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Magazine Highlights
May/June 1999
Feature Articles
The Nemesis Effect
Burdened by a growing number of overlapping stresses, the world's ecosystems may grow increasingly susceptible to rapid, unexpected decline.
by Chris Bright
The most destructive kind of environmental problem the world will face in the coming years will not be climate change, deforestation, pollution, or anything now familiar to the environmental agenda-it will be what happens when such pressures combine, according to the lead article in the May/June issue of World Watch magazine.
The author, Worldwatch Institute researcher Chris Bright, has assembled compelling evidence that such overlapping stresses are likely to produce a growing number of environmental "surprises," in which ecosystems degrade-and impinge on human societies and economies-in often shockingly rapid and unanticipated ways.
"Given the pressures to which the global environment is now subject, the potential for surprise is, for all practical purposes, unlimited," says Bright, who has called this phenomenon "the Nemesis Effect." Some of the kinds of shocks Bright describes have already begun and are gaining momentum rapidly. A condensed version of two such overlaps follows:
- Climate change + overfishing + nitrogen pollution + epidemic disease = global coral reef collapse.
- Over the past several years, record sea surface temperatures have caused extreme episodes of "bleaching" in coral reefs, which are the world's second richest biome (after tropical moist forests). When coral bleaches, it expels the algae within its tissues, an action that turns the coral white. Prolonged bleaching is usually fatal because the coral depends on the algae to supply it with food through photosynthesis.
- As certain types of coral bleach and die, other corals become more vulnerable to predators such as starfish. Their vulnerability is exacerbated by overfishing, which is removing the fish that eat the starfish.
- The nitrogen pollution from sewage and farm runoff is promoting the growth of certain algae, which can displace coral or prevent it from reestablishing where it has already died.
- The nitrogen pollution and warming waters appear also to promote coral pathogens, which are spreading throughout the world's reef communities. The pathogens are presumably not new themselves but current conditions are allowing them to behave in a way that has never before been observed: they are causing epidemics fatal to a wide range of coral species.
- If global reef decline continues, the reef structures themselves may begin to degrade and that is likely to increase wave erosion on some of the world's most populous coastlines, already under threat from the rising sea levels that will accompany climate change.
- Climate change + nitrogen pollution + cholera = greater risks of epidemics.
- Warming coastal ocean water, especially when it's nitrogen polluted, creates habitat for cholera, a pathogen that is constantly traveling through the global trading network as a contaminant of ship ballast water. This was probably the mechanism that brought epidemic cholera back to the Americas, after more than a century's absence: the epidemic that began in Peru in 1991 may have infected several million people and killed 10,000 of them.
Dealing with these overlaps, according to Bright, will require a much more "system sensitive" approach to managing our relationship with the environment. He proposes four general principles from which such approaches could be developed:
- Thinking beyond monocultures, and mimicking the complexities of nature. Diversity is one sign of a healthy ecosystem, and perpetuating that, whether through agriculture, technology, or the economy, is a key step.
- Developing in harmony with, rather than in opposition to, nature. Building in flood plains, suppressing natural fire cycles in forests, or consuming massive amounts of materials all contradict and eventually will conflict with ecological processes.
- Planning ahead and anticipating problems with entire systems in mind. "Systems sensitive" planning could help alleviate many of the problems that are creating by thinking in simple, cause-and-effect terms.
- Looking for system-level solutions, rather than individual quick fixes. A whole system can be greater than the sum of its parts: "institutional pluralism can create a public space that no single institution could have created alone," says Bright.
According to Bright, the main key to anticipating the nemesis effect-and to dealing with it when it occurs-is to look beyond the immediate effects of a policy, and to see it as part of the system in which it will be deployed. "That may sound obvious," he says, "but we tend to focus only on one problem at a time, so we often miss the cumulative. I think that shows how far we still have to go in perceptions, let alone in our planning."
Essay: Why Are We Not Astonished?
by Ed Ayres
In today's high-speed world, each of us receives vastly larger numbers of "bits" of information about our world than earlier generations ever did, but those bits are still like the dots in an extremely tiny fragment of an increasingly enormous picture. From where we normally see it, it is incomprehensible. But stand back far enough, and the larger picture comes into focus. The world's multiple declines become visible as a single decline. It becomes clear that we are in a mega-crisis of our own making, and that we have a chance now to escape it before it destroys us -- but that the chance won't last long. The window of opportunity is closing fast. In his essay, Ed Ayres looks at ways we can reform our consciousness--beliefs, attitudes, values--in order to see through that window before it's too late.
The Politics of Life and Death
by Mary Caron
If effectively fighting HIV means openly getting condoms to teenagers or clean needles to addicts, or candidly discussing the prevalence of prostitution in their communities, many politicians would rather avoid the subject altogether--even if it means allowing an epidemic to flourish. Where leaders have lifted their heads from the sand, however, millions of lives have been saved. Mary Caron reviews the experiences of various countries over the past two decades and the set of policies that have worked, at least at moblilizing communities to keep HIV in check.
Departments
Editorial
The Failure of U.S. Leadership
Note From a World Watcher
The paradox of surprise
From Readers
Ecologists on plantations and climate change; security experts on transnational environmental threats
Environmental Intelligence
U.S. intransigence on biosafety; climate scientists turning to advocacy; East Timor in the balance
Essay
Why Are We Not Astonished?
Matters of Scale
Food for Thought
Endpiece
Children in East Timor
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