Strained Resources and the Good Life

By ERNEST SWIFT

(Reprinted from Conservation News, National Wildlife Federation, Washington, D.C.)

Despite today's opulence—never dreamed of a few decades ago—the American taxpayer is beginning to wonder if all the present demands on his pocket book can be indefinitely sustained: an escalating war, escalating welfare, escalating wages and higher prices for commodities, and even escalating recreation. To most people money and security go hand in hand.

But there seems little unanimity in placing hard and fast priorities on these many desires and obligations. A hot-rodding public has vague hopes that Santa Claus, Uncle Sam or a Divine Providence will find a solution for all these man-made riddles they have compounded.

There are still too many who resist the drab but all-important reminder that these demands are contingent on protecting and managing the basic resources, and, likewise, too few who will face up to that fact. But these facts are always there, immovable and like a sphinx. Raw resources support the tax base.

Resourse abuse and man-made problems have a common proliferation. Our survival demands have progressed far beyond the needs of simple foods, shelter and heat. These basic requirements are no longer acceptable unless highly refined and made available with little or no physical effort. Nor is this basic tripod of life considered at all sufficient unless cushioned with an increasing number of social and welfare guarantees.

But long continued soil depletion and periodic forest fires, massive water and air pollution problems, the alarming increase of automobile junk yards, and the litter and waste of throw-away articles are creating no wealth to build war machines, or pay for social security, medicare, unemployment compensation, poverty programs and foreign aid. And if resources continue to be destroyed at the present rate with each passing decade, it is logical to assume that our epicurean recreational appetite may be in for some belt-tightening. Some people are afraid of such speculative inquiry and condemn it as a form of irrational thinking.

Of course there is the argument on the other side that new oil and mineral strikes will be found ad-infinitum, undiscovered plastics will come forth from test tubes, and finally the uncounted riches of the many seas are yet to be tapped.

If all this be true, why all the concern?

In spite of continued and over-riding assurance by segments of industry and government, that our divine right to security and prosperity will be forever perpetuated, there is ever increasing concern that this attitude may be blind optimism. If the prophets are correct in this regard why are there ever-more queries to be found in newspapers, news magazines, trade and scientific journals? Comments and concern cover a wider range of subject matter on natural resources and human conduct than ever before in history.

The issue now causing the most soul-searching is that of increasing human populations. How many people per acre can this old world tolerate and still retain enjoyable living standards? Standing room only has become an intriguing subject to economists and one of troubled alarm by church leaders. At worst too many people can mean proverty, pestilence and starvation; at best no elbow room.

Since MAN first became a herdsman he has known that too many livestock will destroy pasture and range. Some historians credit the destruction of ancient civilizations in the arid mid-east and Africa to erosion caused by long continued overgrazing of sheep and goats on elevations above irrigating systems. In simple terms, the soil devoid of cover, slid into rivers which fed irrigation canals and choked them. Just why it has taken MAN so long to discover that human numbers can be as destructive as livestock—more so by documentation—is an indictment to MAN'S egotism and supposed intellectual superiority.

In the realm of the wild kingdom some species of animals will kill their own kind when populations become too crowded. Certainly this trait has been apparent in human behavior in parts of the world for a long, long time. For these many years now the United States has sent food to unfortunate countries. Most of them have high human populations and have neglected their land husbandry. In our own case the urge for space is becoming notable with the mass-migration of frustrated people from crowded cities to the country. Although well-fed by comparison with many other countries, we are gradually becoming contentious for want of space. Our reactions are the same as those of over-crowded animals. City people buying land on a lake or in the country are usually the ones who put up NO TRESPASS signs. Country people are far less prone to do this.

How much is enough to sustain acceptable standards of living without being discontented with our lot and running out of resources? Finding an answer to this question would take more discussion than waiting for the United Nations to agree on the mid-east.

What is sufficient for one person is near poverty for another. Food, shelter and heat can range from turnip greens to caviar, from a house with no modern facilities to one with every gadget known to mankind. Luxuries for one person are necessities to another.

Our free enterprise system, once based on the theory that any person could go as far as their ability and the urge to succeed would take them, has now become a race for immediate creature comforts. Success rests on how much

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credit and how many time payments can be promoted. Our free enterprise system is rapidly developing another dimension which makes it no longer free enterprise; and that is the welfare system where everyone will be guaranteed a minimum living. This is on the assumption that opportunities are denied part of the population.

Already the debate has gone into slight orbit as to what constitutes a minimum living standard. Living standards which some unfortunate countries would gratefully accept would be scorned by many Americans, although even we have reported areas of poverty. (When I was a boy I was raised in a region where people were poor but not poverty stricken.)

But the champions of both free enterprise and the welfare state fail to recognize that the great limiting factor of their dreams is no money. In the long run it will be raw resources—resources which only the land, well-husbanded, can supply. The needs and dreams of all must come from the same source regardless of social ideologies.

Our genius for things material indicates a grave imbalance between maturity and adolescence. Caution and common sense fails to keep pace with technological advances, partly because of the profit motive and also because of a passion for indulgences.

The urge for material rewards is not bad in itself—but they certainly must be subordinated to the needs of health, security, personal freedoms and a mature social conscience. Highway deaths, lack of pesticide controls, air and water pollution, soil depletion and general resource abuse are proof the caution does not keep abreast of techniques.

If society lacks the intellectual maturity to cope with the problems which it creates, it will ultimately destroy itself. With each new innovation and invention which our civilization is capable of developing today we create a risk potential which is always disregarded until near disaster strikes. Belated and feeble laws are no substitute for a personal and public conscience and an ever constant sense of responsibility.

Lastly, can our resources stand the strain of increasing demands and still guarantee the good life?

Illinois Parks 69 March/ April 1970