New Enlightenment

Summary

After establishing regulations on the use of all resources and the outputs of all harmful substances, resources continued to decrease and the environment continued to deteriorate. Initially, it was easy to reduce harmful pollutants and reduce the use of some resources. However, as time progressed it became more difficult to reduce green house gasses and further limit the use of resources while maintaining the same level of consumerism. The regulations needed to maintain sustainable levels became impossible to enforce. The inevitable collapse of the environment or loss of resources had only been delayed by market regulation. Long term-orientated people foresaw this collapse and changed from normal consumer behavior to only consuming products that had no impact on resources and the environment. For example, they changed from reducing carbon dioxide to producing something else that did not produce carbon dioxide at all. These long-term oriented countries lead the world in innovating a cradle to cradle lifestyle. After realizing the market potential for cradle to cradle products short-term oriented nations followed suit and saved the environment and its natural resources.

Description

2010

The world faced a serious threat from global warming, which also had negative effects on the ecosystems and biodiversity. Several natural resources such as oil were becoming more and more scarce. The world had begun to move into an era of high resource prices. Growth in population and consumption per person through the past fifty years had put severe demands on the supply of commodities such as oil and food. Many people and countries were already aware of the situation and ready to resolve the problems through global cooperation instead of individual and less effective efforts.

The leaders of governments with the largest economies met and acknowledged that the climate is changing due to human influence. They set more stringent regulations on carbon dioxide production that included more industries. Unfortunately, the number of storms, sea levels, and the temperature continued to increase during the 2010’s, however the increase was at a slower rate. People moved away from regions where storms are a constant threat, like Southern United States and Southeast Asia. The insurance prices were too high and they were tired of rebuilding after every storm or worrying about when the next one will hit. Droughts in other areas like Western North America and Australia began to become unbearable. People moved from unstable areas to more stable environments. These conditions created massive movements of people. These movements caused businesses to collapse and local governments to go further into debt in unstable regions. Stable regions faced high unemployment and a strain on their infrastructure due to a massive influx of people. Land owners in the stable regions made lots of money while people from unstable regions lost all of their investments. Also during this period, resources and species begin to disappear, most notably blue fin tuna and the polar bear.

Watching these resources disappear woke up several long-term thinking countries like China, Japan, and Europe. They began to meet and review their regulations and agreed to lower their requirements even more. These market regulations brought other short-term thinking countries into the discussions. Short-term thinking countries used the size of their economies to weaken the original meaning of the new regulations and the new trading system. Illegal trading was prevalent through out the system.

2020

Unfortunately, the result of these weakened agreements is that nothing changed. The number of storms, temperature, and sea levels continued to rise. The movement of people away from undesirable areas multiplied and resources dwindled. The long-term oriented people realized that the collapse of the environment was still inevitable through market regulation. They made a conscious change from reducing pollution to not polluting at all. Instead of burning less fossil fuels that produce carbon dioxide, they didn’t use any fossil fuels at all. Instead of eating less over-fished species, they eat none. This was not easy to do individually. The increase in people wanting this lifestyle started several social networks that shared information about which products contained pollutants or limited resources. These social networks started to lobby both businesses and governments to include an easy to read symbol system that simply shows whether the product is sustainable or not.

Some companies realize the demand for cradle-to-cradle products and came up with their own labels. The first companies in each industry to set their own standards for non-pollution had the best chances to set the standards for their industry. These first movers lobby the government to spread their standards that were already in use across their industry. The government followed with cradle-to-cradle regulation of all industries. Companies that did not follow the cradle-to-cradle trend fell behind or collapsed.

Long-term thinking nations made cradle-to-cradle regulations across their entire nations while short-term thinking nations left cradle-to-cradle thinking to grow in its localized industries or regions.

2030

The deterioration of the environment slowed but did not stop. There is a continual battle between the environment and what was left of the old consumerism mindset. Even when there was a gradual awakening of consumers to cradle-to-cradle living, there was still be a large part of the population that wanted to continue to live as they once did before. The largest part of the population that opposed the cradle-to-cradle movement was the Americans with their high consumption lifestyle. They had the most to change. The largest segment of the population that will pushed for the largest change were the Chinese with their high long-term orientation and collective movement.

The world temperature, storms, and sea level growth became close to flat. People shared an attitude of acting together in order to prevent a further drive towards ‘runaway’ climate change. Resources were consumed more rapidly by the short-term thinking nations for a short period due to low prices caused by the drop in demand from long-term thinking nations. Local movements within the short-term thinking nations pushed the nation towards the cradle-to-cradle lifestyle. Energy consumption dropped off dramatically. Energy came from a variety of sources sourced locally from renewable resources with no emissions.

China, Japan, and Europe continued to push for global cooperation for cradle-to-cradle living. In the United States and India, local and regional regulations were aligned with national and international regulations.

Common Characteristics

Environment: There are an increasing number of violent storms and temperatures and sea levels are rising due to green house gas emissions.
Values: The difference between long and short term orientation will be the difference in success and failure.
Businesses: Businesses adopting cradle to cradle thinking succeed far more than traditional businesses.
Resources: Resources such as oil, tuna, and polar bears will run out within 44 years.

Key Uncertainties

The key uncertainty in this scenario is whether or not the habits of China, Japan, and Europe can influence the habits of heavy consumers and polluters like the United States. Will China move quickly enough away from its market driven economy to a cradle-to-cradle driven lifestyle? Will they put the environment as a higher priority than their people?

Timeline