We are living in a period of extraordinary change and extraordinary challenges. To get your thinking started, consider the rate of growth of the world economy and the world population. When I was born in 1961, there were 3 billion people on Earth that relied on a global gross domestic product (GDP) of $1.4 trillion (based on current U.S. dollars). Today, in the span of less than my one human lifetime, we have reached a global population of 7.7 billion people who rely on a global GDP of $80 trillion. By 2050, that world population is expected to reach 9.8 billion (United Nations 2004) and global GDP is expected to reach $135 trillion (World Bank 2006). Let these data sink in for a minute.
What does this growth in people and the consumption associated with our GDP mean for both our lives and those of all living creatures on this finite planet? Fortunately, or unfortunately, we have some glimpses into the answer to that question. Our economy relies on fossil-fuels and the emissions from those fuels are creating changes in our global climate, which increase the frequency and intensity of wildfires, droughts, hurricanes, temperature fluctuations, sea-level rise, and more. Adding to that sobering reality, we are restricting the availability of clean water, dumping massive amounts of nitrogen and phosphorous into our land and water, warming and acidifying the world’s oceans, and causing enormous numbers of species to go extinct.
At the same time, our society is becoming dangerously unequal as disparities in economic wealth and opportunity grow to epidemic levels not seen in some parts of the world since 1929, just before the start of the Great Depression. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, nearly 40 percent of Americans were unable to pay for a $400 emergency (Board of Governors 2019); 78 percent lived paycheck to paycheck (Martin 2019); 44 percent earned about $18,000 per year (Ross and Bateman 2020); and 42 percent had saved less than $10,000 for retirement (Morris 2018). In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, many of these people are facing real hardship and fear in an economy that unfairly distributes its benefits.
But there is reason for hope. As Charles Kettering, former head of research at General Motors, famously said, “A problem well stated is half solved.” The nature of the problems we face are becoming clear and a new generation is rising to meet them. This is what Environmental Theologian Thomas Berry called The Great Work (2000) when he wrote, “The success or failure of any historical age is the extent to which those living at that time have fulfilled the special role that history has imposed upon them … The nobility of our lives, however, depends upon the manner in which we come to understand and fulfill our assigned role.” To my mind, the great work for today’s generation lies in correcting the flaws in our political, economic, and social systems that lead to the systemic breakdowns that issues such as climate change and income inequality expose. You, the next generation of leaders, have been born into this reality and you have no choice but to respond. You did not choose this reality but you must embrace it. The nobility of your lives will be determined by how you respond to the challenges you face.
And that’s where the book you are now holding comes in. It does this by shifting from “thin sustainability” to “thick sustainability,” locating its analysis in a specific context—the corridor of the Yellowstone River Basin—among the actual local people who make their livelihoods and lives within this specific natural ecosystem. It presents a clear and compelling explanation of sustainability science as a critical tool for addressing the systemic challenges we face with solutions that must, by definition, also be systemic. The book points out that we can see some problems coming. For example, it is known that the regional water supply, which is vital to every aspect of life in Yellowstone River Valley, is already overallocated and there will not be enough water to satisfy all of the legitimate users. At the same time, there are increasing demands for the fossil-fuels in the Bakken field that lies under western North Dakota and northeastern Montana, and extracting those fuels requires more water. The book also points out that some problems are not yet fully known. For example, one farmer (sadly, an aging community) rightly worries that bees are disappearing as a result of chemicals that are applied on fields to boost crop yield; a tour guide worries about the future of tourism as demand rises and river access is constricted; and scientists worry about declining rainfall and snowmelt as a result of climate change. The challenge is to gather what we know and what we need to know and make our complex and highly interconnected social, economic, political, and natural systems “resilient” to avoid conflict as best as we can. This book offers the tools and models to do that in a compelling, tangible, and instructive way (such as the Yellowstone Cumulative Effects Analysis). This local specificity is so important and so needed. And unfortunately, it is not the norm.
Today, sustainability is all too often discussed in a more disconnected way, taught by a recitation of the “triple bottom line” (Elkington, 1997)—People, Planet, and Profit, or Equity, Environment, and Economy—and the Brundtland Commission (1987) definition that “Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” We can all recite those terms such that they have become clichés. What do they really mean in practice? In many ways they are incomplete and impractical. How do we measure the 3 Ps or the 3 Es? How do we aggregate them, make trade-offs among them, come to specific policy decisions? These questions cannot be answered in the aggregate or theoretical. They must be addressed in the specific, and this book takes you there and challenges you to answer them in ways that have real import for people’s lives.
I doubt that we can truly understand or achieve sustainability—or as John Ehrenfeld (2008) prefers to call it, flourishing—if we do not bring it down to this local level where real people, economies, and ecosystems reside. In the end, any implementation of efforts to address the challenges we face must be done in partnership with the people who understand, must live with and can enact those efforts. There is no other way. As our present political climate makes all too clear, the top-down imposition of solutions—whether they be fishing moratoriums, mask mandates, or pollution reductions—will be met with fierce resistance.
The antidote is careful, thoughtful, and engaged problem solving at the system level. And this book gives you the full coverage of the systemic challenges that face the precious natural and social ecosystem of the Yellowstone River that humans and nature interact in, on, and around. It tells a story—and as any science communicator will tell you “stories stick”—based on rigorous analysis. This is the best kind of science; work that is engaging, informative, educational, and pragmatic, hitting what David Stokes (1997) famously called “Pasteur’s Quadrant,” where “use-inspired research” breaks down the divide between basic and applied science.
It is my hope that you, the next generation of leaders, will learn from this story; consider the needs of all communities that rely on the natural world for their survival, get knee deep in the real concerns, fears, hopes, and aspirations of those communities and help us find ways to solve the problems that will continue to mount as our population, our economy, and our demands on limited resources continue to grow. No one wants to destroy the environment, the economy, or their community. As one interviewee said in this book “we just love the river so much.” And more than just “love,” hunting and fishing are “life enhancing” activities for many of the people who live in the Yellowstone River Basin. If we take the spirit that all want to help solve our problems but just need to be shown how, we can find a way forward. And with lesson learned, we can apply them in our own lives and community.
The future is yours to make. I challenge you to make it a future based on fairness, equality, equity, accountability, and environmental justice; one in which we all work together to create a place where everyone can thrive and flourish in a natural environment that can do the same. That is your “great work” and I encourage you to embrace it. I hope that you respond to this book’s challenge with the creativity and urgency it requires. Indeed, you must, because the future of this generation and all generations to come is depending on it.
—Andrew J. Hoffman
Holcim (U.S.), Inc. Professor of Sustainable Enterprise
University of Michigan
Ann Arbor, Michigan, 2021