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The Upside of Down, by Thomas Homer-Dixon
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Homer-Dixon makes the comparison of earthquakes to social systems and how they exhibit foreshocks. He explains how the Iraq war, 9/11, the 2005 urban riots in France, and Hurricane Katrina might be seen as foreshocks of a coming global breakdown. He highlights five tectonic stresses that are accumulating deep beneath the surface of our societies – population, energy, environment, climate and economics. Although these stresses are deeply invisible, their effects on the world are immensely powerful. These stresses are slowly building and can release their force without warning. He emphasizes energy stress and the central role it plays as society’s master resource.
Homer-Dixon writes how the events of 9/11 and the Blackout of 2003 were complete surprises that materialized out of a complex world that we only remotely understand. The effects of both were greatly amplified by the intricate networks that tightly connect people, money, information, materials and energy. He reminds us of the shock people felt toward the simultaneous failure of portable phones, automatic tellers, debit card machines, electronic hotel room doors, electric garage doors and almost all clocks. Most disconcerting during the Blackout of 2003 was the loss of the constant flow of information that’s become a drug in our lives. People were cut off from television, email and worst of all, the Web.
Homer-Dixon explains that globalization is as much about the spread of new diseases and the arrival of shiploads of poor migrants on our shores as it is about trade negotiations, farm subsidies, and currency convertibility. Greater connectivity and speed allow what would have once been mere local shocks and disruptions to cascade outward as never before, as was the case during the Blackout of 2003 when shockwaves were sent from Ohio across Eastern North America, and during the 2003 SARS emerge in Southern China. Violent groups have also learned how to convert civilian technologies into appalling weapons – as Al Qaeda terrorists did.
Synopsis by Michelle Thomas
Plan. Provide. Protect…The Sovereign Deed Promise™