Collapse of Easter Island

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Collapse of Easter Island

• Lessons for Sustainability of Small Islands

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Human-Dominated Planet Earth?

• Unprecedented increases in human
• activities have been changing the planet
• at faster rates, and in new ways than
• ever before

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Six Global Indicators of Change

• Increased concentration of carbon dioxide
• Substantial modification of the planets land
  surface
• Increased use of finite fresh water supply

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Indicators Continued

• Vastly modified nitrogen cycles
• Over exploited and or depleted fisheries
• Beginning of the sixth mass extinction of species

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The best of times, or the worst of times?

• Justifiably, we claim to live in the best of
  times
• from the stance of breath-taking, scientific,
• technological, and economic achievement
• Yet, is also argued that we live in the worst of
• times in the history of human evolution - threats
• to human survival on the crowded planet earth
• have been overhanging

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Partnership or Proprietorship?

• Having dominated the planet Earth only
• for a speck of time, we are obviously
• deceiving ourselves by thinking that we
• are the exclusive owners of the Earth.

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Fundamental Paradigm Shift

• Unfortunately, our conceptual and
• analytical frameworks, based on
• traditional academic disciplines, for
• understanding and dealing with complex
• human induced changesare becoming
• increasingly inadequate

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Optimism vs. Destructive Growth

• With increasing technological optimism,
• mainstream economics continues to
• ignore the fact that all economic activity
• ultimately depends on a finite
• environmental resource base and the
• ecosystem contained therein.

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Holistic Thinking

• Not that there is a lack of initiative, there is
  little understanding of the Total System.
• Thus, we tend to ignore the interconnections,
  feedback, and non-linear changes

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Demise of Easter Island From Rags to Riches, to
Riches to Rags

• The parallels between what happened on
• Easter Island and what is happening
• today in the world, though more slowly
• on a larger scale, is as Diamond states
• chillingly obvious

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Margaret Meade (1976) On Small Islands

• We have in all small islands the greatest
  diversity of ecological, cultural, and economic
  style that we have anywhere in the world
• Easter Island was a good model of
• planet Earth

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Easter Island

• Lies in the South Pacific roughly triangular
  shape166km in area
• 3200km off the west coast of Chile 2000km from
  Pitcarin
• Subtropical with a mild climate fertile soil due
  its volcanic origins, and surrounded by
  resource-rich waters

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• Biological evidence shows that Rapa Nui was
  covered by large forest of 12,000 palm trees
• 300-380 A.D. - prehistoric period of
  colonization of Rapu Nui by a group of 40-100
  Polynesian settlers

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From Riches...

• Abundance of theses trees provided the
• essentials for survivalshelter, nutrients for
• the soil, transportation, food, fire, etc.
• The first Polynesian colonists found themselves
  on an island with fertile soil, abundant food,
  bountiful building material, ample lebensraum,
  and all the prerequisites for comfortable living
  (Diamond, 1995)

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To Rags

• Population reached more than 10,000 by 1550
• With the increasing population they cut down the
  trees faster than they could grow
• Leading to deforestation, soil erosion, loss of
  biodiversity

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Spiral Effects of Population and
Stone Technology

• Malthusian trap
• Ecological suicide via mass construction of stone
  monuments
• Failure to see the interconnections between
  economy, ecology, and society

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Avoiding Danger of Easter Islands path

• Trend can be reversed only by aiming
• to achieve a healthy ecosystem and
• ecological sustainability
• Sustainability of the ecosystems, not sustainable
  development, must receive greater attention in
  the global public policy arena

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What we can learn from Easter Island

• 1) In the development of small islands, economic
  activities must not transcend the ecological
  limits and physical limits found in the islands
  system.
• 2) Economic perspectives should take into the
  fundamental properties of the biosphere

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• Need for an Overarching
• Sustainability Science -
• Transcending All Disciplines

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Becoming One New Field

Merging Natural, Physical, Biological
and the Social Sciences
Science of Sustainability
economic
social
ecological
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(Re)-Defining Progress

• What is Progress?
• Progress for Whom?
• And at what costs? Is it sustainable?