The answer is undoubtedly yes, but this doesn't mean hair-shirt austerity, as many people fear. On the contrary, the changes we need to make in order to save the planet would radically improve the quality of life for all of us.
Our high energy lifestyle has often been described as an addiction. And like every addiction, it only gives us an illusion of happiness; real happiness will be achieved by giving up the drug altogether (although the cure won't be entirely painless!)
The high-energy, gasguzzling, go-getter lifestyle is epitomised by what is often called the "American way of life.
The idea that each of us can, through our individual endeavour, aspire to a fast car, a big house (stuffed full of consumer durables of course, not to mention mountains of clutter and junk,) frequent jettravel to exotic locations, daily consumption of equally exotic foods, and a regularly updated wardrobe, is not just a dream, it is a cruel illusion (and one which is either sold to us via Hollywood or, as is the case in Iraq, forced on us at the point of a gun.)
It is an illusion because, for the overwhelming majority of humanity, it is quite simply unattainable. everyone on Earth consumed as much energy as the average US citizen, the planet's known oil reserves would be exhausted within 19 days! But is this 'American Dream, worth pursuing, or would we be better off without it?
Take transport as a prime example. Every major city in the world is now choked up with traffic.
Half a billion cars (most of which spend 95% of their time stationary, and the rest crawling through traffic jams) simply cannot deliver the advertisers exuberant promises of "freedom of the road".
Wouldn't we be happier and less stressed if our journeys were quicker, more comfortable, relaxing and sociable?
Wouldn't we feel less anxious if our children could roam and play without the constant fear of them being run over?
A massively expanded, fully integrated and free public transport system would give us all of this and more.
And if the world's engineers and technicians concentrated on producing high quality buses, coaches and trains, instead of hundreds of millions of cars, they could work tewer hours and enjoy longer holidays into the bargain!
A similar argument can be unnecessary commodities which are currently mass produced (at an intolerable cost to the environment).
Instead of falling victim to the diktats of the marketing departments of fashion houses, wouldn't we be happier with high quality clothing that lasted more than a few weeks, and which we could supp-lement and adapt using our own creativity instead of relying on the tired and stilted designs of the fashion world?
The same applies to our food. Not only is fresh local produce better for our health, it is tastier too.
And while we're at it, why not develop high quality and free communal facilities for cooking our food and laundering our clothes?
The rich don't spend half their leisure time in the kitchen, why should the rest of us?
A collective approach to domestic labour would not only cut carbon emissions, it would also liberate us from drudgery.
Ah, I hear you exclaim, but what about foreign travel?
Why shouldn't we be allowed to jet off to sunnier climes for our holidays once (or twice, or three times) a year?
Wouldn't the absence of
cheap flights diminish the quality of our lives?
Not at all! If we didn't waste so much of our time producing and marketing junk (within which category I include cars, fashion items, most of the toys we buy our kids for Christmas, armaments, and much else besides,) and concentrated instead on producing the things we really need, then we could give ourselves much longer holidays.
We could still see the world and experience other cultures, but we could do it at a much slower pace, so that foreign travel would become the genuinely enriching experience we all want it to be. We have only one world, and we can't grow another!
So, is this 'other world" possible, or is it a utopian pipe dream? Is there really no alternative to the "New American Century of the neocons and the Blairites?
Well, the changes I describe are not inevitable, that's for sure. They will only happen if we, collectively, make them happen. But the alternative is unthinkable. 'Business as usual under Bush, Blair and the entire class they represent will mean endless war and inevitable environmental catastrophe. The choice is