intergovern-mental Panel on Climate Change [IPCC], described how lifestyle change could curb climate change. What we choose to eat, how we work, the buildings where we work and live, how we travel, and what we buy, all matter. The writer Stephanie Mills observes: "Because the planet is finite and somewhat of a closed system "we all live intimately with the results of our acts. Things do add up, and as population grows, there are of us adding to the adding of things. Similarly, the benefits from many individual actions of self-restraint, frugality, and material simplicity will add up."

In his book, The Tipping Point: How Small Things Make a Difference, Malcolm Gladwell suggests that social movements behave much the same way as epidemics do. Gladwell points to three elements that cause epidemics to spread, and says that these same elements are fundamental to any large scale social change. They are:
The Law of the Few  -- some people spread disease (and ideas) better than others.

The Stickiness Factor -- the potency of viruses (or ideas and actions). 

Without stickiness, the ideas of a social movement are likely to influence only a few people.  With stickiness, they can become universal.  Ideas and actions to reverse climate change need to continue evolving and draw in people from around the world.  Stickiness is where some popular movements work, and keep working, while others fade quickly into obscurity, or even create a backlash.  The greater context of our climate dilemma suggests that if a favorable human tipping point is to occur, it needs to be able to cross cultures, genders, age groups, and races. It will need to be sticky across all those differences.

The Power of Context -- the conditions under which the change is considered tend to either reinforce the change or thwart its spread.  As noted at the beginning of this chapter, Margaret Mead famously said, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has."  This law also tells us that commitment is not enough. The committed have to act, and share their commitment with others.  Social commentator Sharon Astyk writes:

     "[T]here is no possible way that we can make the necessary environmental

     cuts without sacrifice.  90% or more over 10 years is a big deal, and some of it

     will hurt – period. There are thousands of  people who really don't want to

     hear that part - they think that if we just elect the right leader or we just do the

     right thing we can make everything easy and place all the burden magically

     on someone else. But we can't.  90% means 90% across the board. That

     doesn't mean that it can't be made better and easier, but it does that this will

     cost us.

     "How do we make that idea palatable? Personally, I think denying the need for

     self-sacrifice is a huge mistake, and so is apologizing for it, or minimizing it. I

     think the absolute opposite strategy is called for -- we have to make it a

     challenge, an honor, a gift to do this. That is, of course, how we have gotten

     people to make sacrifices and endure hardship before – giving their lives in

     wartime, climbing big mountains -- we've emphasized how exciting the

     challenge is, and how lucky they are to participate, how doing so makes them

     exceptional and heroic. The more we tell people that sacrifices won't be

     required, the more we make them nervous about the very idea.”

“We” Can Become a Tipping Point:

                    Changing Human Consciousness

Julia Whitty called attention to tipping points and their relevance to the climate change crisis in an article, "The Thirteenth Tipping Point: Twelve Global Disasters and One Powerful Antidote," (Mother Jones Magazine, November-December 2006).  In it she identifies 12 potentially catastrophic tipping points -- Amazon Rainforest, North Atlantic Current, Greenland Ice Sheet, Ozone Hole, Antarctic Circumpolar Current, Sahara Desert , Tibetan Plateau, Asian Monsoon, Methane Clathrates, Salinity Valves, El Nino, and West Antarctic Ice Sheet.   She compares them to asteroids and asks, "Is it likely that 12 asteroids on known collision with earth would garner such meager attention?" The actual number of tipping points and the accuracy of this particular list is open to question, but our purpose here is to focus on what Whitty calls the "13th Tipping Point."

As Whitty conceives it, “We” are the “13^th Tipping Point.  More specifically by shifting our consciousness, we can serve as a “powerful antidote” to potential global disasters.  Even more specifically,  that shift would encompass: 1) our  view of ourselves and our relation both to Earth and our "natural environment” and 2) our willingness to participate in concurrent action (including public awareness and involvement resulting in massive economic and political pressure that compels those in positions of power and influence to move us in the direction of sustainable life on Earth).]

Other chapters in this Report will touch on the specifics of many of these "asteroids," so we will focus only on one as an example of how it can be a "tipping point."  The Amazon Rainforest is at risk of massive deforestation.

 Whitty points out that "...climate models forecast that a warming globe will convert the wet Amazonia forest into savannah within this century, and the loss of trees will render the region a net CO2 producer, further accelerating global warming."  And, it is important to note that burning forests have a two-fold effect because the burning emits CO2 into the atmosphere and destroys the CO2 capturing ability of the living forests.

In the article referred to, Whitty postulates that "We" (all humanity) have the potential to become a "tipping point" that can prevent or minimize the threats of catastrophic climate change.  Some threats are irreversible because of our past actions, but they can be mitigated.  The challenge is to develop our ability to cope with the threats and, in time, stabilize our Earth's climate at a sustainable, habitable level.  To do so requires change in the worldview of a sufficient number of people, including

a)        their view of Earth and their environment,

b)        their relationship with Earth and their environment,

c)        their relationship with each other

d)        their collective willingness to collaborate in coordinated grassroots education and mobilization campaigns that result in a re-ordering of societal priorities in the direction of sustainability for all life on Earth.

To succeed, our tipping point strategy will need to be:

          Practical – it must focus on reversing climate change substantially and

             bring us back from the brink of catastrophe; global emissions must not

             exceed what we (the living system of Earth) can tolerate.

         Simple –  it must be easily accomplishable and replicable.

         Desirable - it must confer immediate advantages to individuals over and

            above what they are presently experiencing. [As noted by Sharon Astyk,

            even sacrifice can be experienced positively, e.g. the enhanced sense of

            community during World War II).]

Other chapters in this report provide many examples of actions being taken to reverse climate change and stabilize our planet’s habitability.   To attract and stick, our tipping point strategy will need to:

• confer greater enjoyment of life or other advantages to individuals, and it must do so in an era of severe population pressure on multiple, essential, but steeply declining natural resources and an epochal transition in energy reliance.

• recognize that there is a pernicious tendency to equate a higher standard of living with greater consumption of non-renewable natural resources, and therefore to try to match the speeds in spending down one-time natural capital.

• That fallacy is now laid bare, discredited by any glance at a world map of relative happiness.  On such a map, expressing how much people enjoy their lives, the "standard of well-being" in the Philippines is well above the USA , and tiny Iceland -- far ahead in its transition to renewables - is above the rest of Europe .
• Part of the challenge in crafting the Bali agreement was that some States felt that other States had reaped the benefits of industrialization at the expense of the global commons and therefore a debt was owed.

Envisioning an idyllic future just ahead and at the same time experiencing the real-world environment of human population explosion, cascading species extinctions, visible ecosystem demise, unprecedented resource depletion and scarcity, economic collapse and military adventurism is certainly challenging. And, yet, it could well be the only alternative that has a chance to succeed.

We need dreams and visions. We need the stories that go with them. We need those stories to infect us, inspire us, pick us up when we tire, and push us to new and even better dreams.  Antoine-Marie-Roger de Saint-Exupery wrote, "If you want to build a ship, don't herd people together to collect wood and don't assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea." 

Expanding Our Paradigm of Who "We" Are

How would you answer the question, "Who are you?" 

Many of us would answer, "I am..." followed by our name and a list of characteristics that identify us as an individual, such as name, age, and ethnicity

After reflecting on what those characteristics are for you, think for a moment about what they mean.   ...    [We'll return to this in a moment.]

In Birth of the Chaordic Age  (Berrett-Kohler, 1999), Dee Hock, founder of VISA (one of the largest enterprises in the world) said:  "We are living on the knife's edge of one of those rare and momentous turning points in human history.

Liveable lives for our grandchildren, their children, and the children's grand-children hang in the balance ... We are experiencing a global epidemic of institutional failure. ... Poised as we are on the knife's edge between socio-environmental disaster and a liveable future, one question cuts to the core of our future:  Will the result be chaos…Or will we emerge...into a new

world of profound, constructive organizational change?... The answer lies in the very concept of organization and in the beliefs and values of individuals." [underlining added]  The underlined ideas can be revised to fit the purpose of this Chapter by shifing attention from organizations to our selves and our global community.   The question that "cuts to the core of our future" then becomes: "... Will we emerge...into a new world of profound, constructive personal and global change?" And answer “…lies in the very concept of 'personal and global change' and in our beliefs and values about who 'we' are. "

Hock continues by describing what needs to happen for people to "get beyond the origin and nature of our current concepts of organization," a process of changing our minds.  He says, "Every mind is a room filled with archaic furniture.  It must be moved about or cleared away before anything new can enter."  He continues, "The process can easily begin with a deceptively simple question: 'If anything is possible, if there are no constraints whatever, what would be the nature of an ideal organization to ....?'” And to answer that the people involved will need to clarify their purpose, namely "a clear simple statement of intent that identifies and binds the community together."  Although Hock’s focus is on an organizational community, the same question can be asked about our global community. 

So, how would we complete this statement: "If anything is possible, if there are no constraints whatever, the nature of our world would be to ....?"  In other words, "What do we conceive of as the purpose of our world?"   That raises a second question, "What does 'we' mean?"  And then, after answering the first two questions, "How do we conceive of our relationship with our environment?" and "How can we approach climate change and related environmental issues appropriately?"  [Or, more concisely, "How does understanding our environment and our relationship with it help us understand who we are and how we think about the purpose of our world?"]

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The chapter ends at this point.  But we want to recognize that, as this chapter develops

we expect to explore:

    1). the possibility of expanding our worldview, including shifts in our paradigms of

           a) who "We" are,

           b) our environment and our relationship with it,

           c) how we can take effective, appropriate action

   (so that well-intentioned actions are actually helpful, and

                 do not make our situation worse or create serious new problems);

    2). how such paradigm shifts might be brought into being on a global scale;

    3). ways in which such shifts might in fact contribute to coping with our crisis;

    4). plans for evoking such shifts on a global scale; and

    5). plans for facilitating collaborative action on a global scale (including reports on action

         already taken, plans for future action, and plans for follow-on as our future emerges).

Other areas for further exploration as this chapter evolves have emerged while thinking about how we might respond to the above questions, I (Bill G) have found a number of helpful ideas I have read about in the past and I have re-read them (several times) with this Chapter in mind.  In particular I have found them helpful as food for thought and conversation about answers to these questions: 

         1). What do we conceive of as the purpose of our world?" 

         2). What do we mean by 'we'?" 

         3). How is our world now?  [Our current reality as we perceive it.]

                     And then, when (not "if") we are successful in serving our purpose...

         4). What is our vision of how we would like our world to be?"

     And then, with our vision clear, we can focus on answering...

         5). How can we move from our current reality toward our vision? (the world as we would

                   like it to be)

The books include: Global Mind Change: The Promise of the 21st Century (Willis Harman, 1998);

 The Global Brain: Speculations on the Evolutionary Leap to Planetary Consciousness (Peter Russell, 1983) and  Towards a New Worldview: Conversations at the Leading Edge (interviews with 27 well known writers, speakers, including Harman and Russell, 1996).   

*************************************** 

Steve Sachs adds:

Concerning the third question: If we are to be successful in containing global warming, and limiting the effects of climate change, it is essential that we approach the problems involved in ways that do not make the situation worse, or produce serious new problems or side effects. The traditional approach of western science, and popular thinking following from it, has focused on narrow issues and goals. While there is  power in this reductionism, its failure to consider the full effects of actions is the major cause of our current environmental crises. We need to catch up with the cutting edge of post-modern science, particularly in physics and biology, which, in agreement with ancient wisdom, understands that major problems, including those involving the environment, require holistic approaches.  

"The Earth is a complex system, with many subsystems, in which a great many factors  interact with each other. Any action - any change in one factor, in one area - produces far reaching changes everywhere. One needs to understand that everything is interrelated. So far as possible, in designing environmental solutions, it is necessary to take into account the full range of direct and secondary impacts of every action to find the best balance of resulting impacts, so that the long term positive results significantly out way  [weigh?]the inevitable negative results. At the same time, it is critical to realize that every location and situation is unique, so that correct general principles cannot be effectively applied, unless they are adapted, very carefully, to the particulars of each local application. What works in one location, very often does not work in another place, unless it is properly engineered for the new location. Furthermore, since environmental systems and subsystems are sufficiently complex that is almost always impossible to predict the full range of results of actions, especially in the longer term, it is important to continually monitor and analyze on going developments, and to take appropriate corrective action."
[Where is this from, Steve?  If they are your words, I'd like to include them.  Or, if someone else's, at least make sure we include the ideas.]