The Business To Community Challenge (BCC)  

Reflections on Hamburg Climate Futures Outlook 2023  

  by john suter

For readers who take the time to read the extensive HCFOutlook 2023, the results are both surprising and sobering.  According to the authors, two of the biggest obstacles that prevent us from keeping below the Paris Agreement target of 1.5 Celsius are “Consumption Patterns and Corporate Responses.”   Many of these same problems were outlined in the white board video “New Climate Dice and the Media” in 2012.     Youtube dot com/watch?v=iH3Gx_qjPOc 

Outlook 23 brings up the fact that what we call “tipping points” are not really tipping points, but rather measurements that show the rate of change in our environment.  That is what the temperature measurements do.  But even though temperature is simply an indicator it may be misleading to minimize this when saying there will be minimal temperature change until 2050. 

It is not the actual temperature change that is so dangerous.  Many of us live in climates that have a yearly swing in temperature of 50 degrees Celsius or more (90 degrees Fahrenheit).  What’s the big deal about 1.5?   We humans can put on layers of clothing and turn on the heater when the temperature drops, or turn on the AC when it gets warm. Plants can’t do that.  So the big deal is that we will lose our food supply.  This is something that Lester Brown from the Earth Island Institute finally realized and wrote about in “Plan B, 4.0”

Ice melting is a linear process and it will not show us a tipping point until it is all gone.  Ice turning to water at the freezing point takes 334 Joules of energy for each gram of water as the crystals “unwind”.  This means a lot of energy from the sun that would normally go into increasing the air temperature is hidden from us because ice acts as a buffer.  When the ice is gone, then the energy from the sun will raise the air temperature much faster.  A tipping point means that humans have lost control.  Positive feedback loops may take over and not stop until all the forests have burned.  If grass roots people knew what lies ahead they would stop and pay attention, talk about it, and find solutions.  At this point we do not have these social skills.   

Resistance to social change is related to the fact that each of us belong to at least one group and within that group have some well-defined or vaguely-defined position.  These are positions that we could lose if we don’t act according to the spoken and unspoken norms.  Our ability to form social hierarchies and create divisions of labor is both a great strength but also a point of vulnerability.  Difficult jobs are foisted upon other people in the group or onto outsiders.  Group membership may also depend on how we act and what knowledge we bring, since this may help the group advance.  New information, even scientific information, cannot be pushed onto the group until there is some discussion.   

The authors of Outlook 23 undoubtedly believe it would be nice if political leaders read the report and “do something!”   Yet leaders face the same social obstacles that all of us do, the  problem related to finding and moving useful information.  We should be doing experiments in the social realm.  One does not have to be a social scientist to do an experiment.  We are all scientists in some way.  Do something, observe, change, repeat.  That is the scientific method. 

What we call “culture” arises from the interaction of a natural environment and a genetic pool, resulting in stories, songs, and customs that help the group survive.  Things that help the group survive are called “moral”.   Groups can make adjustments if the environment changes slowly, but if changes are too slow or invisible, such as the buildup of carbon in the atmosphere, then people don’t think about it.  We need to create the tools that make time and space for people to talk more, think, and talk again, mostly in private.  This is what will be needed to find and Move Useful Information (MUI).

The Overton Window describes policies that are acceptable to a general population but it may be for a population that is under no tension, no gradient to get their attention.  External threats provide one type of gradient that can get people’s attention, as do tax incentives.  Both of these engage people to create a story for their own future. 

FORCE FIELD

As sociologist Max Weber noted, the power of the state comes from a monopoly on the use of Coercive Force of Arms (CFA).  Just ask Hong Kong.  The United Nations cannot force people to take action in the same way that sovereign nations do.  Along with CFA comes monopoly on the money supply.  This is not all bad since it helps to standardize trade.  

But a monopoly on CFA and the money supply from the top creates a kind of force field that can make it difficult for Useful Information (UI) to work it’s way up the ladder.  So politicians are often ignorant of things they should know.  The irony is that politicians are the ones who maintain this structure that makes them ignorant.  

Maybe we don’t all have to cut back on carbon.  The top tier of society will not have to cut back or change their lifestyle if everyone else cuts back enough.  People at the top are unable to hear the call for a “No Fly Wednesday”, a sacred day each week during which there is a “flying fast” in order to take time to ponder, pray, and think about how else we can cut back on carbon.  

It can be helpful to define power more broadly to include “getting things done” (GTD) or “slowing things that already have momentum” (SloMo).  Both of these require the ability to find and filter information, even at the lowest level.  The ability of humans to form a social hierarchy depends on good communication.  Without good communication the hierarchy collapses.  

Go Right . . . Go Orthogonal to the Force Field

If we cannot push UI up the ladder to leaders, then one way out of this Force Field is to create an orthogonal (right angle) force by pushing UI laterally toward the next town, the next Neighborhood Community (NHC).  Push that NHC to be Sustainable on Low Carbon (SLC).  Why should anyone do this?  It’s not in my best interest.   No, right, but it can be made into a game.   Dropping a ball into a hole or thru a basket are just games, and temporary, but they engage so many people and lots of money.  We need to use competition to find answers to climate issues.  

Games creates gradients that cause people to sit up and pay attention.  Anyone can create a gradient for small groups, maybe a dozen people.  It is not being a salesman but creating a playing field and a challenge.  Judges too must be local and randomly chosen.  Followup Discussion Questions (DQ) come from whoever sponsors the game.  Some games will collapse.  Other games will start seeds for new ideas.  A mini-Overton might be described as that which will be acceptable to the local NHC since each has a different environment and different people. 

The Business To Community Challenge (BCC) – A New Hope

Consumption Patterns and Corporate Responses (CPCR) were identified as major points of resistance to social change.  Yet these two are certainly related and can work together to develop better stories, action, and real change.  Businesses must tell stories that have some connection to reality.  Wall Street is now raising billions to be invested in carbon capture, but this may be a wasted effort.  Anyone who studies thermodynamics knows that capturing a tiny carbon dioxide molecule and pushing it down a hole will consume as much energy as it saves.  This scheme will make money for Wall Street, just like carbon cap and trade, but Wall Street executives will line up for photo ops with their new EV, but mostly it’s a waste of resources.  

Making change from the top may be too fast and provide too many opportunities for graft.  

There are mixed signs that anyone at the top really want change.  They may not know how.   The smaller size of a NHC where people can meet fact-to-face may be optimal for finding and moving information on a number of issues, but BCC must be efficient and gain support.  A key point is the synergy that happens when the same number of individuals work or play games together to decrease carbon.  It’s more effective than the same number of individual efforts.  

Any business could take the lead and challenge a cross section of players and judges from any community.  If there is no interest, pick different players and increase the prize.  At some point there will be engagement.  Community members may not know what questions to ask, so finding a Discussion Question can itself be the goal of a game.  Business has energy. Communities have ideas.  Plug it in.  This is not just an invitation but a challenge.  Even tobacco companies and climate deniers can participate if the DQ is on some specific issue of finding waste or how to build a solar panel.  

One game might attempt to build a “Ten-Two Group” with ten breadwinners who are willing to support two among them with basic needs for some period of time.  These basic needs may be Maslow Plus (Food, Rent, Insurance).  Once started, this will be an entirely self-contained effort with the group of ten making all their own decisions for two in their group to do any kind of work that is acceptable to the other eight.  This gives the group more power and flexibility than ten separate individuals.  

Some climate groups should stay and work within the existing vertical force field to convince leaders on the how and why to make changes.  Other climate groups might do better by working at right angles and push communities to take charge of their own future but still remain engaged with other communities around them.  

This model can even be trans-national with town-to-town transactions and translators.  This route may be more effective than traditional attempts to push ideas up to our leaders, hoping they will talk to other leaders and then down to their citizens.  Traditional methods are useful but also beckon to opportunists who have been known to take big chunks of money.  

Experiment with Discussion Questions (DQ):

Where are we wasting energy and money, both at home and at a government level?  

How do we approach and push the next NHC “up the hill” toward SLC?

How do we create other types of gradients, besides prize money, that will engage people? 

Where do we start to create Ten-Two groups?   Could it be in the Next NHC.  

Citizens need the tools to talk and think, but also need a gradient to engage other people for short periods of time, over and over again – just like a game.  Businesses can get it started.