Page 91 - Sustainable Cities and Communities Design Handbook

68 Sustainable Cities and Communities Design Handbook

Louisiana. The United States and other countries cannot ignore the environ-
mental consequences and economic costs of the 2IR that have handicapped its
moving into the GIR. The end result is not good for the Americans, let alone
the rest of the world.
The deregulation of industries starting in the Reagan and Thatcher eras was
a mistake and a completely naı ¨ve view of reality from neoclassical economics
by Adam Smith. There has never been a society or area in the world in which
the principles of capitalism have been proved to work in reality. Instead just
the opposite has been the reality. Chomsky (2012) looks at the history of
economics in a far more concrete manner.

THE WESTERN ECONOMIC PARADIGM MUST CHANGE
Even The Economist in two special issues labels modern economics as “state
capitalism” (January 23, 2012b) and in another issue soon after that as The Third
Industrial Revolution (3IR) (April, 2012a), a theme from Jeremy Rifkin (2004)
and his book with that title in 2012. Clark has published several articles and given
numerous talks about the 3IR (2008, 2009, 2010, and 2011) but prefers to think of
it as the GIR (Clark and Cooke, 2011). Basically, the GIR concerns renewable
energy, smart green communities, and advanced technologies that produce, store,
and transmit energy for infrastructures, while saving the environment.
The point is that the development of the United States into a powerful
world leader had a lot to do with its military strength and also its economic
development of fossil fuels for over a century in the 2IR including the tech-
nologies that support them, such as combustion engines and related technol-
ogies such as atom bomb and nuclear power (Chomsky, 2012). The growth of
the United States started with businesses and their owners who control the
economy today. There is little or no competition. However, even more sig-
nificant is that the basis for this wealth is in fossil fuels and continues to be
there. Hence the environment is continuing to be damaged to produce more oil
and natural gas causing climate change. However, this 2IR retards and places
the United States decades back when compared with emerging economics and
even other Western developed nations.
As historians have documented, the development of the 2IR in the United
States was primarily based on “state capitalism” since oil companies got land
grants, funding, and even trains or pipelines for transporting their fossil fuels.
That governmental support continues today. Consider the issue of the United
States getting shale oil from Alberta, Canada, and the massive pipelines that
were installed through the United States to get the oil to the country.
Furthermore, these same companies get tax breaks and credits such that their
economic responsibility to the United States is minimal. The argument that the
United States will be “energy independent” with these fossil fuels is false. The
United States needs to stop getting its energy from fossil fuels anywhere in the
world, including domestically or from its neighbors.