I was wrong to conclude collapse is inevitable… - resiliencehttps://www.resilience.org/stories/2023-04-18/i-was-wrong-to-conclude-collapse-is-inevitable/I was new to the topic of societal collapse at that time. So when in early 2021 I embarked on a couple of years of research on the topic, with an interdisciplinary team, I was open to finding analysis that would nuance my conclusions. The result of that process is contained in my new book, Breaking Together. What I discovered is that the breakdown of societies had already begun when I was researching the Deep Adaptation paper in 2017/18. Collapse is a process, not an event, and because the changes already observed appear to be irreversible, collapse is a reasonable term to describe that process.
In the book I go into great depth on the evidence base for this perspective. I also explain why it is not one that we hear so often from experts. Chapter 1 is available for free as an audio file on soundcloud. In it I describe some of the socio-economic evidence and theory for the view that the collapse of industrial consumer societies has already begun. Chapter 4 on global food system breakdown is also available as an Occasional Paper from my University. Commenting on it, Dr Katja Hujo from the UN Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD) notes:
“Jem Bendell’s paper (and forthcoming book) is a wake-up call that our global food systems are approaching global breakdown due to a number of interlinked hard trends, from biophysical limits of food production and climate change to growing demand and the destructive implications of our profit-oriented capitalist system. The application of interdisciplinary integrative analysis and the emphasis on economic, social, technological and ecological dimensions of the challenge ahead helps to grapple with the complexity of the issue and to avoid simplistic solutions. It is an analysis that motivates the reader to act at multiple fronts and critically engage with a topic that has a huge bearing on the future of humanity.”
BREAKING TOGETHER – a freedom-loving response to collapse – Professor Jem Bendellhttps://jembendell.com/2023/04/08/breaking-together-a-freedom-loving-response-to-collapse/Initiative for Leadership and Sustainability: Six hard trends that drive food system breakdown – globally http://iflas.blogspot.com/2023/02/six-hard-trends-that-drive-food-system.html?m=1