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Leaving the “sustainability or collapse” narrative behind

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Abstract

In this paper, we investigate the cogency of the “sustainability or collapse” narrative, that is, the notion that the current global civilization risks ecological overshoot-induced collapse. Combining different strands of literature, we put forward three arguments: First, for many empirical cases of past societies that purportedly “collapsed”, alternative interpretations, emphasizing resilience, transformation and reorganization are equally if not more plausible. Second, the “sustainability or collapse” narrative tends to be misleading insofar as it suggests that resource input constraints are the main sustainability challenge global civilization faces today. Instead, we argue that a stronger focus on system outputs and pollution is needed. Third, collapse-warnings are psychologically ineffective because they might induce fear and guilt, which leads to apathy not action. In consequence, we suggest that the sustainability agenda relies on positive framings that highlight the benefits from institutional and behavioral changes for human well-being. We illustrate our argument with two examples, water scarcity in Cape Town, South Africa and the German energy transition.

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Notes

  1. For instance, the word ‘quarantine’ derives from the 40-day isolation period introduced in the 14th century to prevent the spread of the plague.

  2. “As far as productivity and calories are concerned, the island could easily have provided some twenty thousand people with a healthy diet. […] The percentage of teeth with hypoplasia in the skulls of Easter Islanders did not differ markedly from the percentages found on other Polynesian islands. Moreover, they compare quite favorably to the teeth of stress-ridden, medieval Europeans” (Boersema 2015: 117).

  3. Observe the name of the so-called „Commission on growth, structural change and employment“, which comprises a diversity of stakeholders whose main task is to negotiate a timeline for the coal exit. See https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/germanys-coal-exit-commission

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Economics, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research-UFZ, Permoserstr. 15, 04318, Leipzig, Germany

    Sebastian Strunz

  2. Department of Ecosystem Services, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research-UFZ, Permoserstr. 15, 04318, Leipzig, Germany

    Melissa Marselle

  3. German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig, Deutscher Platz 5e, 04103, Leipzig, Germany

    Melissa Marselle

  4. Department of Computational Landscape Ecology, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research-UFZ, Permoserstr. 15, 04318, Leipzig, Germany

    Matthias Schröter

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Correspondence to Sebastian Strunz.

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Strunz, S., Marselle, M. & Schröter, M. Leaving the “sustainability or collapse” narrative behind. Sustain Sci 14, 1717–1728 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11625-019-00673-0

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