Adrian Atkinson

Cities after oil—1: ‘Sustainable development’ and energy futures

One facet of City over the years has been a rather dark foreboding that the trajectory of urbanisation around the world is accumulating problems that refuse to be solved and that in the foreseeable future we will see some kind of apocalyptic collapse. In New Orleans we saw one version of this, in other cities there may be others yet to reveal themselves. This paper is one of a trilogy that focus on the ‘sustainable development’ of cities and that, by the end, spells out a rather specific scenario of collapse as a consequence of energy starvation that we will, in all likelihood, be seeing unfold over the coming decades. Here we take a distanced view of the whole ‘sustainable development’ and ‘sustainable cities’ discourse, concluding that it has become diffused and lost in a welter of fragmented analyses, hopes and small projects that, prima facie, is failing to address deteriorating environmental conditions. The point, however, is that the real source of unsustainability of our civilisation lies in its extreme and increasing reliance on fossil fuels which, in the coming decades will be declining in availability. This paper makes a preliminary assessment of the relationship between ‘development’ and its demand for energy, noting the consistent avoidance of any meaningful assessment of this or what should be done in an effective way to avoid an emerging crisis. This will surely reveal itself with the progressive difficulty, and thence impossibility, of satisfying our energy demands in a situation where the widely held belief in the imminent rapid growth of alternative sources of energy proves to be without foundation. The next paper in the trilogy looks at the reasons why our society is so blind to the tragedy ahead and the third sketches the probable trajectory of the collapse of our civilisation and the consequence of this for the future of cities both in the north and the south.

Cities after oil—3

In this third and last instalment of ‘Cities after Oil’, I envision the stages through which ‘modern’ civilisation will collapse over the coming decades. The first essay analysed the discourse on sustainability and how this has abjectly failed to deflect what has become a fatal global development trajectory. The essay focused on the coming decline in available energy and the inability of our civilisation to function without vast and increasing energy supplies. The second essay looked at the general parameters of ‘the collapse of civilisations’ and then in detail at two key aspects of our civilisation that are driving it over the edge, namely, suburban living and the obsession with the automobile. It is not at all clear how fast and through what stages the collapse will unfold because there are many variables which will interact differentially and depend crucially on political decisions taken—and possibly major conflicts—along the way; however, we can be sure that in general the decline will be inexorable. By the latter decades of this century, a radically altered world will have emerged, with a greatly reduced population living surrounded by the defunct debris of modernity, comprised of fragmented and largely self‐reliant political entities. Our complex, ‘globalised’ world of megastates and technological hubris will be but a fading memory. The impacts of global warming and other environmental legacies of our age will reduce the options for reconstruction, possibly fatally. The essay ends by surveying the attempts in the shadows of our current civilisation to envisage and even live ‘alternatives’ that might be seeds of the reconstruction of a civilisation viable within the resource and environmental constraints that can be expected to prevail.

Cities after oil—2: Background to the collapse of ‘modern’ civilisation

In line with a general foreboding emerging from the analysis of the future of our cities—and indeed concerning our civilisations as such—that has made its appearance in the pages of CITY, this paper investigates in detail how civilisations collapse. It looks at the systemic forces that produce the general self‐consciousness of civilisations that leads to their relinquishing responsibility for their own future. In the case of our civilisation we can see a number of ingredients that include an early adoption of individualistic thinking that tends to the belief that looking after one’s self is better for society than trying to look after society as such (to précis Adam Smith). The postmodern condition and the unalloyed pursuit of consumption in our age is, however, altogether more extravagant than any past civilisation and this paper goes into considerable detail on the way in which our passion for the automobile has come to possess our culture and is screening out any realistic sense of responsibility for what is now looking like a catastrophic collapse ahead. This paper is the centrepiece of a trilogy appearing in the pages of CITY. The first paper appeared in the last issue and pointed both to the failure of the debate on sustainable development (and sustainable cities) and our dependence of vast throughputs of energy that in a few short years will start to dry up. In the next issue, I will be presenting the most likely scenario of collapse that will be unfolding over the coming decades, finishing with a discussion of how we need to conceptualise this and do what we can to survive the consequences.

Watershed management in Thailand: concepts, problems and implementation

Problems of water resource management are becoming increasingly severe in most countries of the developing world. Already from early in this century it was recognised, wherever water resource management problems began to manifest themselves, that the most appropriate level upon which to study and confront these problems was the river basin. This paper reviews various approaches that have been taken to river basin management and the way in which these have surfaced from the particular range of problems and the political context from which they emerged. Since the end of the 1970s, the rapid development of Thailand has brought into focus the need for integrated resource management as a basis for overcoming increasingly severe problems of drought and flood. Deforestation is seen as a major cause of these problems and so it is in watershed management that the first initiatives are being taken. The paper describes in some detail the system which has been adopted and finally discusses the political and administrative problems facing implementation of the system.

Readjusting to reality 2: Transition?

This is a sequel to another paper—also entitled ‘Readjusting to Reality’, published in City 17 (1)—that focused on Urban and Peri-Urban Agriculture (UPA) as a vital component of the downward passage from our energy-intensive modern world to one where we will have to live more in tune with our ecological context, with re-localised economies that live on local resources and production. This paper focuses on the Transition Movement that is growing rapidly around the world, aimed at responding more broadly to the emerging energy and climate change problematic, ahead of what otherwise can be expected to be the collapse of our globalised economy and the social aspirations and political structures that this has created. The Transition Movement, by contrast, is concerned to develop positive responses that reintegrate local communities, living in harmony within their local worlds. The heart of the paper, however, focuses on the current tumult of protest movements and demonstrations around the world, enquiring as to what these are trying to achieve, how effective they are in achieving their ostensible aims and, in the final analysis, whether the inchoate aspirations are in practice realisable. The discussion places the present manifestations in the context of past revolutions and their motivations to ask whether we might expect growth in the current protest movements to yield genuine change to resolve the issues they are attempting to address, warning that these could, rather, end in authoritarian, even tyrannical responses. The paper ends by suggesting that the Transition Movement, relating as it does back to anarchist movements of the past, presents a realistic resolution to the problematic of revolution as well as addressing the emergent energy and climate change problematic. A tailpiece to the paper asks whether Transition is relevant not only to the global North but also to cultures elsewhere, illustrating this with a description of an emergent Transition Initiative in the Philippines.

Where do we stand? Progress in acknowledging and confronting climate change and ‘peak oil’

This paper reviews the current state of public debate concerning the problems of ‘climate change’ and ‘peak oil’. Following a short analysis of what is at stake, a number of documents are reviewed, together with the public reception which some of these have encountered. There is still almost no admission that effective action to halt global warming will mean putting the global economy into sharp reverse and that peak oil will in any case have the same effect. As the political process gradually comes to acknowledge at least the basic facts, so an increasing literature of denial is appearing to reassure the public that there is nothing to worry about. Nevertheless, the ‘Transition Towns/Cities’ movement, that does acknowledge the challenge, is spreading rapidly amongst a certain segment of the population and involving many local authorities. However, the academic world of urban concern has yet to open its eyes to what lies in store. The paper ends with a brief analysis of the current planning process in London showing that the challenges are apparently accepted but what this will mean in terms of altered future reality and how to plan in that context is still absent.

Readjusting to reality

Modern civilisation has been driven by the notion that things can but go onwards and upwards with two versions of the vision being one of urbanisation in the context of technological and economic progress contrasted with another that saw the eventual achievement of a society of easy living and social equality. Over the past three decades, drowned out by the sheer noise of the modern consumer society, the optimism has ebbed away and the future seems not only increasingly uncertain but also potentially catastrophic in the face of global warming and declining energy resources. Changes are starting to take place, indicating new directions in urban development, initially in the local provisioning of food through urban and peri-urban agriculture (UPA) growing rapidly almost everywhere in the world. Whilst food security is, in many cities, the primary consideration, there are many other concerns, motivations, starting points and means of organising UPA initiatives. This paper analyses the background to the growth of UPA and describes some contrasting examples. It ends with a return to the consideration of where, in the longer term, the UPA movement may be going, speculating on an eventual re-ruralisation of populations and the decline of cities.

Sustainable cities dilemmas and options

Because of the urgency of narrowly defined environmental problems in the cities of the South‐e.g. contaminated water supplies, inadequate waste management, air pollution, etc. — much of the literature concerning the solutions to these problems loses sight of the wider problem of the unsustainability of modern cities. Atkinson starts by looking at this more restricted agenda for environmental problems but then broadens the discussion to encompass the question of the sustainability of cities.

Urbanization in a neo‐liberal world

Europe and North America—the Occident—have adopted the role of the bearers of civilization for a long time, assuming the task to enlightening (or imposing it on) others. ‘Development’ in its current form derives from ideas and practices, as Atkinson accurately describes, that have their ideological roots in the rise of capitalism and Christian ethics, and finds their expression and reproduction in the constant obsession with power and wealth. In this essay, Adrian Atkinson questions the ideas, reasons and effect behind the currently widespread development process, instigated and adopted by international development agencies. Its core concern revolves around the opposition of the neoliberal reality against a ‘utopian communities paradigm’. The crux of Atkinsons argument is the tension between fatalism which underpins the mono‐dimensional, neoliberal approach to development, and the challenge which is embodied in a host of radical and revolutionary ideas and past movements which assert that we can design and build a world that provides for the needs and reasonable desires of all.

Climate change policy, energy and cities

Urgent public policy debate on energy is currently highly fragmented with one party not wishing to hear what the other is saying. There is continuing pressure to find and exploit more oil and gas. This, however, contradicts the recent Copenhagen Climate Change Agreement to limit global warming - caused mainly by burning fossil fuel – to no more than another 2°C. Then we have the ‘peak oil’ debate that indicates that in any case oil, and shortly after gas, production will imminently be diminishing on the way down to total exhaustion later this century. This should, actually, be good news as NGOs attending the Copenhagen Conference indicated that it will take a rapid exit from the use of fossil fuel to achieve the Copenhagen limit. However, if we are to maintain even our present energy demand, let alone further growth, then we would need a crash programme to obtain more energy from renewables and nuclear. The International Energy Agency, that recently confirmed that oil production is very likely soon to go into rapid decline, has expressed scepticism that even if such a programme were politically and financially feasible, the available technologies are not up to the job. Whether the Copenhagen Agreement is implemented through political decision to reduce energy use, or whether we are forced to reduce energy use by lack of supply, the consequences for our present lifestyle are dire. The second half of this article discusses some of the issues and debates that are currently emerging that try to face up to these consequences and what this might do to our cities