The More Things Change - Closing The Circle

This is not a book review but more a look back more than four decades to some of the flaws in industrial development serious enough in Barry Commoner's opinion to warrant a book predicting and explaining the horrors to come if technological progress was to be determined solely by profit.
Much of his argument is directed to the post-world war II era when he and colleagues compiled a mass of information to give a clear picture of the causes of the then very apparent decline in the state of the general environment - air, water and land.

Using figures based on per capita GNP for the years 1948-68 in the US there is no evidence that growing population was responsible for increased pollution. Per capita GNP, adjusted for inflation, stayed steady or increased slightly in a few areas but science and technology had made great strides. Their study did reveal, however, how the US economy had grown in that time, the winners all being highly polluting manufacturing processes. Non-returnable bottles up by 53,000%, synthetic fibres up 5,980%, mercury for chlorine production up 3,930%, mercury used in mildew-resistant paint up 3,210%, etc. Compared with these are the group of productive activities that had grown at roughly the same pace the population had grown - up to about 42%: namely, food production and consumption, total production of textiles and clothes and household utilities. So, although production for basic needs - food, clothing, housing - had been fairly constant per capita the kinds of goods had changed dramatically.


"The technology factor - that is the increased output of pollutants per unit of production resulting from the introduction of new productive technologies since 1946 - accounts for about 95% of the total output of pollutants, except in the case of passenger travel, where it accounts for about 40% of the total."

Regarding the social issues connected with the negative outcomes of technological progress he had this to say: 'the new technologies were not failures when tested against their stated aims' but then, 'the fault lies in its aims - - in the age of technology we have acted blindly, massively, on nature before we were aware of the consequences.'

More than forty years later when 'peak-everything' is being widely discussed it is pertinent to note that Commoner was warning in 1970 of when the 'brink of catastrophe' would be, but that it was guesswork and more important was the will to act - now. However he also quoted the economist K.W. Kapp, writing in the 60s, at some length, a brief one of which here: 'conventional private enterprise economic theory is incapable of accommodating the powerful externalities generated by the very source of present economic strength - modern technology.'

Regarding the incompatibility of economic growth ad infinitum within the limits of the ecosystem Commoner was of the opinion that, 'the emergence of a full-blown crisis in the ecosystem can be regarded, as well, as the signal of an emerging crisis in the economic system.' In conclusion he stressed forcefully the need to give up political luxuries so long enjoyed by those who benefit from them: 'the luxury of allowing the wealth of the nation to serve preferentially the interests of so few of its citizens - - - -of burying the issues revealed by logic in a morass of self-serving propaganda.'

'Our options are reduced to two: either the rational, social organisation of the use and distribution of the earth's resources, or a new barbarism.'

How little has the attitude changed from the capitalist side except to compound the problems inherent in the capitalist production system but how much things have changed to the detriment of the majority and its one and only habitat.

All quotes from Barry Commoner's 'The Closing Circle' 1971
JS