Deep Adaptation:A Map for Navigating Climate Tragedy
IFLAS Occasional Paper 2www.iflas.info
July 27th 20181
Professor Jem Bendell BA (Hons) PhD
Click to access deepadaptation.pdf
First: despite the format, this doesn’t appear to be an accredited or peer-reviewed piece. The author doesn’t intend to be misleading, and neither do I. His sources and data ARE from peer-reviewed sources, however.
Bendell, the author of the piece, explains it thusly:
“Some readers might consider [this work] an unacademic form of writing. Which would be an interesting comment on why we even write at all. I chose the words above as an attempt to cut through the sense that this topic is purely theoretical.
As we are considering here a situation where the publishers of this journal would no longer exist, the electricity to read its outputs won’t exist, and a profession to educate won’t exist, I think it time we break some of the conventions of this format. However, some of us may take pride in upholding the norms of the current society, even amidst collapse. Even though some of us might believe in the importance of maintaining norms of behaviour, as indicators of shared values, others will consider that the probability of collapse means that effort at reforming our current system is no longer the pragmatic choice. My conclusion to this situation has been that we need to expand our work on “sustainability” to consider how communities, countries and humanity can adapt to the coming troubles. I have dubbed this the “Deep Adaptation Agenda,” to contrast it with the limited scope of current climate adaptation activities. My experience is that a lot of people are resistant to the conclusions I have just shared. So before explaining the implications, let us consider some of the emotional and psychological responses to the information I have just summarised.”
Second: The situation is dire. Bendell writes, “They predict a decline of normal agriculture, including the compromising of mass production of grains in the northern hemisphere and intermittent disruption to rice production in the tropics. That includes predicted declines in the yields of rice, wheat, and corn in China by 36.25%, 18.26%, and 45.10%, respectively, by the end of this century (Zhang et al, 2016). Naresh Kumar et al. (2014) project a 6–23 and 15–25% reduction in the wheat yield in India during the 2050s and 2080s, respectively, under the mainstream projected climate change scenarios. The loss of coral and the acidification of the seas is predicted to reduce fisheries productivity by over half (Rogers et al, 2017).”
Bendell also raises the alarum about methane emissions, noting that concentrations in the Arctic have jump by 15ppb since 1990, and a terrifying 35ppb at mid-level atmosphere. Combined with recent horrifying reports of massive melt in the tundra suggest methane emission may take even bigger jumps, no matter what we do.
Bendell also discusses the risks of being a gore-crow: “I questioned why I was even writing this paper. If all the data and analysis turn out to be misleading, and this society continues nicely for the coming decades, then this article will not have helped my career. If the predicted collapse comes within the next decade, then I won’t have a career. It is the perfect lose-lose.”
It’s grim reading, but lose-lose or not, very important.