The Race for What's Left: The Global Scramble for the World's Last Resources

Mistaken Premises, Peace and "The `Race' for What's `Left'" ?Review of The Race for What's Left: The Global Scramble for the World's Last Resources, (Henry Holt/Metropolitan Books, 2012) by Katrin Marx I was raised to love learning, science, and respectful mutual active listening. There is a sort of peace and a great, wonderful sense of achievement that comes from "coming together" to solutions or conclusions of arguments, as Plato's Socrates demonstrates. The world needs this sort of dialectic. Given the latest data on the catastrophically changing climate, and Klare's information on rare Earth metals and other things he "shows" we need, we can only survive now by means of this creative listening: not merely polls or studies, but listening to those who know (about the causes of, and ways to avoid the climate catastrophes looming ahead of us soon). Given that wars waste more resources than any other human effort, we need to invent enough peace to give us time to work together in the world for the new technologies we need. We need a completely different process-of ethical creativity, social action together, and alternatives to both the capitalist and the old Marxist political economies, instead of the purported "race for what's left," the title of Michael Klare's new book, so tauted by The Nation and its readers. It fails in its premises and its blind, basic thrust, though well-intended and, one presumes, hoping to help inform us so that we might avoid the wars that he "shows" will result. The Gloom and Doom of Klare's book should not be as popular as it appears to be: As even Klare himself suggests at the end, on page 227 in "The Race to Adapt," PEACE and deciding NOT to race (for these toxic, Earth-killing oil and other mineral deposits he seems to value too much) should be our path. Why FOCUS on that which , we KNOW we are now addicted to, and most of which will (even if burned "cleanly") kill the planet? There is a very clear scientific consensus about fossil fuels and the coming complete global disaster: rising coastal water levels, dying oceans from excessive CO2 dissolved as Carbonic Acid. In addition, there is Methane from cattle farms and human wastes and landfills, which traps heat 33 times worse than CO2 does, not to mention agriculturally overused Oxides of Nitrogen which trap heat 300% more than CO2. It's no longer in doubt. Given these substances whose stable remains in Earth's atmosphere which will continue to trap heat and increase global warming and extreme climate events for at least the next hundred years, even if we stop emitting greenhouse gases soon, most crops will fail. Klare does acknowledge this. But he commits, then, the fallacy of "false cause," presuming it's the lack of the resources he suggests we will or should race for, that could, if we do not change course, cause this mass starvation and the death of most of the selfish, guilty, greedy human race. How will we "RACE" for more carbon-based fuel then, on empty stomachs and brains, and why would we decide to, if we were sane? We must refuse to race now while we can still think and while scarcity is not so extreme that we can still cooperate to make the needed changes. We must create a different race: to the Other Sources, but not merely in material "resources:" we need different sources in our moral grounding and our thinking about Ethics, Logic, imagination, and government. The Unstated Premises: Klare assumes our "stockpiles" are nearing "wholesale Exhaustion." (p. 36). We are so distracted by Klare's details about such admittedly (currently) very useful things as Rare Earth Elements for military and commercial uses, or Lithium (for batteries, even for relatively "low tech" cell phones, etc.), that we fail to notice the basic premises on which the book is based. It is a mistake to think that the toxic "resources" studied in such depth and detail by Klare are "What's LEFT!" They are what we should put on lists to be AVOIDED and NEVER developed! I was very upset by the unstated underlying assumptions of "The Race for What's Left" - which commits classic and TRAGIC logical fallacies of "missing premise," `is' to `ought," and non-sequitur. Just because there ARE such toxins deeply buried, which some know how to mine and burn, is not a reason to BURN or USE them. We CAN find alternatives, and we CAN CONSERVE the 65% of all energy produced, that is completely WASTED! There is not much left of REASON and good logical thinking about "The Future," if it now exists as even a possibility beyond the year 2100. One is compelled to ask, not "What's LEFT?!" as if we are greedy youngest siblings who have come too late for dinner, but rather, what I heard in German as a young University student in Hamburg, even as I nearly went hungry a few weeks, when my mother failed to send promised funds, ... "Was noch?" (What ELSE is there? What OTHER sources of what we think we need. I found some, and survived!) "What ELSE is there?" is the question we should ask, not how we could race to resources that are toxic. "What else is there?!" is what he means by "Adapt!" it seems. We need imagination, not just adaptation. "Adapt" to what, in a book that cites the Wall Street Journal more than Amory Lovins, and does not reference any environmental groups? We seem to be stuck with the deadly view that all Nature is a marketable "resource" for us humans, with few solutions, needing a basic "redirect" of our attitude and perspective to solve these problems, not just adaptation to shortages. We seem to say "we can't" when confronted with views of Earth as Source, her (not "our!") "resources" not merely of use value, but intrinsically sacred or valuable, even if left alone or not "exploited." But we "can't" sit still and meditate on this. We still think we must "race" after resources we believe we have a right to mine and use come what may. We "can't" stop! We therefore need someone, or a supportive group, to help us envision how things can be better, not stuck in this race. Elementary school teachers with wisdom know this: I have heard one ask her students, "What would it be like if you DID know...?" something they had just said they didn't know or couldn't do. The students did come up with good answers then. The cognitive moral skill that is lacking is called, by researchers in ethics, "Moral Imagination," and it's of course crucial. There are other "cognitive" factors, or really objective, measurable and, with sufficient community and experience of real crisis or need, teachable skills in thinking, that we must teach, share,and develop together. We must challenge those who would "race" to toxic old sources of energy, and listen actively and carefully about needs versus wants, both as despairing individuals of our era and as communities that must rise to this occasion. We must collectively acknowledge the premise upon which any energy strategy rests: the CLEAR and truly indisputable facts (but easily "deniable" if we want to avoid the ethical stress needed to urge us onward), the data on ineluctable Human-Induced Climate Change and the complete predicted disasters of an unlivable planet, for humans and other living things we know. One finds it hard to praise, or even re-read, the deterministic predictions and economic prophecies of this author, who claims to be involved in international relations programs, which presumably study the techniques of peace as well as the self-fulfilling prophecies of war. We have all been surprised by wholly new economic entities in recent decades, such as micro-finance for women-owned businesses, the massive collapse of corrupt mortgage finance and the housing bubble, etc. Why would these be any more certain than predictions of those who held the "too big to fail" assumptions?Klare mentions climate change and global warming a respectable number of times in his Index, but gives it no serious or prolonged treatment or consideration by comparison with "new sources" of old, filthy oil, for instance. If is as if he let his older brothers in the oil business bully him into going along on their same old pattern of a deadly rampage in the night, in deliberate ignorance of alternative projects, friends, of more affirming and imaginative exploits than stealing, raping, plundering, spoiling, and degrading others just to prove "we" are somehow better. Klare's knowledge of all these "sources" of something we now know to be basically "bad" -for Earth and for us, -things that we only think we need, e.g., petroleum in various unacceptable forms and uses may be detailed, but it takes our attention from the details of empowering local people in each of these places, -- from the Arctic to Guinea and Gabon, ... to defend eco-systems free of pollution by this whole toxic, addictive process which leads this misguided "race." Instead of DOING, GETTING, RACING and thinking we need what we only want because of a deep sickness and addiction, we CAN work together to listen, CREATE, imagine, meditate, respect, mediate, care, and think and LIVE (survive!) ethically and globally. We need seminars and projects in Ethics and Logic even more than we may need Lithium batteries and the "Win/Win" that still permits such domineering corporate personhood in all its forms. Think for once, human technology addicts! Did Plato "NEED" a cell phone? The Greeks did have a theory that the actual metals of the Earth mixed with human flesh and blood and determined who would be bright, and who dull, but they knew that the Good was not in these elements alone, or their material uses. The great enduring Greek philosophers, poets, and playwrights showed that the questions about what really makes happiness are more important than the material wants and superficial pleasures that may completely fill up and pollute our days and nights. What DO we (including the Earth we are a part of) need? A healthy Earth? And if we cannot "help" her, at least we ought not do further harm. Instead of asking "What's LEFT" (for me, for us, egoistically and unethically) we need to ask "What ELSE is possible?" Is is striking that Klare does not mention other books of great relevance, if only to update their important, not totally outdated information: Beyond Oil: The View From Hubbert's Peak, by Kenneth Deffeyes (NY: Hill and Wang, 2005) on Hubbert's Curve (is it meaningless now that oil's high price and lack of effective taxation make the dirtiest, most expensive oil "worthwhile" and permissible to process) and Energy Beyond Oil by Paul Mobbs, (Leicester, UK: Matador, 2005), or Paul Roberts' The End of Oil (2004) and many others with positive project ideas. His sources are standard media sites, the NRC (surely not an objective observer regarding energy policy), various websites including BP propaganda, and many other oil and gas industry publications. One wonders truly how he intended to find the truth and preserve the sciences from raw exploitation and misuse by groups with vested interests and media ignorance linked with commercial and political bias in almost every mainstream media source. What Klare properly calls "the race to adapt" by finding the new solutions he doesn't really focus on is in fact starting now, led by (among so many others worthy of note) people he does mention, such as Amory Lovins of the Rocky Mountain Institute, Wes Jackson of the Land Institute, and "Green" thinkers in Germany, Italy, Spain, Brazil, and China. But we won't have the solutions in place, together, on Planet Earth, without a priority on Ethics, Logic, and developing Imagination. We must continue to monitor the route of the race, know where we start from, and what we, inextricably Earthlings, really need. See, for the predictions based on science that may even be underestimating how fast and total the Earth's mass extinction and complete change of climate and habitability will happen, given recent increases in all areas I visited during the past month in the US, all of which were ten degrees hotter than normal and experiencing DROUGHT (followed in some cases by extreme flooding and storm damage, thus taking out even more of the trees that generally help us take up CO2 and resist erosion.) For more information on the immediate climate catastrophes we face, and our ignoring at our imminent peril, see recent articles by David Orr, June 2012, and the following:The scientific publication: June 2012 Nature article costs $32 to read [...]Summary orally in [...][...]MOST APPALLINGLY ABSENT from Public Discourse Currently, and Klare's Basic Premises:A study by group of scientists from five nations has shown that the earth is rapidly approaching a "tipping point" of catastrophic and irreversible global environmental upheaval. The research shows a combination of population growth, climate change, habitat and species extinction, and the over exploitation of energy resources threaten to cause major destructive changes to the earth similar to those not seen since the end of the last ice age, close to 14,000 years ago. Led by Anthony Barnosky, a paleobiologist at the University of California, Berkeley, the report appears in the June 7 issue of the journal, Nature. Berkeley Initiative in Global Change Biology involves more than 100 UC Berkeley scientists from a wide range of disciplines. But this time, it's "fire" and ice "will not suffice!" to paraphrase Robert Frost the poet. We are truly living in times of terrifying future scenarios, now. Read this book, but also read the climate catastrophe items above, and consider if we haven't missed something. Then contact everyone you know with any power, local, state, county, and federal: demand that we have an immediate moratorium on coal and tarsands oil, fracking, and major Methane REcapture innovations funding! IMMEDIATELY, as "after the elections" will be, in all likelihood, too late to save any meaningful, habitable future, given the facts about the absolute seriousness of the threat of rapid climate change, facts we had formerly underestimated.

The prolific Michael Klare has produced another book -- "The Race for What's Left" -- addressing the dangers we will face in the coming years, dangers which express our strong dependence on the earth and its material abundance along with our inability to create global political institutions which secure peace and prosperity. It is worthy read as are Klare's previous books on this subject. In his latest, he addresses a few simple theses:1. The demand for natural resources will continue to grow2. The supply of these resources will continue to shrink3. The search for new sources of hydrocarbons, common and uncommon minerals, water and arable land will intensify over time and likely will generate resources wars.In a nutshell, we are now passing from an "easy-resource world" to a "hard-resource world." This claim encapsulates a few disturbing facts: Existing oil wells no longer produce at the rate they once had and once productive mines have become stingy. These key resources have peaked or will peak soon, and this fact will drive commerce in the future. More importantly, fallow and potentially productive farm land has become scarce in various locales due to overuse, desertification, urbanization and other destructive forms of consumption. We can expect food shortages to intensify as time passes. Furthermore, increasing demand will augment this `natural' scarcity. Brazil, Russia, India and China are industrializing (or reindustrializing in Russia's case). Other countries have also taken off. Many are trying to develop their productive capacity and their natural resources. The industries in many of these countries are now competitive in the global market and will consume a growing share of the planet's raw goods. They will produce finished or near-to-finished goods, some of which will be shipped abroad and some of which will supply their local `haves' with the commodities of a `modern' consumer culture. Consumer demand, the system of production it drives and the quest for profits will thus continuously diminish the quantity of available raw materials. These goods are finite in number and, in some cases, lack an adequate substitute. Impelled by local and global demand as well as by the scarcity of the materials needed to compete, countries and firms will intensify their search for new sources of these increasingly scarce resources. Finding and using these goods will be neither easy nor cheap. We can expect competition for these resources to be intense.This, therefore, is the race for what's left: We have consumed so much of the planet's resources that we can only renew our supply of these materials by finding new sources, mostly in inhospitable locales. We can also expect these new sources to be either less productive than the sources they replace or made to produce only with more effort, greater risks and higher costs. Arctic drilling and mining provide the exemplary cases of this problem. They are not the only cases, however. Worst of all, the race for what's left can never end given the nature of a modern and global economic system. Resource use today necessarily generates the scarcity of tomorrow.Klare, oddly enough, gives little attention to one resource now in decline: An environment fit for human habitation. Global warming can and will likely become a species threat. Industrial waste befouls the land, water and atmosphere. A proud humankind may not survive the externalities generated by its supposed achievements. Of course, the global warming catastrophe has already begun, and the task humans must complete to survive goes well beyond taking measures that will ensure we avoid that dire situation. There is no magic bullet solution to this situation. The task instead requires pulling on the brake handle before it becomes too late to save ourselves and the world we have long inhabited.It may have been inevitable that "The Race for What's Left' will not inspire hope for the future. The race is driven by the need to conserve the industrial method of production, techniques and resource usage which cause global warming and resource depletion. The sense I got from reading Klare's book is that we can expect national states to seek to secure the resources they need before it is too late to do so, too late to keep pace in a increasingly ruthless world economic system. Capitalist firms, on the other hand, will continue to seek out profitable uses for their technological capabilities and, of course, their property in general. The fortunate ones may take superprofits from their efforts, using resource scarcity to extract rents from the consumers of their goods. The stakes for these firms are very high and will increase in the future since countries and firms that fail to compete in the emerging markets can end in social disintegration, subjugation and bankruptcy because of their failure. Path dependent development entails confronting a socio-political rigidity that can prove fatal. Why fatal? At present, the world devotes little to the effort to pull on the brake handle, to radically alter the direction of material progress. Rather, it devotes treasure and blood reproducing the disaster.The situation grows increasingly dire, and hopes for the future depend upon the human capacity for reasonable thought and action as well as for generating solidarity among humanity's diverse parts. In this situation -- yoked as we are to techniques and social forms which cannot sustain themselves -- gaining hope for the future entails confronting the hopelessness of our very modern predicament.I gave "Race for What's Left" four stars. It is an accessible, well-researched and timely intervention into the world public sphere. I deducted a star because it is not the definitive work on the subject, although I should state that Klare clearly did not mean it to be such.

The facts Mr. Klare presents to his reader regarding our dwindling resources (or rather our dwindling, easily recoverable resources) is not in dispute; however, I find he exhibits an American bias in that he spends a good deal of the book, writing about what China and other countries are doing to secure the minerals, land, and hydrocarbon resources they need to ensure their economic security, but little was said about the United States, who also has an interest in ensuring its economic security. The book ended rather abruptly, with predictable platitudes about developing alternative energy, something which is fraught with its own problems. In the end, Mr. Klare says nothing about population, I suppose because there isn't an easy answer to that, only to say that if humanity does not control its population, we will change our planet in dramatic ways which may very well lead to our extinction.

This is the best published description of my own gloomy geopoliticoeconomic analysis, which says the planet's dominant species is plunging headlong toward self-destruction. Klare describes the last great "play" being made by big-energy, mining and other elite capitalists for the control and sale of all the non-renewable resources still remaining on our abused Mother Earth. His research is magisterial, and like myself, he does not easily see a way out of the momentum toward and past tipping points that he describes. You need to get this book and digest it, either to confirm your own pessimism, which it is capable of doing, or to sharpen your resolve to resist, whatever the odds.I shall add no "images," as apparently Amazon's screening of reviews believes I did and refused to publish this review of this crucial book.

Let me sum up the content in a few words. We're running out of fossil fuels and agricultural land due to the world's large and growing population. The remaining fossil fuels are frequently difficult and/or expensive to extract. Most of the book repeats this point over and over, giving different examples to say the same thing.Then there's about four pages where he offers his 'solution': renewable energy.At this point there is still quarter of the book left to read, and you are expecting him to put some meat on the bones of the framework he has laid out for the reader. Surely now the book will really get interesting. Where is all this going to lead? What is the future for mankind? But no! The book ends there. Fully a quarter of the book, the final 70 pages are taken up with notes and references.He has spent the whole book telling us we can't carry on growing our population and consuming all the resources, because eventually we'll run out of not only energy, but also something even more critical and which certainly cannot be replaced with renewable resources: agricultural land (and living space). But he never once considers that the problem is caused by there being too many people, and the solution isn't merely to switch to renewable energy sources (although undoubtedly, a not only desirable step but one which we will eventually have no choice about), but to control our numbers! Should we grasp the nettle and do it now, when it would be challenging but doable, gradually, over time? Or should we wait for nature to enforce harsh limits on our numbers by one day finding that the planet can't produce enough food for 10 or 12 or 15 billion people? But he never asks this question, nor offers any solutions, commentary or analysis.The book quickly becomes monotonous, offers no particular insight and I did not find it of much value.

This books tells a very important story - the depletion of many global resources. Its strength is the large number of issues and examples it brings together - not only oil/gas but also minerals, commodities and land. Where the book is relatively weak is in the quantitative overviews. But a very important book nonetheless.

Need to understand the mad rush to non renewable resources. A must read for everyone who wants to understand where, and why, the power sources are acting over the planet and mankind.

Thank you!

Es ist sehr schön einmal eine Zusammenfassung der Situation zu lesen, wie viel denn noch wo steckt. Und zwar so, dass ein normaler Mensch das auch versteht.