Economic progress is heading toward collapse. There are converging ecological crises looming on the horizon of modern civilization: climate change, peak oil, overpopulation, unsustainable consumption of water, fish and food. The world is on a collision course against the limits of the ecosystem. Modern societies are consuming, polluting and expanding as if there is no tomorrow. Indeed, there may not be one.
In Progress or Collapse, Roberto De Vogli guides us on an irreverent journey throughout the crises of progress, the so-called "externalities" of the current socioeconomic system. The book explores the interconnections between the environmental degradation and the psychological, social, cultural, political and economic changes affecting modern societies. It is no coincidence, the author argues, that multiple ecological crises are occurring in tandem with other symptoms of social breakdown: rising mental disorders, mindless consumerism, materialistic conformism, status competition, civic disengagement, startling economic inequalities, global financial instability and widespread political inertia.
Progress or Collapse is not an original study. It is a work of synthesis. It is a conceptual blending of seemingly distant facts and factors. It is an attempt to put a wide variety of disciplines under the same theoretical roof. The book invites the reader to look at society and the global economy from a critical, lateral perspective. Of course, there are the multiple underlying causes of the converging global crises of our time. This book does not cover all of them, but concentrates on the most profound one: the market greed doctrine.
In this hard-hitting analysis, the author argues that, in recent decades, the global economy has been dominated by a pathological ideology based on two articles of faith: the greed creed and the belief in the market God. The greed creed states that people are nothing but selfish profiteers in perpetual search for status and wealth. The belief in the market God is the conviction that all social and human affairs are best regulated as market exchanges.
Under command of the market greed doctrine, modern society is now spinning out of control. It is like a train, without a driver, approaching a precipice. What is to be done to stop it? How can we change its direction? How can we halt our progress toward collapse?
Given the current distribution of power and wealth, and the state of psychological and political inertia in which we are trapped, chances to redefine the economy around alternative values seem rather slim. Yet, the history of human emancipation has often been shaped by giant leaps forward and unthinkable civic advances. In the past, citizens organized in social movements have prevailed over almost insurmountable obstacles. Often, they have managed to overcome "the limits of the possible." We do not know whether this will happen again in the future. What we do know, however, is that there may be no future if this does not happen again.