杏吧原创

Will more of the world鈥檚 cities share Singapore鈥檚 future vision of itself? (Image: Suzanne Lee/SGIA/Panos Pictures)

OPTIMISM is in the air. Some environmentalists are shrugging off their perennial doom and gloom, and daring to think the possible 鈥� that we are not done for. After half a century of despair since the publication of Silent Spring, The Limits to Growth and The Population Bomb, the green shoots of ecological redemption can sometimes be seen between hard covers. It is a welcome relief.

In On The Edge, Claude Martin, former director of environmental group WWF International, remembers that back in the 1980s, forest biologists like him warned that the loss of pristine rainforests was driving tens of thousands of species to extinction. Yet it wasn鈥檛 so. His magisterial review of the state of those forests concedes that the 鈥減essimistic projections鈥�, which assumed that species would be lost as fast as forest area, have proved false.

Most species in these habitats survive even in the face of rampant deforestation. Puerto Rico lost 99 per cent of its primary forests but just seven bird species, and today has more species than before, he says. And thanks in part to reseeding by alien species, old forests are starting to grow again.

The Anthropocene geological epoch, it turns out, is not a one-way trip to ecological disaster. Nature clings on and fights back: the trick is to find ways to help. That means cosseting the vast amount of nature that persists in logged and degraded forests that conservationists traditionally snub as not 鈥減ristine鈥�. And it also means embracing people who were once seen as enemies of conservation.

Martin notes that peasants and indigenous forest dwellers, who his own staff at WWF once demonised as the prime agents of forest destruction, are often nature鈥檚 best defenders 鈥� better even than conservationists like him. They need more powers to control their lands, he says, rather than having outsiders moving in to 鈥減rotect鈥� nature from them.

Nicholas Stern, former chief economist at the World Bank, can also see the light in unexpected places. Nearly a decade ago, in The Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change, he cast fighting climate change as a trillion-dollar challenge that required shared economic sacrifices today to save our children from wild weather and rising tides in the future.

Now, he writes, the need for 鈥渂urden-sharing鈥� is passing. Clean technologies are often as cheap as burning fossil fuels: 鈥淢uch of what is necessary on the low-carbon front is also very good for growth, development and poverty reduction.鈥�

Last year, fewer countries were tied to legally binding international targets for cutting carbon emissions than for almost two decades. Even so, a record 60 per cent of new investment in electricity generation was spent on renewables. Fixing climate change, Stern says, is no longer a 鈥渮ero-sum game鈥�. There is no burden to share; played right, everyone can win.

The trouble is that many people haven鈥檛 noticed. Too many governments pump trillions of dollars into subsidies to prop up uneconomic fossil-fuel industries, and then turn up at international negotiations convinced that every cut in carbon emissions they concede will be a defeat for their national interests. Stern doesn鈥檛 say so, but it may be that the language of burden-sharing at the core of UN climate talks is becoming part of the problem rather than the solution.

In End Game, academics Anthony Barnosky and Elizabeth Hadly eloquently lay out the ecological perils we face, deftly showing how they might segue into food and water shortages, disease, resource wars and mass migrations. 鈥淟ife would go on, but there would be a lot more losers than winners,鈥� they write. But they, too, conjure good news from the crisis. Their subtitle, 鈥淭ipping point for planet Earth?鈥�, refers not just to nature鈥檚 potential implosion under human assault, but also to positive tipping points in human responses.

Like nature, we can fight what once seemed inevitable. As the authors explain, family sizes have become radically smaller, defusing population bombs; rich societies are reaching 鈥減eak stuff鈥� as people spend spare cash on 鈥渆xperiences rather than things鈥�; agriculture can become far more efficient; and recycling can both end pollution and stem resource shortages.

Political will has produced major changes for the better before, they note. Slavery mostly ended in the 19th century, and the 20th century brought a green revolution that doubled global food production in a generation. Now we know the challenges for the 21st century; we just need to act.

Stern interestingly dissects how we have had successes against such evils as smoking, leaded petrol, drunk driving and HIV. Fighting climate change may be a bigger challenge, but he says that 鈥渂ig change can happen very quickly once [societal] tipping points are reached鈥�. The tide turns quickly when technology, economics, morality and politics line up. One day, he predicts, 鈥渢he low-carbon world will become鈥� normal鈥�. The unanswered question is whether we get to our tipping point before nature gets to its own.

聯The unanswered question is whether we get to our tipping point before nature gets to its own聰

None of the authors are complacent. As Barnosky and Hadly put it: 鈥淭he world really is poised to roll in one of two different directions.鈥� But Stern believes we can defeat climate change on 鈥渁 wave of low-carbon innovation, growth and prosperity鈥�. And Martin, despite the disappearance of so many forests, refuses to be labelled a pessimist. 鈥淚 abhor statements that pretend all is lost,鈥� he says. 鈥淭hey are wrong.鈥�

This article appeared in print under the headline 鈥淕reen shoots of hope?鈥�