David Keith: A case for climate geoengineering (MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 2013), 2013, 174 pages, chapter notes. No index, glossary, photos or graphics. Compact, may serve as an introduction and even as basic reference text (alas! - for the lack of an index and glossary).
Abbreviations used in article:
CC: climate change
CO2: carbon dioxide
GHG: greenhouse gases. GHG are responsible for global warming and climate change. The most important GHG are carbon dioxide and methane.
GW: global warming
Global warming (GW) and the subsequent climate change (CC) threaten, in the next few decades, to disrupt regional climates upon which traditional food production systems depend, affecting crop and livestock choices, yields, timing of planting and harvesting, pest and disease risks, droughts, extreme weather damage risks, erosion rates, availability of water.. - note 1. Such regional disruption of food production would likely entail great misery, large scale population declines and an enormous rise is the risk of war and terrorism. For example GW causes sea levels to rise: through the thermal expansion of water and glacial melt in north and south polar regions.
impact of sea level rise on Pakistan coastal zone
http://www.dawn.com/news/1169339
If things get really bad, low lying countries like Pakistan with nuclear weapons might be tempted to clear adjacent regions of their neighbor's territory of their population with exterminating nuclear strikes before invading and resettling their threatened coastal population on the "cleared" land. (Historical analog: the clearing and resettling of aboriginal populations by European colonists in North and South America.)
Since attempts to reduce GHG emissions to safe levels have failed - a case of "too little, too late" - some researches have proposed "geoengineering" fixes to compensate the negative impact of GW / CC.
book review: Earthmasters by Clive Hamilton
Geoengineering technologies fall into several broad categories:
1- carbon removal: offending GHG are removed directly at the source or from the atmosphere. Some technologies attempt to "sequester" or lock up carbon in a secure place: exhausted oil fields, natural underground caverns, absorption by minerals or photosynthetic algae or bacteria (to produce food and biofuels). Generally, these schemes propose capturing CO2 emissions at the site of production although some recent proposals are based on chemical absorption from the general atmosphere.
2- solar geoengineering: these technologies attempt to compensate for the increased quantity of heat retained by the atmosphere by reducing the amount of sunlight reaching the earth's surface. They aim to reduce the flow of energy heating the earth.
A case for geoengineering pleads for a well-studied, gradually phased-in multilateral (global) adoption of solar geoengineering. The technologies reviewed by Keith may be described as first generation: the "low hanging fruit", the most obvious and least costly applications.
"It is possible to cool the planet by injecting reflective particles of sulfuric acid into the upper atmosphere where they would scatter a tiny fraction of incoming sunlight back to space, creating a thin sunshade for the ground beneath.. it is cheap and technically easy. The specialized aircraft and dispersal systems required to get started could be deployed in a few years for the price of a Hollywood blockbuster.. [It could] stop GW; it could increase crop yields, particularly those in the hottest and poorest parts of the world."
"Solar geoengineering is an extraordinarily powerful tool. But it is also dangerous. It entails novel environmental risks. And, like CC itself, its effects are unequal, so even if it makes many farmers better off, others will be worse off. It is so cheap that almost any nation could afford to alter the earth's climate, a fact that may accelerate the shifting balance of global power, raising security concerns that could, in the worst case, lead to war. If misused, geoengineering could drive extraordinarily rapid CC, imperiling global food supply. In the long run, stable control of geoengineering may require new forms of global governance and prove as disruptive to the political order of the 21st century as nuclear weapons were for the 20th." Pages X - XI (emphasis added)
One of the virtues of this compact, easy reading text is that the author aims for a "neutral objectivity". He states what geoengineering is - he is a researcher in the field - and what are the plausible (and implausible) risks of employing it. He describes why we might need to use it in the next few decades: disruptive GW / CC and resultant geopolitical instability. Then he presents the case why he advocates a cautious, gradual deployment within the next few years.
Injection of a fine mist of sulfuric acid droplets in the upper atmosphere, reflecting sunlight back into space, is perhaps the easiest, cheapest and most well understood proposal to date. It is founded on the observation of planetary cooling following massive volcanic eruptions which inject sulfuric acid aerosols into the stratosphere such as the massive Mt Pinatubo eruption (Philippines) of 1991 which produced a global cooling of .6 C (1 degree Fahrenheit).
Thar she blows! Mount Pinatubo, 1991
Cooling the earth to a significant degree would require a fleet of modified commercial or military jets. It could be implemented today.. Demonstration projects - to test the technology and observe negative side effects - could cost a "mere" $700 million annually. This is a bit less than half the US military budget of 2015 ($1,600 million), and the burden would be shared among the nations of the earth..
Sulfuric acid aerosol injection has side effects, often opposing, and not distributed equally around the world. Algal growth would be stimulated in some parts of the world ocean, producing more food for fish and possibly absorbing a bit of CO2 in the process. Other parts of the ocean would reach toxic levels of acidity, reducing photosynthetic activity and biomass production. Some regions of the globe will cool more than others; modification of temperature regimes disrupts weather patterns and weather regulating oceanic currents like the Gulf Stream. Some regions will receive more rain, others will become drier. Though the planet will cool and agricultural production rise, there will be winners and losers. The big problem here, of course, is how to redistribute gains - and compensate losses - on a global scale in a just, equitable fashion. Given current geo-political tensions, such redistribution will prove much, much harder than actually implementing aerosol injection and monitoring its effects. Dr Keith, to his credit, addresses such difficulties, being forced finally to admit that a new system of international governance will be required. Good luck on that one!
Aerosol injection should be "ramped up" gradually with close monitoring of side effects, both positive and negative. Fortunately, its effects are reversible. Stop injecting aerosols into the stratosphere and, in a year or two, the droplets have descended. In aerosol injection's favor, Dr Keith argues that crop loss due to heat stress and flooding afflicts most harshly on the world' poorest. It is thus the poorest who could benefit the most - if aerosol injection "works" ( produces more positive effects than negative ones).
Why GW is really bad. The unprecedented speed of GW / CC will prove costly. Sea costs will flood forcing mass inland migrations. This is really bad because most people actually live near costs and much of the world is already overpopulated. Eleven of the fifteen largest cities of the world lie along sea coasts or on river estuaries. 53% of the US population lives near a seacoast. Relocating climate refugees inland (where else can they go ?) steals land from agricultural production. Our overpopulated world has already put all the arable land under the plow. Where, then, will hundreds of millions of coastal climate refugees go? The moon? Mars? Not likely..
Then there's the question of the increasing frequency of extreme weather events.
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg2/en/ch19s19-3-6.html
As the world warms, evaporation increases. Water vapor carries with it the energy which was required to raise the energy of water molecules from the liquid state to vapor (the "heat of evaporation" or "latent heat"). The hydrological cycle comprises the cyclic movement of water from the liquid state (lakes, oceans), through
- evaporation,
- transport of vapor by circulating air currents,
- recondensation of vapor as precipitation,
- flow of water downhill to lakes and oceans, completing the cycle.
Increased evaporation means two things: 1- more energy (latent heat) carried by the atmosphere, 2- increased speed circulation of water in the hydrological cycle. The big wheel in the sky turns faster and faster.
http://transparencycanada.blogspot.ca/2013/06/future-climate-wither-our-weather.html
The result? More droughts in arid regions, greater storm violence with increased risk of flood, high wind, hail and lightning damage.The real costs of GW / CC arise not from a mediocre global temperature rise of a 1 - 2 C but from the increased frequency of extreme weather events, something insurance companies are well aware of.
http://www.swissre.com/rethinking/turbulent_times_ahead_in_europe.html
"The study of Swiss Re and ETH showed a clear trend: in addition to
intensifying storms, the storm paths will shift further northwards,
resulting in a higher storm frequency and higher losses in the regions
affected. For the period 1975-2085, for instance, we expect losses from
winter storms to increase in real terms by 16 to 68 percent, depending
on the region."
An additional problem, rarely discussed. Some northern nations like Canada, Sweden, Norway, Russia.. may, in the long run benefit from GW. Their growing seasons will be longer and slightly warmer. GW temperatures rise faster in polar regions; northern temperatures rise about double the global average. The recently implemented Paris Climate Agreement seeks to limit GW to 1.5 C. In fact, the measures stipulated in the Accord fall short of the mark and will lead to a 2 C or greater increase in global temperature. Therefore Canada should, conservatively speaking, expect a 4 to 6 C (7 to 11 degree Fahrenheit!!) rise in annual temperature by century's end. Such a rise could, "all things being equal" (they may not be though!), boost agricultural ouputs significantly. The hick is that the transition to the warmer "Northern Bread Basket" climate will require decades (??) of unstable, "kaleidoscopically shifting", weather patterns, highly variable from one year to the next, and, in any case, "out of synch" with traditional farming practices and crop choices. If northern countries benefit from GW in the long run, the short and medium terms promise a chaotic transition with reduced agricultural outputs, social and political disruption. We even have an historical analog to study. A similar phase of acute climate instability marked the end of the Little Ice Age (1300 - 1850) in western Europe. Recurrent local and regional crop failures contributed to the social strife that fueled the French Revolution. See, for example, Simon Schama: Citizens, a chronicle of the French Revolution, (Random House, 1990).
Prof Keith argues convincingly that geoengineering, judiciously chosen and democratically implemented (with full compensation to those negatively affected), with all its risks, may be less costly (in lives and money) than current wimpy GHG reduction and green energy policies. These "policies", be it admitted, are a lot of hot air: CO2 levels now stand 50% above pre-industrial levels (as measured from glacial ice cores). They are still rising with no end in sight.
Keith proposes research on the development of geoengineering technologies. Then if, at some time in the near future, it is decided that we need geoengineering to avoid catastrophic ecological and social breakdown, we will have a viable Plan B, ready to go.
Keith emphasizes that geoengineering should not be taken as a substitute for renewable energy development, GHG emission reduction or CC mitigation strategies (reclaiming wetlands, sea walls, alternative crops, water conservation, tree planting in arid zones..) A rational approach to geoengineering, cautions prof Keith, is to employ it as an emergency measure to buy more time for green energy deployment and CC mitigation.
"Cutting [GHG] emissions to zero means replacing a big chunk of the heavy infrastructure on which our society rests." Page 31
And that, of course, takes time - too much of which we have frittered away and wasted, to date..
Where we disagree. Prof Keith believes that nuclear energy provides a viable transitional technology to a green future. I don't. This probably arises from the fact that I am less of an optimist (and certainly less of a techno-optimist) than he is. At this late date, I no longer believe that a smooth, peaceful transition to a green energy future is possible. I believe in the near inevitability of large scale societal breakdown and rapid regional population collapse. To deal with the Hard Days Ahead, we need simple technologies to maintain Cultural Refugia.
"At this time of planetary crisis, I propose we should take a page from those great survivalists of Late Antiquity, the early Christians. Christian monasteries preserved a good part of the philosophy, law, science and mathematics of antiquity during the Dark Ages which followed the breakup of the Roman Empire. These preserved teachings served a vital role in the Renaissance of Western civilization and the birth of Modernity (12th through 17th centuries).
We need to think of doing something similar today, to preserve what is worth saving in our civilization so that the survivors won't have to start from scratch, so they will have the best seed from which to grow a new civilizational cycle. I call communities designed to preserve and pass on our civilization's knowledge and our best values, Cultural Refugia. We have payed a high price for our science, we should not throw it away lightly (very bad karma!) We need to preserve the Periodic Table, Calculus, Physics, Chemistry, Ecology... We need to preserve essential technologies to kick start a new cycle of civilization. Ideally, the larger Refugia would maintain 19th century metalurgy and electrical technology, early 20th century vacuum tube technology (intergrated circuitry is probably too high tech to survive the social chaos I see coming. Ditto for nuclear reactors: too complex, too demanding of infrastructure and capital). To the degree possible, we should attempt to maintain mid-20th century medicine.. Above all, we need to preserve our most precious spiritual acquisitions like Civil or Human Rights: liberty, equality, fraternity; the belief in the dignity of the human person and the Universality of human nature; the gains of modern feminism,.."
http://transparencycanada.blogspot.ca/2016/08/dodging-extinction-part-3-what-can-we-do.html
Prof Keith spends much time deflating "propagandistic" distortions and selective readings of geoengineering research by the environmental Left. Example: solar geoengineering necessarily causes droughts which will afflict poor farmers in the third world. Once again - alas! - we encounter that ancient - but always forgotten - truth: in war the first casualty is truth.
As an environmentalist, I found Keith's discussion of the Left's propagandistic distortions to be a healthy corrective to the natural human failing of seeing one's own camp as virtuous and our opponent's camp as a cesspit of iniquity. Such hypocrisy is all too evident when one takes the time to look. Liberal professionals in North America decry geoengineering as "technological hubris". Yet, geoengineering may be the fastest stopgap measure to reduce Third World drought and famine until renewable energy technologies really kick in and reduce our carbon footprint to zero. Meanwhile, the same liberal professionals continue to buy gas guzzling, GHG spewing SUVs, nor do they militate for GHG reducing public transport and green energy. Collectively, we speak from both sides of our mouths..
"It's vital that the debate about geoengineering shift from the physics of climate models to focus on human and environmental impacts. The risks of geoengineering need urgent attention, along with the benefits. But the current debate reveals the extent to which people fit geoengineering into convenient narratives while ignoring facts that don't fit their theory." Page 61, emphasis added.
To this I can only say "amen!" I remain skeptical about the feasibility of a global program of gradually phased in and moderately dosed geoengineering in today's increasingly chaotic, divided and conflictual world. Given the speed of climate deterioration, the world's leaders may soon be forced to deploy geoengineering within the framework of a scientifically based United Nations administered program. Unfortunately, it is as least as likely that rogue states, heavily impacted by CC, will undertake ill-advised, crisis driven climate modification projects - and to hell with the neighbors! Think: Kim's North Korea, Putin's Russia, Trump's America..
If Keith is right, a judicious mix of green technologies and palliative geoengineering could allow technical civilization to scrape through the Hard Days Ahead. The real problem, though, is not sciento-technological in nature, but spiritual: as a world we lack the collective, political will to work together for the Common Good of all.
notes:
1- GHG: Greenhouse effect. The most important GHG are carbon dioxide and methane. These gases are produced naturally by respiration, the decomposition of organic matter, and volcanism. Carbon
naturally cycles in the the earth's ecosystems and between ecosystems and geological reservoirs (sedimentary rock produced by compression of ocean sediment..) These fluxes maintain a
rough equilibrium over long periods of time, geologically speaking. Excesses of GHG produced by the combustion of fossil fuels and modern agriculture are responsible for GW and CC.
In the last two centuries, industrial activities, rising living standards and rapid population growth have increased global atmospheric levels of CO2. Carbon which was once harmlessly sequestered in subterranean reservoirs of coal, petroleum and natural gas has been burned to sustain increased industrialization, living standards and population. Likewise, forest and grassland clearing for agricultural activities and settlement release carbon stored in soil humus to the atmosphere as CO2. Rice cultivation and livestock production are net sources of methane.
Like the glass wall of a greenhouse, GHG trap heat radiated by earth and water heated by the sun, thus raising the earth's average temperature. GW, in turn, profoundly affects the productivity and timing of biological processes such as maturation, migration and the geographical distribution of species. The planet's average temperature also profoundly affects average weather patterns: precipitation, extent and location of deserts, the trajectory of agriculturally vital monsoon rains and the availability of mountain glacial melt water. A complicating factor, increasing the uncertainty in predicting the evolution of tomorrow's climate: GW is not uniform in time and space. Nigh time temperatures are raised more than daily temperature maxima. Northern and southern polar regions warm faster than for lands falling near the equator.
click on the image for enlargement
Physical events have a symbolic aspect making it possible to construct "narratives" (sacred stories, myths, ideologies..) from physical events ( whether real or imagined). In practice, story creation involves collective editing. The group - society - selects which facts, actions, attitudes are "real", "important" or acceptable.
Anatomy of violence, Deepa Mehta film
Indo-Canadian film-maker Deepa Mehta's recent film deals with a gang rape which fatally injured an Indian medical student a few years ago. Mehta agrees that the young men (one was even married) were "monsters" and needed to be punished. She wanted to explore the question of how (and, perhaps, why) society creates such monsters.
She focused on causal factors like poverty which debases and degrades sensibilities, cultural norms which tolerate physical (and, to some degree, sexual) abuse of children, a machismo psychology which devalues women and glorifies male violence and toughness. As Mehta realizes, the problem of gender inequality knows no national boundaries even if it manifests a bit differently from place to place and one historical period to another.
Anthropologists see human culture as a (more flexible) replacement for instinctive behavior patterns. Even if cultures don't allow individuals much more freedom than fixed instinctual patterns do, human cultures themselves are less constrained and more rapidly adaptable in their expression than "instinct dominated" animal societies. The individual human may not be much - or any - "freer" than the average animal but human groups possess superior behavioral suppleness and adaptability because of human culture.
Periods of extremely rapid transformation such as we are living through today, provide particular challenges. The old Roadmaps of Reality that once worked no longer do, or they are no longer believable or no one wants to reach the old destinations anymore. Such times inevitably show a rise in "insane" behaviors. Over the years I have heard several comedians complain that satire becomes impossible in a world in which today's parody is tomorrow's headline news: think, the Trump presidential campaign and election! Who would have thought it possible just a year ago. Trump himself is a self-parodying modern narcissist..
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/05/business/media/comet-ping-pong-pizza-shooting-fake-news-consequences.html?smid=fb-share&_r=0
The following article deals with some of the problems of living in a time of transition. As colonizers we occidentals were raised with the foundational myth that we were bringing the One True Religion in order to save the souls of the Heathen from eternal punishment in Hell's fires. (Later, after the Enlightenment and Scientific Materialism, a new foundational myth was needed to justify European rapacity in the colonized world: White Supremacy. Darwin's evolutionary theory was press-ganged to justify and rationalize colonial exploitation: superior races are destined to dominate / eliminate inferior ones in the universal struggle for survival..
https://godsandradicals.org/2016/12/05/the-myth-of-the-pagan-passcard/
The following podcast gives some insight into just how strong the human "herd instinct" really is. Once we have committed ourselves to some cause or course of action, we assiduously sweep aside all data that do not conform to our current position (note 1). One can easily see that, under technologically primitive conditions, such behavior would probably have been "selected for" by evolutionary pressures such as endemic competition with other human or proto-human hunter / gatherer groups for limited resources. The question now arises as to whether such behavior has negative survival in world of space rockets, genetic engineering and nuclear bombs. In our evolutionary past most of our worst problems probably came from the natural environment. Our collective "ecological footprint" was small, our impacts on the environment limited in scope, intensity and duration. Today, with advances in technology, we - not nature - have become the source of our own worse problems.
In the archaic Past, blind obedience to a charismatic leader may have had survival value but as World War II demonstrated, in "advanced" industrial societies, these ancient patterns of behavior may prove lethal..
A CBC journalist visited towns along the route of the Kinder Morgan pipeline (western Canada). This pipeline is going to be updated, tripling its capacity to carry oil from the center of the country to West coast ports for export. People in smaller, remote communities accepted unhesitatingly the multinationals' false equation: a healthy environment means job loss. Thus in the collective mind, pipelines become equated with economic security and "Progress".
The multinationals' stranglehold on the mass media provides them with a propaganda victory. The fact that renewable energies tend to be less capital intensive and more labor intensive - thus creating more jobs per dollar invested than highly centralized fossil fuel or nuclear energy systems - appeared to be universally rejected by all the people interviewed. Some people did nuance their enthusiasm for Big Oil with a desire for increased security in transport but none challenged the Great Lie: Jobs OR Environment.
http://podcast.cbc.ca/mp3/podcasts/current_20161206_61335.mp3
Rationalizations. "Pipelines, at least, are safer than rail transport of petroleum". But the root questions never get asked. What do we actually need energy for? Are there better sources than the one's we rely on today? Do we really need all the energy we consume to do the things we want to do (that is, can we do things more efficiently)? And - of course - what should we really want to do (that is, what constitutes the Good Life)?
http://transparencycanada.blogspot.ca/2013/07/petro-transport-rail-or-pipeline.html
http://transparencycanada.blogspot.ca/2013/10/lac-megantic-2-sequel.html
http://transparencycanada.blogspot.ca/2014/08/deregulation-blues-anatomy-of-inferno.html
http://transparencycanada.blogspot.ca/2014/08/lac-megantic-inferno-transport-safety.html
Even out in the - supposedly - tree hugging West Coast, British Columbia, "tangible concerns" like jobs and transport security trumped worries over the long term effects of greenhouse gas emissions. In Burnaby BC, risk to water quality and local scenic beauty was the Big Issue. No one gets the Big Pic, that in a Self-Organizing System like nature, everything is connected to everything else.. You can't do serious injury to one part without its impact being felt elsewhere.
https://robertscribbler.com/2016/11/23/climate-change-has-left-bolivia-crippled-by-drought/
https://robertscribbler.com/2016/11/23/climate-change-has-left-bolivia-crippled-by-drought/
notes:
1- Cognitive dissonance. We favor "Roadmaps of Reality" that are internally logically consistent. Data, arising from the environment (social or physical), which doesn't fit with our world view are ignored, denied, under-rated or re-interpreted to make them fit.
"anxiety that results from simultaneously holding contradictory or otherwise incompatible attitudes, beliefs, or the like, as when one likes a person but disapproves strongly of one of his or her habits."
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/cognitive-dissonance
Mirror image clones joined at the lip
Jeff Sharlet: The Family, the secret fundamentalism at the heart of American Power (Harper Collins, New York, 2008): 387 pages, extensive chapter notes, index. Missing: a glossary to keep track of obscure fundamentalist pressure groups and their front organizations.
"I
am not against structure. I am for structure. I just think it needs to
be underground", page 218. Doug Coe, elitist fundamentalist militant
"All the vital activities of industry, commerce and government are carried on by corporations and other formal organizations. Such bodies are constantly growing in size, and hence the top leadership is continually growing in power and influence.
We have entered an era when the masses of the people are dependent upon a rapidly diminishing number of leaders for the determination of their patterns of life and the definition of their ultimate goals. It is the age of minority control", page 143. Abram Vereide, elitist fundamentalist militant
" 'An epochal opportunity is ours', one of his tracts had advertised to the new men of his congressional Fellowship back in 1942, 'to control the future of America by the simple strategy of controlling the character and ideals of a relatively small majority of {college-age} men and women. Hitler long ago perceived this strategy, and established his elaborate system of .. leadership training. The democracies have been asleep'.", page 217. Abram Vereide
For one who has lost their belief in Lighthouse America, beacon of hope to the world's oppressed, The Family does not shock so much as confirm and complete their understanding of America's decline. The book will be a great shock, methink, for secularists who can only see religion as as a vestigial force, a relic of primitive ages when Myth, not Science, served to explain the world and our place in it.
The Family documents how, far from being dead, religion and the rising tide of social reaction are forging powerful new symbiotic linkages. Post-modern society, we learn, is being steered toward a destination neither envisioned nor desired by the founders of the Enlightenment nor their successors.
This was not an easy read for me. The first three-quarters of the text is a history of the current fundamentalist revival (post World War II, USA). I found it tedious and overwritten. I wished an editor had taken a weed whacker to the manuscript and hacked out 20 - 30% of the superfluous matter. I felt that the numerous intertwining narratives of bit actors obscured, rather than elucidates, whatever points Sharlet is trying to make.
My opinion changed during the last one hundred pages. The last quarter of the books is a freestanding narrative of Sharlet's investigation of the various groups, churches, schools and organizations which constitute the network known to insiders as The Family (also known as The Fellowship, The Brotherhood). As Sharlet himself intimates, The Family is not an easy concept to grasp. Like the Islamic jihadist organizations which it preceded, The Family is fluid, omnipresent, interconnected and polymorphous, constantly generating offshoots and mutating into new forms as circumstances require. Like Islamic jihadism, the informal American fundamentalist network in its international extension is hard to pin down, define, isolate geographically or in terms of class, nationality, race or even psychology. (Some interesting parallels to say the least.. note 1)
The Family, as it exists today, may be described as a loose informal network of American fundamentalist activists and groups. Their goal is, baldly, World Theocracy (Islamic State style.. mirror image clones joined at the lip..) A "Christian" Theocracy led by that most exceptional of all nations, the United States.
"The voice he heard was his own, his prayers, transformed by his inverted theology into revelation. What he wanted was what God wanted.. And what the Family desired, from Abram Vereide to Doug Coe to Bengt, was power, worldly power, with which Christ's Kingdom could be built, cell by cell", page 51
Spiritual arrogance, hubris and delusion raised to the highest power: mistaking one's will for God's - under the guise of a false self-serving "humility" which sees wo/mankind as "worthless sinners".
The Family (Brotherhood, Fellowship) includes America's "elite": CEOs of multinationals, powerful neoconservative politicians at the State and Federal level, the Officer corps of the military and Christian university students. A prefered method of outreach is the Prayer Group - or "cell", following the example of the early Christians during their persecutions and revolutionaries of all ages and cultures. A loose (semi-)informal network of cells encourages intense personal interaction, efficient mutual / group indoctrination and the elaboration of highly effective "on the ground" tactical engagements. A cellular network allowed Christianity to survive several persecutions to become the Number One religion on earth today. And let us not forget, a revolutionary cellular network allowed Communism to rise to become a very serious threat to monopolistic Capitalism! Of course, Internet interconnectivity facilitates cellular interaction and organization: witness the work of terrorist groups like ISIS (or Right Wing extremists in Europe and North America).
As is the case with ISIS, the actual philosophy and psychology of Prayer Groups (other names are used) is surprisingly hard to pin down and define. On the one hand, the "elite" are required to submit to God's Will and do His Bidding. Which raises the thorny questions: what is God's Will? How do we know it?
Apparently - as an unchallenged assumption on the part of Family members - the Divine Will coincides with unregulated "Free Market" capitalism and minimal environmental and worker protection. If I read Sharlet right, it is as dumbly and blindly self-serving as that! (Sharlet's documentation seems impeccable, a few exceptions aside. Sceptics - always a healthy starting position! - should check out his references given in the notes; quite a few are on line.)
What makes the Family really dangerous - beyond its arrogance, power and depth of self-deception - is their recent (post 1960) fusion with / control of popular fundamentalist Christianity. For example, Family members or sympathizers produce textbooks for self-schooling fundamentalist parents of for use in school districts controlled by Family friendly politicians. Such texts deny the reality of Darwinian evolution and teach that the Book of Genesis gives an accurate account of the creation of the world, thus weakening the appeal of scientific, fact-based argument to young people. These guys really know how to fly under the radar, invisible to self-contented and somewhat contemptuous Liberal commentators. Yet their influence on young minds seems to be growing. Recent polls indicate that 50% of Americans do not accept Darwinian evolution as "factual" or "proven". In Canada, that figure is only 25%. In Western Europe, where American fundamentalism has less taken root, even fewer people reject science.
An Open Conspiracy. Several times Sharlet notes how Family members consciously avoid seeking publicity.
"I
am not against structure. I am for structure. I just think it needs to
be underground", page 218. Doug Coe, elitist fundamentalist militant
As a Christian theocratic elite, The Family wants to work through backroom politics, elite speaking to elite, the Old Boys' Club - Democracy be damned! The recent fusion with / control of popular fundamentalism, Sharlet believes, augurs no good. To be blunt, it smacks of the kind of (mass) psychological manipulation, responsible for the 20th century's bloodiness: Communism, Fascism (but also, for its long term negative environmental consequences, Consumerism). Sharlet chillingly provides numerous citations, written, printed or spoken, of Family members' admiration for fascists, communists and dictators. Such admiration makes a certain cockeyed logical sense: if God speaks to you personally through the networks' cells, you possess Absolute Truth, you therefore have no need of debate to discover truth. It follows that Democracy's untidiness and uncertainty are not for those whose soul and will have been enflamed by "God's" Will..
"'Yes', Coe told us, "it's good to have friends. Do know what a difference a friend can make? A friend you can agree with?'. He smiled. 'Two or three agree, and they pray? They can do anything. Agree. Agreement. What's that mean?' Doug Coe looked at me. 'You're a writer. What does that mean?'
I remember Paul's letter to Philippians, which we {a bible study group Sharlet had joined in order to study it} had begun to memorize. Fufill ye my joy, that ye be likeminded.
'Unity', I said. 'Agreement means unity.'
Doug Coe didn't smile. 'Yes', he said. 'Total unity. Two, or three, become one. Do you know,' he asked, 'that there's another word for that?'
No one spoke.
'It's called a covenant. Two, or three, agree? They can do anything. A covenant is.. powerful. Can you think of anyone who made a covenant with his friends?'
We knew the answer to this, having heard his names invoked numerous times in this context. Andrew from Australia, sitting beside Coe, cleared this throat: 'Hitler'.
'Yes,' Doug Coe said. 'Yes, Hitler made a covenant. The Mafia makes a covenant. It is such a very powerful thing. Two or three agree.'" Page 54
The meeting this quotation comes from could be considered a form of political indoctrination of intelligent, but naive and rather socially isolated, young college men from well-to-do / wealthy families. The anti-democratic elitist vision expressed is patently evident. Less evident, the covert, Machiavellian ethic: God's Will, which works through established "elites" is above the law, outside any consideration of a "common humanity". Hitler and the Mafia are, after all, not known to be altar boys..
Another piece of evidence for the danger the Family poses to Democracy: the Family's capacity to clone cells / Prayer Groups among the elites of countries under the sway of the American Imperium: Egypt, Indonesia, Brazil, post-war occupied Japan, Indochina, India.. Since their real goal is Power (wielded in God's Name to bring about His Kingdom on Earth), Family cells may, in practice, include non-Christians - a rather curious ecumenicism for theocratic globalists!! Foreign Prayer Group members are drawn from local elites heavily implicated in the civil rights abuses, corruption and drug running which the cynical Pax Americana authorizes: Egypt's autocratic military governments, murderous Indonesian and African regimes, the obscene Pinochet regime installed by CIA coup in Chili ("the Other 9-11": September 11, 1973, the overthrow of the democratically elected Leftist Allende government)..
All in all, it is neither a pretty nor an edifying picture: religion "instrumentalized" - prostituted - to the service of the multinational corporate elite. The Family's true function, if I read Sharlet rightly, is to grease the wheels of the universal (American based) corporate elite.
Fascism: control or seizure of the State by the Corporate Elite
It is a scary image of America. The Family was published about eight years ago. The recent election of Donald Trump gives credence of its essential correctness. Once again, the Corporate Elite will fleece the masses by directing their anger - raised by globalization's negative impacts - onto scapegoats. Witness the racism, sexism, xenophobia flooding the media and, especially, the Internet lately..
These are dangerous times we live in. If there is indeed a silver lining to this turmoil, it will lie in the demonstration of inability of the "System" to confront the mounting tide of planetary challenges. While The Family is not an easy - or comforting! - read, it is essential reading for those who want to get a handle on the rise of authoritarian political views and movements today, what is their true source and inspiration or, alternatively (as in the case of Al Queda or ISIS) what they are reacting against.
"When Buchman spoke of Christianity's 'new illumination', 'a new social order under the dictatorship of the Spirit of God' that would transform politics and eradicate the conflict of capital and labor, Abram took him literally." Page 128
notes:
1- The psychology of groups like ISIS is hard to quantify or qualify. Members may be rich or poor, foreign or native born, male or female, conventionally religious or not, well integrated socially or not, idealistic or criminally motivated, and so on. Some social psychologists blame the Anomia (sense of meaningless or drift), typical of industrial urban culture. They point to the lack of "Life Narrative" (sense of purpose and value in one's life) and the lack of a sense of Community in modern society as causal or contributing factors to the success of terrorist recruiters. These are certainly contributing factors. In addition, the misguided and misdirected attention of Western powers in the Mid-East has provided a reservoir of long standing greivances to avenge. Specific events in the Mid-East have then served as "nuclei of crystalisation", as triggers or detonators for the radicalization of disaffected young people, particularly in Western Europe (but also here in North America). An overarching source of frustration has been the failure of the West to launch a Green Technological Revolution in the Third World in the eight decades following World War II. Rising expectations frustrated by chronic unemployment and underemployment in burgeonning youthful populations. Can't ask for better Social Dynamite than that!
http://transparencycanada.blogspot.ca/2016/07/bastille-day-massacre-what-more-is.html
