By Chris Smaje, Small Farm Future
Archaeologist Joseph Tainter, whose book The Collapse of Complex Societies I mentioned in my previous post, uses this working definition: “A society has collapsed when it displays a rapid, significant loss of an established level of sociopolitical complexity”.
By Damaris Zehner, Integrity of Life
Collapse can’t happen soon enough, as far as I’m concerned. By collapse, I mean the breakdown of the complexities of our current society. It's not that I long for the feral world, red in tooth and claw, portrayed in collapse fiction, although I know there are those who fantasize about mastering a post-apocalyptic wasteland.
By Asher Miller, Rob Dietz, Jason Bradford, Resilience.org
If you recognize controversies and hypocrisies like these, then you know what it’s like to live in Crazy Town. Laugh along with Asher, Rob, and Jason (mostly so you don’t cry) as they explore the back alleys, figure out how to navigate sanely, and even find an escape route every once in awhile.
By Richard Heinberg, Resilience.org
It is only by pulling together that we can hope to salvage and protect what is most intrinsically valuable about our world, and perhaps even improve lives over the long term.
By Brian Davey, Feasta
The historian and archeologist Joseph Tainter made a name for himself with his book The Collapse of Complex Societies. At a certain point civilisations collapse because they become more and more complex
By Brian Davey, Resilience.org
But what does it mean to say that a society becomes “more complex”?
By Brian Davey, Feasta
Economists make forecasts about what is going to happen in the world of that great God – money.
By John Michael Greer, The Archdruid Report
I suppose you could call the era of dissolution the Rodney Dangerfield of collapse, though it’s not so much that it gets no respect; it generally doesn’t even get discussed.
By John Michael Greer, The Archdruid Report
The fourth of the stages in the sequence of collapse we’ve been discussing is the era of breakdown.
By John Michael Greer, The Archdruid Report
Over the last week or so, I’ve heard from a remarkable number of people who feel that a major crisis is in the offing.
By John Michael Greer, The Archdruid Report
As the conventional wisdom of flat-earth cornucopians crashes and burns around us, it's time for some real heresy.
By John Michael Greer, The Archdruid Report
One of the things my readers ask me most often, in response to this blog’s exploration of the ongoing decline and impending fall of modern industrial civilization, is what I suggest people ought to do about it all.