Re: Does Hubbert Peak Bode Ill for World System?

Thanks for these comments. Perhaps the views I'm espousing here are "quietist." Still I think they make better analytical and economic sense than the standard, stockmarket type "bears" and "bulls" approaches for the most part.

Having said that, though, I also Tamblyn's "bearish" world-crisis assessment (resource and societally/economically-wise) poses a near and serious danger to the world and human society as we've known it. Read this in terms of decades ... For more details on Bill's assessments and perspectives, check out any of his comments either on Safehaven Longwaves or my own list's archives at Topica.

One final point: knowing that you and a bunch of the other WSN'ers do occasionally go into these energy conversations here on this list as well as discuss longwave dynamics vis-a-vis modern world affairs and the WS, do take a look at the material on Safehaven Longwaves and/or the EnergyResources list on Yahoogroups

Here are their links:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/energyresources/

http://www.safehaven.com/forums.cfm

All the best! (Luke R.)

Luke Rondinaro

The Consilience Projects

Louis Proyect <lnp3@panix.com> wrote:

Luke Rondinaro wrote: > > What are we to make of this “bearish” outlook on the world (system) and > socioeconomic systems? And for that matter, what’s the merit of such > “bullish” and “bearish” perspectives in the first place? … Markets, in > their systemic context, go up … and markets … go down. I wonder really > what the use is in the framing of paradigms that are exclusively > upward-focused or downward-focused. I’d argue the general trend is > neither exclusively in a climb or a plunge; it’s in an economic process > regulating itself in its cycles. The system is balancing itself around > a point of equilibrium. This sounds a bit too Olympian to me. One of my big problems with ws theory is its tendency to take an almost left Viconian or Spenglerian approach that seemed to be one of the big problems with Andre G. Frank's Reorient. Long waves, global frameworks, etc. invite a kind of detachment from the class struggle. When you couple this with the sort of disavowal of state-based socialism found in some of Wallerstein's articles, you veer dangerously in the direction of quietism. On the question of ecological disaster. I have noticed a tendency in certain kinds of dogmatic Marxism to assert that capitalism will always find substitutes for whatever. In a sense this is true. It also undermines the sort of "second contradiction" millenarianism of O'Connor. It doesn't matter if the planet goes to shit. As long as the stock markets function and as long as there are getaways like St. Barts, I doubt that the big bourgeoisie will care very much. It seems to me that the challenge facing socialism (is that a dirty word here?) is to present a clear alternative to capitalism. To be taken seriously by scientists, you have to address the question of ecological sustainability. On the Marxism list, a couple of subscribers mentioned that the planet can sustain about 2 billion people. If you mention that in some quarters, you get called "Malthusian". It is not Malthusian to understand that we are rapidly approaching the point where industrial society as it is presently constituted cannot continue, whether under private or public ownership of the means of production. We have to reintegrate the town and the country, as the Communist Manifesto called for. Energy, water and soil have to be carefully husbanded. Wildlife must be protected. There can be a better future, but Julian Simon type bromides from either the capitalist intelligentsia like Gregg Easterbrook or "Marxists" have to be rejected. -- The Marxism list: www.marxmail.org