Multiple Crises as Symptoms of an Unsustainable System

Research Foundation of SUNY

Multiple Crises as Symptoms of an Unsustainable SystemAuthor(s): Fred MagdoffSource: Review (Fernand Braudel Center), Vol. 33, No. 2/3, FOOD, ENERGY, ENVIRONMENT:CRISIS OF THE MODERN WORLD-SYSTEM (2010), pp. 103-129Published by: Research Foundation of SUNY for and on behalf of the Fernand Braudel CenterStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/23346878 .

Accessed: 01/10/2014 17:13

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

Research Foundation of SUNY and Fernand Braudel Center are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserveand extend access to Review (Fernand Braudel Center).

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 132.198.50.13 on Wed, 1 Oct 2014 17:13:12 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=rfsuny

http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=fbc

http://www.jstor.org/stable/23346878?origin=JSTOR-pdf

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp


Multiple Crises as Symptoms of an Unsustainable System

Fred Magdoff

I. CRISES EVERYWHERE YOU TURN

The

world is facing a number of severe and extraordinary si

multaneous crises—unprecedented in human history. These in

clude food, energy, environmental, economic, and imperial crises.

There is inadequate access to sufficient food, quantity and quality, for many people now (at least 1 billion people suffer hunger and

many more are in a state of food insecurity) and for a growing

global population. A relatively new development is the large level

of obesity in the U.S. and a number of other countries, partially caused by inexpensive and addictive junk food, with severe human

health repercussions. As supplies of liquid fuels become tighter relative to demand, conducting agriculture and other essential hu

man endeavors during the transition away from fossil fuels in an

era of increasing fuel costs and lower availability will be a huge

challenge. In addition, the continued use of large quantities of coal

to produce electricity and increased use of other fossil fuels wors

ens the environmental crisis. Rampant consumerism of the world's

middle class and the ever-increasing production of more and more

products to sell to consumers degrade the earth's life support sys tems by global warming, pollution of air and water, and decreased

soil health. The financial crisis that began quietly in the summer

of 2007 has turned into a major recession that three years later—

especially for the United States, Europe, and a number of other

countries—shows little sign of abating, although it was declared

over in the summer of 2009. Lastly, there is a crisis of imperial ism that is marked by expanding militarism and wars, but also by a scramble among the already wealthy countries, as well as China

and India, for resources in the South.

review, xxxiii, 2/3, 2010, 103-29 103



104 Fred Magdoff

This combination of crises facing the earth and its people is

truly unprecedented and has the potential to destabilize both na

tions and alliances. I will not discuss the economic crisis, except

peripherally.1 The economic crisis, of course, interacts with the

other three crises. And it is important to remember that it is caus

ing real distress—in the United States, at the end 2010, there were

over 14 million people unemployed (only 9% of the labor force was

"officially" unemployed, but many had dropped out and stopped

looking), many of whom have run out of their extended unemploy ment benefits—plus another 9 million working part time who want

full-time jobs—plus more than 2 million who have given up looking for work and are not considered part of the labor force. So we have

about 25 million people suffering—losing homes, food insecurity, and going through devastating psychological pain. We have an in

sidious economic/political system that privatizes profits while at

the same time socializing risk incurred by the wealthy and large

corporations. It leaves the working class and much of the middle

class with inadequate protection in hard times.

Nor will I discuss, except tangentially, the imperial crisis, re

flected in the U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the build-up of

U.S. military bases worldwide, the increasing asymmetries between

the global North as a whole and the global South, the increasing Chinese military capability, which includes increasing numbers of

navy ships to protect oil shipments from the Middle East. Those

interested in these issues might read Harry Magdoff's Imperialism: From the Colonial Age to the Present (still an important work), and

recent analyses in Monthly Review by a whole host of world-systems

theorists, not least of all Immanuel Wallerstein.

II. THE TRIPLE CRISIS: FOOD/AGRICULTURE, ENVIRONMENT, AND ENERGY

The triple crises of food, energy, and the environment are

clearly related to one another in numerous ways. But what are the

chances that they're all manifestations of a single phenomenon? Most people would loudly exclaim that it just couldn't possibly be

1 For details on the economic crisis, see John Bellamy Foster & Fred Magdoff (2009)

and Fred Magdoff & Michael Yates (2009).



MULTIPLE CRISES AS SYMPTOMS 105

so. They would argue that each of these has complex origins and

while they certainly have some relation to one another, they each

have multiple causes. It is, of course, true that they have multiple causes. However, they are all related to a single underlying prob lem—a socio-economic-political system that in its very essence, as it

normally functions, breeds crises.

A. The Food and Agriculture Crisis

The food and agriculture crisis facing the world is the result of

a number of long-term as well as short-term trends:

DECLINE IN PER CAPITA GRAIN PRODUCTION

After increasing from the 1950s to the 1980s, the per capita world production of key grain crops has leveled off and then de

clined (figure l)2 so that any shortfall in production due to weath

er or other factors seriously depletes storage stocks and results in

rising prices as speculators, small and large, squeeze the public.

Although total global food production per capita has remained

relatively constant—because of the increasing production of meat,

poultry, dairy products, and vegetables—the poor rely overwhelm

ingly on the basic grains and vegetable oils. Thus, the decrease in

supplies and the increasing diversion of these key foods for other

uses has serious adverse effects on many hundreds of millions of

people.

DIVERSION OF FOOD CROPS TO FEED ANIMALS

There has been a huge increase in the feeding of food crops—

especially corn and soybeans—to animals as the per capita con

sumption of animal products on a world basis has doubled from

the 1960s to 2007 and the quantity of meat produced has increased

400% for the same period.

2 Earth Policy Institute, compiled using 1960-2006 grain data from United States

Department of Agriculture (USDA), Production, Supply äf Distribution, electronic data

base, http://www.fas.usda.gov, updated 12 June 2006; 1950-1959 grain data from USDA, cited in Worldwatch Institute (2001); population from United Nations (2005). Washing ton, DC: Earth Policy Institute, http://www.earth-policy.org/index.phpf/indicators/C54/'.



106 Fred Magdoff

DIVERSION OF FOOD CROPS—MAINLY CORN, SOYBEANS, AND

PALM OIL—TO PRODUCE "BIOFUELS" OR "AGROFUELS" TO FUEL

AUTOMOBILES INSTEAD OF PEOPLE

About one-third of the 2008 U.S. corn crop was used to make

ethanol—something that makes no sense—environmentally or eco

nomically (Magdoff, 2008).

Figure 1

Per Capita World Grain Production, 1950-2006

Source: Earth Policy Institute.

A GLOBAL PHENOMENON OF PEOPLE MOVING FROM THE

COUNTRYSIDE INTO THE SLUMS OF THE CITIES—WHAT

FARSHAD ARAGHI HAS REFERRED TO AS "dEPEASANTIZATION"

More than half of humanity now lives in cities, with a third of

those (one-sixth of humanity) living in slums. Many people have

been forced from the land by either economic conditions—until

recently especially, the generally low world prices for food—as well

as the push of large-scale farmers and investors to take over more

land (see below). Some of this displacement from rural areas to

slums has been directly caused by neoliberal trade policies pro moted by the United States and the World Trade Organization. An example of a tragedy associated with this is fallout from the

January 2010 earthquake in Haiti. Former President Bill Clinton




explained that the drive to enhance U.S. exports of food through reduction of import tariffs in poor countries has had a very detri

mental outcome, because local farmers couldn't compete with the

relatively low price of imported foods. In testimony before the Sen

ate Foreign Relations Committee, Clinton said, "It may have been

good for some of my farmers in Arkansas, but it has not worked.

It was a mistake I had to live everyday with the consequences of the loss of capacity to produce a rice crop in Haiti to feed those

people because of what I did; nobody else" (Katz, 2010). The process of depeasantization has increased as land is essen

tially stolen from the poor (or from nature) as its value increases.

Market forces begin to work as capitalist relations enter rural areas

of the third world and their markets become integrated into those

of the rest of the world. A huge amount of cropland is used to grow

soybeans in South America—with approximately 4 million hectares

of Brazilian land owned by foreigners in 2008 (Lehman, 2010); pri vate European corporations have planted the oil seed crop jatropha on large areas in Africa; countries such as China, Egypt, and Saudi

Arabia have purchased or are leasing under long-term arrange ments large tracts of land for production for the "home" markets.

As a former rural dweller in the Philippines explains, "Our family was kicked off our little farm when that big food company took

it over to plant crops to send to Korea [;] we went without land or

food Now they want us out of here and we have nowhere to go" (Cullen, 2010).

THE POOR AND EVEN THE NEAR-POOR DO NOT HAVE ENOUGH MONEY

TO PURCHASE SUFFICIENT (QUANTITY AND QUALITY) FOOD

Food is considered to be just another commodity Hunger prob lems around the world are mainly an issue of poverty. At pres ent, there is sufficient food produced in most countries, and on a

global basis, to feed everyone. Even the severe food crisis of 2008

occurred for reasons other than that there wasn't enough food. As

Eric Holt-Giménez, of Food First, observed: "In 2008 more food

was grown than ever before in history. In 2008 more people were

obese than ever before in history. In 2008 more profit was made

by food companies than ever before in history. And in 2008 more

people went hungry than ever before in history" (Viertel, 2010). Waste, speculation, and the practice of feeding human food to ani



108 Fred Magdoff

mals or to cars (by way of agrofuels) reduces the amount available

for people and increases the cost of what remains.

THE SCOURGE OF OBESITY IN THE U.S., ESPECIALLY AMONG THE POOR, IS

PARTIALLY A RESULT OF THE RELATIVELY LOW COST (PER CALORIE) OF JUNK

FOOD, STRONGLY PROMOTED FOR A SINGLE PURPOSE—TO MAKE MONEY

There is a lack of quality food available in many urban poverty zones—sometimes referred to as "food deserts" because of the ab

sence of supermarkets. This encourages people to purchase low

quality, but high calorie content per dollar, food at small local stores

and fast food outlets. There is some indication that the widespread use of the sweetener, high-fructose corn syrup, for processed foods

and soft drinks may also be contributing to the problem of obesity

(Parker, 2010).

CONCENTRATION IN THE INPUT SUPPLY AND PURCHASERS OF COMMODITIES

LEAVES FARMERS AT THE MERCY OF MORE POWERFUL SECTORS UPSTREAM

AND DOWNSTREAM FROM FARMING, THE ACTUAL PRODUCTION SECTOR

There are no real "free markets"—which require large numbers

of buyers and sellers—and instead we are left with markets under

oligopolistic influence or control. And concentration in supermar kets (and the growth of large supermarkets even in poor countries)

displaces traditional markets and serves to concentrate land even

more as suppliers to larger markets prefer to deal with few large farms rather than with many small ones.

NEED OF CORPORATIONS TO GAIN MORE PROFITS

CREATES MANY DISTORTIONS

One of these is the large-scale breaking of the cycling of nutri

ents, as corporations dictate that animals be raised by contractors

near the huge processing plants. This industrialized separation of

animals from crops results in a transfer of nutrients away from crop

farms, which then requires the purchase of fertilizer to replace soil

nutrients. Also, animal-raising facilities (factory farms) accumulate

nutrients in manure that cause significant local and regional pol lution. Meanwhile the crop farms need to purchase nutrients to

replenish those shipped to the factory-scale animal farms. This is

energy intensive—especially considering the fact that production of nitrogen fertilizers requires a lot of energy, and results in extra




N20 (nitrous oxide) volatilization into the atmosphere. Although

N20 is usually released in small quantities, per unit weight it has

almost 300 times the effect on global warming than C02 (carbon

dioxide). Promoting the use of purchased inputs leads to many unneces

sary expenses for farmers as well as to ecological degradation. Soil

quality deteriorates while pollution of water with nutrients and

pesticides increases.

Another distortion has resulted from the patenting of life and

individual genes so they become the property of a corporation. The

control of seed production in the hands of relatively few influential

corporations that were looking for new products and markets so as

to increase profits has resulted in the genetically-modified-organ ism (GMO) seed industry. The top four firms now control over 40%

of the global seed market and it is estimated that in the United

States over 80% of the corn and the over 90% of the soybeans

planted use traits developed by Monsanto (Hubbard, 2009). The

use of GM corn and soybeans has helped to simplify the system for farmers, allowing them to work ever-larger farms. So far, GM

crops in the United States have generally yielded no better (and sometimes less) than non-GM crops, and the herbicide-resistant

varieties actually require more herbicide use because of the devel

opment of weed resistance to the single herbicide used (glyphosate, sold by Monsanto as Roundup). Farms are now suffering from the

high cost of GM seeds—between 2008 and 2009, prices were raised

some 25 to 30% and farmers using Monsanto's Roundup Ready

(RR) 2 soybean seed in 2010 paid approximately 40% more than in

2009. In addition, many farmers are finding increasing problems with the development of herbicide-resistant weeds. In cotton and

soybean farms in the South, a strain of pigweed has emerged that

is resistant to all modern herbicides.

The agriculture and food crisis arises partially as a result of

the production of food in larger farming units—outcompeting the

production of small farms—and partially as a result of the food be

ing sold into large internal markets or exported abroad. In poor countries, the opening of markets to competition and the cessation

of government support for agriculture under pressure of the inter

national organizations, such as the IMF and the World Bank, have

had devastating results, as imports and lack of government support have driven farmers out of business. The neoliberal ("Washington



110 Fred Magdoff

Consensus") dogma holds that by dropping government supports and import taxes or restrictions, each nation will produce items

for which it has a "comparative advantage" and all will prosper as "free trade" governs economic relations among nations. Joan Robinson has explained the problem with this theory: "When

Ricardo set out the case against protection, he was supporting British economic interests. Free trade ruined Portuguese industry. Free trade for others is in the interest of the strongest competitor in

world markets, and a sufficiently strong competitor has no need for

protection at home" (Robinson, 1979). Trade agreements (under the WTO and bi- and multi-lateral agreements such as the NAFTA) have had deleterious effects on agricultural production in develop

ing countries and, therefore, on food sovereignty. For example, it is

estimated that under NAFTA, corn imports from the United States

put some 1.5 million Mexican farmers out of business (Global Ex

change web site). The world food crisis of 2008 began earlier. In

the fall of 2006, as the corn harvest was progressing in the United

States, the price of corn began to soar, increasing some 40% in a

matter of months, as so much of the crop was diverted to ethanol

production. The Mexican "tortilla" riots of early 2007 was a warn

ing sign of what was to come as almost all basic foods increased in

price, peaking in the summer of 2008, before declining. Although there was a food crisis in Haiti following the 2010 earthquake, Clinton's comments on the issue at the time (see above) also help

explain why hunger there was severe and widespread in 2008. The

remarkable movie Life and Debt has as one of its main themes the

destruction of Jamaican agriculture under the onslaught of U.S.

food imports following implementation of IMF "structural adjust ment" mandates. Local agriculture generally suffers greatly when

imports of low cost, frequently subsidized foods are allowed free

entry.

THE FOOD CRISIS BEFORE 2007/2008

All of the trends discussed above were operating before the

rapid rise of food prices in 2007/2008 created hunger on a massive

scale. And hunger was common and widespread before this pe riod. When supplies are tight "The Market" "decides" the "highest and best use" for products. This means that the wealthy countries

and the wealthy within even poor countries are advantaged while




poor people suffer. Consider these headlines from India, long be

fore the current global food shortages:

"Poor in India Starve as Surplus Wheat Rots" (New York

Times, December 12, 2002).

"Want Amid Plenty, An Indian Paradox: Bumper Harvests

and Rising Hunger" (Wall Street Journal, June 25, 2004)

There also have been many stories about the scourge of sui

cides among Indian farmers unable to pay back loans, made worse

by the 2009 drought in large portions of the country. And these

stories are from the country that's supposed to be one of the Green

Revolution's main success stories!

We need look no further than the United States to see the

problems that arise in a land with plenty of food, but in which

food is considered a commodity. According to the USDA (Nord et

al., 2005), in 2004 "... 38.2 million people lived in food insecure households, including 13.9 million children. Of these individu

als, 7.4 million adults and 3.3 million children lived in households

where someone experienced hunger during the year." And these

were the good times! The situation has gotten much worse with

the Great Recession we are now in—record numbers of people are

using food stamps and pressure on soup kitchens and foodshelves

has greatly increased. The USDA estimated that in 2009 over 50

million people lived in food-insecure households (USDA Economic

Research Service, 2011).

B. The Environmental Crisis

There is plenty of evidence that humans have caused environ

mental damage, literally for millennia. Problems with deforesta

tion, soil erosion, and salinization of irrigated soils go back thou

sands of years. However, now there are more people and we have

the technology to do greater damage and to do it more quickly. In addition, we have a system for making economic decisions that, as Rachel Carson put it, prays to no other gods than profit and

production. In fact, capitalism, by its very workings, demands that

there be no other gods. This has led to the rapid degradation of the earth's environ

ment. Global warming, induced by greenhouse gases (COa, meth

ane, NgO, etc.) is in the process of destabilizing the world's climate,



112 Fred Magdoff

with devastating results expected. The melting of the Greenland

and Antarctica ice sheets is projected to cause flooding of areas

where tens of millions of people now live. The Himalayan glaciers—

upon which a good portion of continental southeast Asia depends for water during the dry season—and the Andean glaciers—which are so important locally for drinking water and irrigation—are rap

idly disappearing. Pollution of air, water, and soil is so great that many of the sup

port systems on which we depend are threatened. Soil degradation

through organic matter depletion and erosion jeopardizes future

agricultural productivity. Factory farms for producing chicken,

hogs, and cattle serve large corporations' interests to allow better

control and to exercise the use of industrial methods to bring down

costs of production. But at the same time this inhumane system creates a huge rupture in nutrient cycling, causing pollution of sur

face and groundwater. It has also induced large-scale agricultural

producers to feed low levels of antibiotics to livestock to try to keep animals healthy, leading to the development of antibiotic-resistant

strains of bacteria.

Humans have become contaminated with a soup of industrial

chemicals. With new production and consumption, more and more

pollutants are generated. More of these are toxic, taking the form

of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) that are disseminated un

controllably through the global environment and in living tissues.

Some 93% of people in the United States have BPA (bisphenol A, used to make rigid polycarbonate plastics used in water cooler bot

tles, baby bottles, linings of most metal food containers—and pres ent in the foods inside these containers, kitchen appliances, etc.)

byproduct in their urine. Almost all people in the United States

have detectable levels of PBDEs (Polybrominated diphenyl ethers,

used as flame retardants in computers, furniture, mattresses, and

medical equipment) in their bodies. PBDEs have been shown to

have negative neurological and fertility effects in animals and may lower fertility in humans as well (Economist, 2010). There is also

significant concern that chemical contamination of fetuses during

pregnancy is contributing to the rise of autism among children

(Landrigan, 2010). According to an editorial in Scientific American,

"... of the more than 80,000 chemicals in use in the U.S., only five

have been either restricted or banned. Not 5 percent, five. The EPA

has been able to force health and safety testing for only around




200" (Scientific American, 2010). At the end of March 2010, the

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency finally listed BPA as a

"chemical of concern," meaning that they will commence studying it (Fahrenthold, 2010).

C. The Energy Crisis

Oil has been the bedrock fuel and/or feedstock for much of

modern industry and transportation—providing the liquid fuels

needed for automobiles, trucks, and airplanes. Ensuring access

to this resource has been the centerpiece of U.S. imperial policy. This began in earnest with the 1953 overthrow of democratically elected Prime Minister Mossadegh in Iran after his government nationalized the oil industry, and the installation of the ruthless re

gime of the Shah. In the process, control over a significant portion of Iranian oil passed from the British owned Anglo-Iranian Oil

Company (later to become British Petroleum) and into the hands

of U.S. corporations. The long-term support of the undemocratic

Saud dynasty in Saudi Arabia is also a part of this policy, as were

the wars conducted by the U.S. against Iraq. While large quantities of coal fuel are available for some time to

come, using this source so extensively has tremendous environmen

tal costs: pollution of the atmosphere and significant harm where

the coal is mined (for example, the lives lost to mine accidents and

the use of "mountain top removal" to reach coal seams for easier

mining). The greatest attention has been focused on the use of

liquid fuels made from oil—gasoline and diesel—because almost all

transportation is based on these fuels. The prospect of peak oil has

already engendered growing geopolitical conflict and has resulted

in efforts to lessen dependence on fossil fuels for transportation.

(See discussion of "biofuels" below.) The prices of oil and gas are

significantly higher than just a few years ago and they are projected to stay at elevated levels for the foreseeable future.

As the easy and cheap techniques to exploit oil and gas depos its have been developed and employed, companies are now going after deposits that are more difficult to recover, resulting in great er environmental damage as a byproduct. The potential ecologi cal harm of deep ocean drilling became apparent with the spring 2010 BP disaster, taking 11 lives and causing extensive damage to

sensitive marshes and wildlife. Canada is the top exporter of oil



114 Fred Magdoff

to the U.S., with over half of the production in 2010 projected to

come from the oil sand deposits. The exploitation of the Alberta

(Canada) oil sand fields is causing ecological havoc over wide ar

eas. In addition, because of the work that must be done to extract

and separate the oil from the sands, 10% more CO, is emitted than

from conventional oil (Swann & Cyran, 2010). The extraction of oil

from Canada's oil sands is responsible for close to one-third of the

country's total greenhouse gas emissions. In the area of natural

gas production, the new extraction method of hydraulic fractur

ing, or fracking, recovers gas trapped in deep shale deposits by

blasting down a liquid mixture of chemicals, including biocides.

One of the larger areas of potential fracking for gas recovery is

the Marcellus Shale deposit that occurs in West Virginia, eastern

Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York. Damage has already occurred

to neighbors' drinking water in Pennsylvania and there is great concern that using this technique could have harmful effects on

groundwater in the upstate watershed that supplies New York City with drinking water.

The emphasis that some place on increasing energy efficiency misses an important point—gains in energy efficiency have been

occurring since the development of the steam engine and will con

tinue. William Stanley Jevons, a century and a half ago, stated that

greater efficiency of coal powered machinery will actually lead to

more coal use, a phenomenon referred to as the Jevons paradox

(or effect): as efficiencies increase so does the exploitation of the

resource. And so far, the gains of increased efficiency of all fuel

sources have been used to expand the scale of production and ener

gy use. So, greater efficiency of energy conversion does not appear to be an answer to the problem. While there is much new to learn

about more efficient energy use, engineer Saul Griffith has noted, "There are a lot of ideas out there, but nothing nearly as radical as

the green-tech hype. We've been working on energy, as a society, for a few thousand years, and especially for the last two hundred,

so we've already turned over most of the stones" (Owen, 2010).

III. INTERRELATIONSHIPS

The crises of food and agriculture, the environment, and ener

gy are interrelated to a great extent. A few examples, by no means




an exhaustive list, of these connections are described briefly be

low.

Energy-Environment: Use of large amounts of fossil fuels is believed

to be primarily responsible for the increase in greenhouse gases in

the earth's atmosphere, causing global climate change. In addition,

mercury emitted from coal burning power plants contaminates

soil, water, and living organisms. As mentioned above regarding coal, the experiences with extraction of fuel from the oil sands or

from the ocean floor have clearly demonstrated that the extraction

process itself can cause extensive environmental harm.

Food-Energy-Environment: "Modern" industrial agricultural produc tion, processing, and distribution are dependent on high levels of

energy inputs. The agrifood system uses close to 20% of all energy used in the United States, with agricultural production accounting for 7%—or one-third of the total used in the agrifood system (Pi

mentel, 2010). Fossil fuel energy used in agriculture and the food

system is much greater than needed, even assuming the current

system. About a third of the energy that goes into growing a crop of corn in the Midwest U.S. farms is in the form of nitrogen fertiliz

er—a nutrient that could be provided by including forage legumes such as alfalfa or legume cover crops in the rotation. Production

of agricultural pesticides is also very energy intensive. The over

application of N fertilizer in quest for the highest possible yields results in significant nitrate pollution of surface and groundwater as well as N20 pollution of the atmosphere. Nitrous oxide is both

the most potent greenhouse gas (per unit weight) and also plays a role in depleting the atmospheric ozone layer that helps protect earth's living creatures from excess exposure to UV rays. Nitrogen from cornfields leaching into the Mississippi and its tributaries is

believed to be responsible for the so-called "dead zone" near where

the river enters the Gulf of Mexico.

Large amounts of energy are needed to supply a system where

animals are divorced from the land that supplies their feed, rather

than in ecologically managed systems. In this industrial agricul tural system, large amounts of fertilizers must be produced and

shipped to crop farms, then crops must be shipped long distance

to the animal farms, then the factory-sized animal farms need to

get rid of the excess manure that accumulates. This is a much more

energy costly and polluting system than one in which animals are



116 Fred Magdoff

raised on integrated cow-crop farms, nitrogen is supplied by grow

ing forage legumes to feed the animals, and most nutrients, which

just pass through the cow, can be returned back to the same fields

from which they came.

One of the proposed answers to the energy crisis is to rely more

on biofuels, especially those produced from agricultural crops. As

mentioned above, the diversion of food and feed crops, especially corn, soybeans, and oil palm to produce biofuels tightens supplies available for human consumption and leads to increased prices. In addition, there are serious environmental consequences to the

"first generation" of biofuels—these include water use and pollu tion during the crop's growing period, water use and pollution in producing the biofuels, air pollution during production of the

biofuels, and accelerated COs evolution as a result of changes of

land use to grow the crop (especially severe where tropical forests

are replaced with oil palm plantations) (Magdoff, 2008). There are

proposals for "second generation" biofuels, not yet commercial

ized, that would use grasses or "waste" crop residues, such as corn

stalks, as the feedstock for conversion of cellulose to ethanol. If

large quantities of crop residues are used, this means lessening the

return of these materials to the soil, decreasing soil organic matter

levels, thus decreasing soil quality. In India, where projects have

been implemented for burning crop residues directly for genera tion of electricity, people are cutting down trees to provide fuel for

fires that was previously provided by crop residues (Rogers, 2010).

People go hungry in a world of abundant food as larger farms

integrated into world markets produce much of the food, as more

and more people are forced off the land and support for farmers in

the poor countries has decreased, and as food crops are diverted

to make fuel or to feed animals.

IV. CAPITALISM AND THE TRIPLE CRISES

Capitalism is an economic system that reaches most corners

of the world and has enormous impacts on political and social as

pects of society. In the process of going to school, reading/looking at media, being perpetually assaulted with what amounts to vari

ous forms of propaganda for the system and products of the system

(commodities and services), people assimilate the ethic, outlook,




and frame of mind of capitalism. They come to believe that greed,

exploitation of labor, and competition (among people, businesses,

countries) are not only acceptable but are actually good for society

by helping the economy to function "efficiently." But let's discuss

some of the key aspects of capitalism—what makes it tick and what

are the logical consequences of such a system.

1. Capitalism has a single driving force, or engine, that motivates

its participants and keeps the system going year after year—the desire to make profits and accumulate more and more money

(capital). This single driving force is the strength of capital ism—a system that has accumulated huge hoards of capital and

produced more innovations in science and technology than any other. Morally, the system is based on the proposition that each

following one's own interests (greed) will promote the general interest and growth. Adam Smith put it: "It is not from the

benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we

expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest"

(1981 [1776]). In other words, individual greed (or quest for

profits) drives the system and, theoretically, human needs are

satisfied as a mere byproduct. This, of course, is not true—each

following one's own interests does not lead to satisfaction of ba

sic human needs for all in society, but only for those who earn

sufficient income to purchase these necessities of life.

Having a single driving force, with no natural boundary in

dicating "enough," leads to the many negative aspects of the

system. These are usually referred to as "externalities," but they arise out of capitalism's inner drives and are not external to the

system, only to the market price of products.

2. Capitalism is a system that by its very nature must expand and continue growing or it is in a state of crisis. When in

ternal markets for a certain product are satisfied, expansion abroad occurs, as well as the creation of internal markets for

new "stuff." Capitalism without growth makes no sense what

soever. How do you continually make new profits with the mon

ey you have if you don't make more stuff and provide more

services and convince people to consume them, as Joseph

Schumpeter put it, through the "elaborate psychotechnics of

advertising" (1934: 73)? The sales effort has become an enor



118 Fred Magdoff

mous and unproductive part of the economy (McChesney et al.,

2009). It serves no other purpose than to convince people to

buy more goods and services—most of which they have little use

for and which do not make them any happier. The importance and scope of the sales drive was described

over a half century ago by marketing consultant Victor Lebow

(1955): "Our enormously productive economy demands that we

make consumption our way of life, that we convert the buying and use of goods into rituals, that we seek our spiritual satisfac

tions, our ego satisfactions, in consumption." The drive, on a finite globe, continually to produce more

and more and convince people to purchase these products and

services through a massive advertising effort makes the very DNA of the system anti-environmental. While it's possible to

more efficiently produce, recycle, or reuse things, continually

increasing production, use, and disposal of commodities pro duces more pollution.

The U.S. population is growing by less than about 1% a

year, as is the number of people in the age group that normally enters the labor force. However, when GDP growth is less than

3% a year, there are usually not enough jobs created to create

anything approaching "full employment" (Magdoff & Foster,

2010). This drive to growth for the sake of growth and more prof

its—which are needed to avert economic crisis—creates a system that is incompatible with maintaining environmental quality. A

system fostering perpetual growth leads to the following:

a. Depletion of non-renewable natural resources without re

gard for needs of future generations; b. Rapacious exploitation of renewable resources, at home

and abroad, sometimes to the point of near extinction;

c. Environmental harm caused by manufacturing, distribu

tion, consumption, and disposal of more and more stuff;

d. Production abroad as well as sales into foreign markets of

domestically made goods, after expansion eventually satu

rates the home market. It also means trying to corner natu

ral resources and markets that are needed now or might be

needed at some time in the future. These phenomena can

be witnessed as China completes its transformation to capi talism. One change leads to another, seemingly inexorably.




Chinese companies have purchased access to raw materi

als, especially in Africa and Southeast Asia. And as China

requires oil from abroad to fuel its rapid expansion, it also

builds up its navy and equips its air force with new jets. The

current U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are incompre hensible without the recognition that one country sits in the

region of the largest pool of oil in the world and the other

along possible oil and gas pipeline routes through central

Asia. Capitalism is a system that must expand—leading to

colonial and imperial wars and economic domination of

poorer countries. Imperialism is an integral part of capi talism (H. Magdoff, 1969), and the military adventures, in

addition to lives lost, waste an estimated trillion dollars that

the United States spends annually on the military/intelli

gence system, helping to maintain literally hundreds of U.S.

bases on foreign soil around the world (Foster et al., 2008;

Wills, 2009); and these imperial wars incur significant envi

ronmental harm.

3. Gradually almost the entire world has been incorporated into a world capitalist system—with different countries play

ing different roles. Some supply mainly raw materials for the

advanced countries (U.S., Europe, Japan, and now China and

India), some supply parts for consumer goods to be assembled

in another country, some provide consumer goods production and/or assembly, some supply machine tools, and of course, some produce a mixture. As Marx and Engels famously put it in

1848 in the Communist Manifesto:

Modern industry has established the world market, for

which the discovery of America paved the way. This mar

ket has given an immense development to commerce, to navigation, to communication by land. This develop ment has, in turn, reacted on the extension of industry; and in proportion as industry, commerce, navigation,

railways extended, in the same proportion the bourgeoi sie developed, increased its capital, and pushed into the

background every class handed down from the Middle

Ages (ch. 1).



120 Fred Magdoff

The roles may change over time, but the relative positions of many countries have remained static for long periods of time. It could be

argued that there are three tiers of economic advancement:

a. The wealthy countries of Europe, the United States, and

Japan, which have been rivals, but since the Second World

War have formed a bloc. In this group, the United States,

being the strongest economy, has taken up the imperial mantle from Britain, and has provided the leadership and, to a certain extent, domination of the world capitalist sys tem.

b. A group of second-tier countries, Brazil, Russia, India, and

China (BRIC), all of which are large in land area and in

population and have significant degrees of endogenous de

velopment, but also retain significant aspects of underde

velopment. Of these four, China clearly is the main country

already posing a significant challenge to the first group—by

cornering natural resources from around the world, build

ing up its navy, using government resources to build up and support the private sector, and so on. On the other

hand, China's economy has significant weaknesses: an as

set bubble has developed and its economy performs more

as a platform on which to assemble parts made elsewhere

(Hart-Landsberg, 2010). But while China is still dependent on many technologies from abroad, some independent tech

nology development is occurring. c. A third group (with many sub-groups within it) of countries

exists—many of these, especially those at the bottom—that

seem doomed to perpetual underdevelopment.

4. Capitalism is marked by recessions and depressions within

the normal business cycle. In the ordinary business cycle, fac

tories and whole industries produce more and more during a boom—assuming the boom will never end and not wanting to miss out on the "good times"—which results in overcapacity and overproduction, and leads to a recession. Excessive debt,

speculation, and asset bubbles may also play a significant role

in starting a recession or depression. In other words, it's prone to crises, during which the poor and near poor suffer the most.

While the environment actually may not be harmed as much




during recessions (as less stuff is produced and people drive

less), many more people go hungry during these times.

5. Capitalism produces and reproduces a stratification of wealth.

Most people need to work in order to earn wages to purchase the necessities of life. But a large number of people, precarious

ly connected to jobs due to the way the system functions, exist

on the bottom rungs of the ladder. They are hired during times

of growth and fired as growth slows or when for other reasons

their labor is no longer needed—Marx referred to this group as

the Reserve Army of Labor. (For a contemporary view of this

reserve army, see Magdoff & Magdoff, 2004.) Given a system with booms and busts and one in which profits are the highest

priority, it is not just a convenience to have a group of people in the "reserve army," it is essential to the smooth workings of

the system. The system, without significant intervention by the

government (through large inheritance taxes and substantial

progressive income taxes), produces a huge inequality of both

income and wealth. The production of great wealth and at the

same time great poverty within and between countries is not

coincidental—they exist as two sides of the same coin. In 2006, the top 1% of the people in the United States controlled 25% of

the wealth! The top 10% controlled approximately 50% of the

wealth. The richest 400 people had wealth worth $1.6 trillion

equivalent to the combined wealth of the bottom 150 million

people in the United States. In addition, the world distribution

of wealth is such that an estimated one-tenth of one percent of

the people controls some $35 trillion, equivalent to approxi

mately half of the world's annual GDP (Miller & Greenberg, 2009; Kennickel, 2009; economywatch.com, 2010; forbes.com,

2011; Capgemini & Merrill Lynch Wealth Management, 2009). Most of the productive forces of society—factories, machin

ery, raw materials, land—are controlled by a relatively small

percentage of the population. And as wealth becomes more

concentrated, the wealthy have more political power and they will do what they can to hold on to all the money they can—at

the expense of those in lower economic strata.

The economic relationships produce and reproduce stratifi

cation on a world level as well. Trade policies are designed by



122 Fred Magd off

those with power to benefit from them. This is not the time

or place to go into the history of GATT and the WTO. Suffice

it to say that these are agreements that significantly assist the

owners of capital in the advanced capitalist countries to have

their way—to have their patents and copyrights respected inter

nationally, to invest where they want and repatriate profits at

will, and to move capital in and out at will to take advantages of

differences in exchange rates, stock exchanges, environmental

and labor regulations. This does not mean that the internation

al trade rules and regulations may be of no help whatsoever to

any capitalist in the Third World, nor that they may not harm

some capitalists in advanced countries. But it has been the rule

of the powerful. There can be no "level playing field" when

there are differences in power. And the powerful do not always

play by the rules.

6. Goods and services are rationed according to ability to pay. The poor do not have access to good homes or adequate food

supplies because they do not have "effective" demand—although

they certainly have biologically-based demands. All goods and

services are commodities. People without sufficient effective

demand (money) have no right to any particular type of com

modity—whether it is a luxury such as a diamond bracelet or a

huge McMansion, or whether it is one of the necessities of life, such as a healthy physical environment, reliable food supplies, or access to quality medical care. Access to all commodities

is determined not by desire or need, but by having sufficient

money or credit to purchase them.

The wealthy and the well-off consume way beyond any logi cal conception of basic human needs, using up natural resourc

es and contributing to environmental degradation. At the same

time those in the lowest strata of society live in substandard

housing, are frequently exposed to industrial and waste site

pollution, and have insufficient access to food.

7. The drive to profits includes continual evaluation and imple mentation of ways to reduce costs and increase sales (and

commodity prices if monopoly/oligopoly conditions prevail).

Automation/mechanization is one of the ways to produce more

with fewer workers. The purpose of the drive to increased labor




productivity is not to give people more leisure time to read or

enjoy other forms of recreation. It is, rather, to increase profits. Cars can be produced now with a fraction of the labor needed

50 years ago. Some services can also be automated, as almost

anyone can attest who has tried to actually get some answers

from a human instead of a computerized answering service.

In most businesses, it is next to impossible, of course, to reach

a real person without great effort. Fewer and fewer people are

needed to produce basic necessities—goods and services. Al

though more and more stuff is produced, it is produced with

fewer laborers. Thus, by the very workings of the system—and this is one of its strengths—less labor is needed to provide

people's basic needs. However, this leaves many people either

under- or unemployed, or employed in non-productive labor, such as marketing representatives for pharmaceutical or fertil

izer companies, as well as a good percentage of the financial

sector, and for health insurance companies.

8. Capitalism is not just an economic system—by its workings and the power relations created by it, it fashions a political,

judicial, and social system to support the economic system.

People are at the service of the economy. Additionally, the

attitudes and mores needed for the smooth functioning of the

system—greed, individualism, competitiveness, exploitation of

others, and "consumerism" (the drive to purchase more and

more stuff unrelated to needs and even happiness) are incul

cated into people by schools, the media, and the workplace. There is an insidious connection between business inter

ests, politics, and law.3 These include outright bribery, in ad

dition to the more subtle sorts of buying access, friendship, and influence through campaign contributions and lobbying efforts. In addition, a culture develops among political leaders, which considers that what is good for capitalist business is good for the country. And within the legal system, the interests of

capitalists and their businesses are given almost every benefit

including having corporations treated as individuals with first

amendment rights to free speech, so that they can spend unlim

5 See Simon Johnson's "The Quiet Coup" for a discussion of the power of financial

interest in the U.S. political system.



124 Fred Magdoff

ited amounts of money on "issue" ads so long as they don't say "vote" or "don't vote" for so-and-so.

V. RESOLVING THE FOOD/AGRICULTURE, ENERGY, AND ENVIRONMENTAL CRISES

... it is our work with living soil that provides sustainable alter

natives to the triple crises of climate, energy, and food. No mat

ter how many songs on your iPod, cars in your garage, or books

on your shelf, it is plants' ability to capture solar energy that is

at the root of it all. Without fertile soil, what is life?

—Vandana Shiva (2008)

If each individual issue is looked at separately, there appear to

be technical solutions, and both large- and small-scale technolo

gies have been proposed for dealing with various aspects of the

triple crisis—from atmospheric engineering to help decrease global

warming, to more efficient hybrid automobiles, to planting trees

that absorb C02, to storing black carbon (biochar) in soils, to us

ing legumes that produce the nitrogen needed for grain crops in

stead of nitrogen fertilizer, to better intercity rail transit for pas

sengers and freight. However, there are potential issues with many of these technologies. For example, planetary bioengineering may have significant negative side effects. The effect on greenhouse gas emissions of hybrid or all-electric cars depends on the feedstock

used to generate electricity—if coal is the energy source for electric

generation, emissions will actually be higher than with an efficient

gasoline engine (Moyer, 2010). Although greater energy efficiency in transportation and industry is a laudable goal for many reasons,

as we have discussed above, this usually leads to greater resource

use. The problem with remedies proposed during the current dis

cussion of the triple crises is that the technologies are viewed as

"silver bullets" to solve individual issues, rather than as part of a

consideration of, and an attempt to deal with, the whole system

including environmental, political, economic, and social aspects. Scientific research and practical experiments of farmers in the

countries of the North as well as the South have indicated that

more sustainable agricultural systems are possible—ones that use

far less energy and irrigation water, use minimal amounts of pesti

cides, pollute water and air less, integrate animal and crop produc




tion on individual farms, and build soil health by increasing soil

organic matter (thereby also sequestering carbon). The principles and practices of a more ecologically-based agriculture are well es

tablished (Magdoff, 2007). But while techniques are readily avail

able for food production that is more ecologically sound than that

of the large-scale and very energy-intensive production systems of

conventional agriculture, it is hard for small-scale "sustainable" or

"organic" farms to compete. Even in the organic sector, the large farms with their financial and physical economies of scale predom inate in supermarkets. Small-scale ecologically sound farms have

made inroads by selling direct to the public or other end users

(such as schools and restaurants). However, in the future of high

energy costs and decreased fossil fuel availability, it will be critical

to have the predominant food system composed of farms that pro duce near the end user, use biologically fixed nitrogen (instead of

fertilizer), have better soil health, and control pests by enhanced

management of the agroecosystem (rather than with pesticides).

Although such systems use more labor than highly mechanized

large-scale production, there are literally tens of millions of people

unemployed around the world who have few prospects of obtain

ing jobs. Ecological agricultural practices carried out by small- to

medium-scale farmers—working cooperatively or individually—will

help the global South deal with the crises of food, the environ

ment, and energy; enormous efforts will be needed to implement such systems.

There are some who see some of the problems that capitalism

brings, but think that it can and should be reformed. According to

Benjamin Barber (2009): "The struggle for the soul of capitalism is

... a struggle between the nation's economic body and its civic soul:

a struggle to put capitalism in its proper place, where it serves our

nature and needs rather than manipulating and fabricating whims

and wants. Saving capitalism means bringing it into harmony with

spirit—with prudence, pluralism and those 'things of the public'... that define our civic souls. A revolution of the spirit." There is one

very large problem with this plea—capitalism has no soul, can nev

er have a soul, and in its very nature it must manipulate and fabri

cate whims and wants. Some have proposed "green capitalism"—in which products are produced using environmentally friendly tech

nologies and in which people and businesses can offset the C02 emissions their activities cause—as an answer to the environmental



126 Fred Magdoff

crisis. However, if the promotion of ever-greater consumption and

growth without end is not changed, "green capitalism" will at best

slow down the rate of environmental destruction. There are also

numerous problems with carbon offsets, including the lack of close

regulation and the lack of a guarantee that any offset project will

be maintained forever (Rogers, 2010). In the absence of systemic change, there certainly are things

that have been done, and more can be done in the future, to lessen

the negative effects of capitalism. For example, there is no practi cal reason why the United States can't have a better social welfare

system, including universal health care, as is the case in many other

advanced capitalist countries—although some of these are being re

versed as Europe goes through its economic crisis. The same goes for insuring sufficient quantities of quality food and good housing for everyone—the problem is that there are very powerful forces

that strongly oppose these projects. Governments can pass laws

and implement regulations to curb the worst of the environmental

problems. They can have regulatory agencies that actually regulate in the best interests of the people and the environment, instead of

protecting the interests of the very groups they supposedly regu late. And more environmentally sound agricultural practices can

be encouraged and harmful ones discouraged. In the meantime people and organizations working locally and

regionally, in the United States and abroad, show that the normal

ways of doing business can be bypassed and new ways can be found

for relating people to people and goods to people. CSA (Commu

nity Supported Agriculture) farms constitute a prime example, where the people who join share the risk, where income-based slid

ing scale fees for shares are common, and where some connections

have been made with local schools or hospital kitchens. Most mid

dlemen are bypassed and farmers regain a direct and strong con

nection to the people who consume their food. Another example is co-housing, projects that purposely attempt to mix generations and socio-economic status. It is wonderful to have such examples, because they demonstrate that other ways of organizing society and economy—at least at the local level—are possible. The small

village of Gaviotas in Colombia is another example of organizing

society along principles different than straight capitalist lines.

Another system is possible and needed. Despite examples that

can be given of more progressive ways to relate to one another in a




capitalist society or to grow food or to use energy more efficiently, the real solution to the triple crises—food, environment, and en

ergy-is to create a different economic system, one at the service

of humanity and the environment on which we all depend. This

means making economic decisions that occur at local, regional, and multiregional levels by democratic procedures (instead of by

private capital)—decisions such as: how to supply everyone with

the basic human needs of food, shelter, clothing, health care, edu

cational, and cultural opportunities; how much of the economic

surplus should be consumed and how much invested; and where

the investments should be directed. Ecologically based agriculture, carried out mainly by small to medium-size farms, can become the

norm in such a society. The distribution of land as well as food, health care, housing, etc. should be based on human need and not

market forces. This doesn't mean that markets will cease to exist, but that they no longer become one of the primary cues to make

investment decisions. This is, of course, easier said than done.

The Community Councils of Venezuela—where people decide

the priorities for social investment in their communities and re

ceive the resources to implement them—is an example of planning for human needs at the local level—for such important needs as

schools, clinics, roads, electricity, running water. In a truly trans

formed society, community councils need to interact with regional and multiregional efforts. And the use of the surplus of society must be based on their decisions.

A new kind of society—in which both the economy and political life are under true democratic social control—is needed to solve

these crises of capitalism. One in which decisions regarding the

investment of the society's surplus are not made by a few individu

als on the basis of what will return the most profit, but rather by the people according to their needs, including the need for a clean

and thriving environment.

REFERENCES

Barber, Benjamin (2009). "A Revolution in Spirit," The Nation, CCLXXXVIII, Febru

ary 9, 22-24. http://www.thenation.com/article/revolution-spirit.

Capgemini & Merrill Lynch Wealth Management, "Introduction," World Wealth Re

port 2009. http://us.capgemini.com/insights-resources/publications/2009-world-wealth

report/.



128 Fred Magdoff

Cullen, Father Shay (2010). "The Travels of Sheila O'Hara Part 3," Preda Foundation

Inc. http://www.preda.org/main/archives/2010/rl0051901.html. Earth Policy Institute (2006). "World Grain Production, Total and Per Person, 1950

2006," electronic database. Washington, DC: Earth Policy Institute. http://www.

earth-policy.org/index.php ?/indicators/C54/ Economist (2010). "Flame wars; Chemical Pollution and Fertility," The Economist,

CCCXCIV, January 30, Issue 8667. http://www.economist.com/node/15391226htory_ id=15391226.

economy watch.com (2010). "World GDP," http://www.economywatch.com/world_economy/

?page=full, accessed January 16.

Fahrenthold, David A. (2010). "Environmental Protection Agency Will List Bisphenol 'Chemical of Concern'," Washington Post, March 30.

Forbes.com. "World's Billionaires," March 8, 2007. http://www.forbes.com/wealth/

billionaires, accessed October 31, 2011.

Foster, John Bellamy & Magdoff, Fred (2009). The Great Financial Crisis: Causes and

Consequences. New York: Monthly Review Press.

Foster, John Bellamy; Holleman, Hannah & McChesney, Robert W. (2008). "The U.S.

Imperial Triangle and Military Spending," Monthly Review, LX, 5, 1-19.

Global Exchange (2010). "CAFTA: Central American Free Trade Agreement Misses

Implementation Date." http://www.globalexchange.org/campaigns/cafta/ accessed

June 23, 2010.

Hart-Landsberg, Martin (2010). "The U.S. Economy and China: Capitalism, Class,

and Crisis," Monthly Review, LXI, 9, 14-31.

Hubbard, Kristina (2009). "Out of Hand: Farmers Face the Consequences of a Con

solidated Seed Industry." Stoughton, WI: National Family Farm Coalition, http://

farmertofarmercampaign.com/Out%20of%20Hand.FullReport.pdf.

Johnson, Simon (2009). "The Quiet Coup," The Atlantic Monthly, May. http://www.the

atlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/05/the-quiet-coup/7364/.

Katz, Jonathan 2010. "With Cheap Food Imports, Haiti Can't Feed Itself," Associated

Press, March 21.

Kennickell, Arthur B. (2009). "Ponds and Streams: Wealth and Income in the U.S.,

1989 to 2007," Federal Reserve Board Working Paper 2009-13, 55, 63.

Landrigan, Philip J. (2010). "What Causes Autism? Exploring the Environmental Con

tribution," Current Opinion in Pediatrics, XXII, 2, 219-25.

Lebow, Victor (1955). "Price Competition in 1955," Journal of Retailing, Spring, http:// hundredgoals.files.wordpress.eom/2009/05/journal-of retailing.pdf.

Lehman, Stan (2010). "Brazil Gov't Plans to Limit Foreign Land Purchases," Associated

Press, June 22.

Magdoff, Fred (2007). "Ecological Agriculture: Principles, Practices, and Constraints,"

Journal of Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems, XXII, 2, 109-17.

Magdoff, Fred (2008). "The Political Economy and Ecology of Biofuels," Monthly Re

view, LX, 3, 34-50.

Magdoff, Fred & Foster, John Bellamy (2010). "What Every Environmentalist Needs to

Know About Capitalism," Monthly Review, LXII, 10, 1-30.

Magdoff, Fred & Magdoff, Harry (2004). "Disposable Workers: Today's Reserve Army

of Labor," Monthly Review, LV, 12, 18-35.

Magdoff, Fred & Yates, Michael (2009). The ABCs of the Economic Crisis: What Working

People Need to Know. New York: Monthly Review Press.

Magdoff, Harry (1969). The Age of Imperialism. New York: Monthly Review Press.




Marx, Karl & Engels, Frederick. The Communist Manifesto (orig. 1848). http://www.

marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm.

McChesney, Robert W.; Foster, John Bellamy; Stole, Inger L. & Holleman, Hannah

(2009). "The Sales Effort and Monopoly Capital," Monthly Review, LX, 11, 1-23.

Miller, Matthew & Greenberg, Duncan, eds., 2009. "The Richest People in America,"

Forbes, Sept. 30. http://www.forbes.com/2009/09/30/forbes-400-gates-buffett-wealth

rich-list-09_land.html.

Moyer, Michael (2010). "The Dirty Truth about Plug-in Hybrids," Scientific American,

CCCIII, 1, 54-55.

Nord, Mark; Andrews, Margaret & Carlson, Steven (2005). "Household Food Security in the United States, 2004." Economic Research Report Number 11, Economic

Research Service, USDA. Washington, DC: Economic Research Service, http://

www.ers.usda.gov/Publications/ERRll/.

Owen, David (2010). "The Inventor's Dilemma," The New Yorker, LXXXVI, May 17,

42-50. Parker, Hillary (2010). "A Sweet Problem: Princeton Researchers Find that High-Fruc

tose Corn Syrup Prompts Considerably More Weight Gain." http://www.princeton.

edu/main/news/archive/S26/91/22K07/index.xml?section=science, accessed June 23,

2010. Pimentel, David (2010). "Reducing Energy Inputs in the Agricultural Production Sys

tem," in Magdoff & Tokar, eds., Agriculture and Food in Crisis: Conflict, Resistance,

Renewal. New York: Monthly Review Press, 241-52.

Robinson, Joan (1979). "What are the Questions?" inj. Robinson, (ed.), Collected Eco

nomic Papers, V. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1-29.

Rogers, Heather (2010). Green Gone Wrong: How Our Economy is Undermining the Envi

ronmental Revolution. New York: Scribner.

Schumpeter, Joseph (1934). The Theory of Economic Development. Cambridge, MA: Har

vard Univ. Press.

Editors, Scientific American (2010), "Chemical Controls," Scientific American, CCCII,

4, 30. Shiva, Vandana (2008). Soil Not Oil: Environmental fustice in an Age of Climate Crisis.

Cambridge, MA: South End.

Smith, Adam (1981). An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, Book

I, chap. 2, para. 2. (orig. 1776). http://oll.libertyfund.org/220/111839/2312795. Swann, Christopher & Cyran, Robert (2010). "Canada Oil Sands Are Still a Gamble,"

New York Times, April 5.

United States Department of Agriculture. "Food Security in the United States: Key Statistics and Graphics." Washington, DC: Economic Research Service, http://

www.ers.usda.gov/Briefing/FoodSecurity/stats_graphs.htm#how_many, accessed Feb

ruary 11, 2011.

Viertel, Josh (2010). "Why Big Ag Won't Feed the World," Atlantic Monthly, http://food. theatlantic.com/sustainability/why-big-ag-wont-feed-the-world-l.php, accessed Feb. 13,

2010. Wills, Gary (2009). "Entangled Giant," New York Review of Books, LVI, 16, 4.



Multiple Crises as Symptoms of an Unsustainable System

Documents

Transcript of Multiple Crises as Symptoms of an Unsustainable System