Collapse Will Look Nothing Like the Movies

Collapse as depicted in movies. Photo by Natalya Letunova on Unsplash

Modern, overdeveloped societies in the West are already in a severe crisis, which will eventually turn into a long global emergency in the decades ahead. A five-century-long era of economic growth, ushered in by colonization and leading to the plundering of natural, mineral and most of all fossil fuel resources, is about to come to its logical endpoint. While it’s nearly impossible to tell precisely how or when the decline of modern civilization will unfold, one thing is for sure: it will look nothing like Hollywood movies.

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The recent bumper crop of post-apocalyptic films are riddled with the same cliches. These themes do have a useful purpose such as making our story-telling brain feel comfortable, or evoking empathy for the protagonists, but they also mislead the audience. As any serious collapsologist would testify, these stereotypes not only make these movies extremely predictable, but also far removed from reality.

We need to set a few things straight about collapse. Let’s start with my personal favorite: namely, that collapse is a nearly instantaneous event, and that it happens everywhere, precisely at the same time. The day before, everything looks and works fine; the day after, the entire world is in ruins. Buildings look dilapidated in a matter of days, streets get clogged with crashed and abandoned vehicles, and there are barely any survivors left to be seen. Everything looks, well, visibly collapsed.

According to the plot, all this is a direct consequence of a mysterious event, resulting in an absurdly large number of people dying in a week. As the story unfolds, we are informed that civilizational collapse is a result of the wrongdoings of a small group of humans, or a virus or natural disaster, and not the consequence of billions of us living unsustainably for hundreds of years. If the latter is accidentally uttered, it is hush-hushed away immediately by an unlikable person, steering the conversation back to how we must fight the evil conspirators, aliens, zombies, virus, you name it. ‘Hey, we’ve got a mission to accomplish! We must save the world!’

At this point it is revealed that only one very special individual (the protagonist) has the key to humanity’s survival, and that there is a promised land far-far away to which this key must be delivered, usually at a great cost. According to the story, experts have managed to preserve science and civilization in this safe haven, and all they need is that special knowledge, ingredient, person, item [fill in the blank] to eliminate the cause of the collapse and reboot society. Needless to say, the role of this mythical place is to perpetuate the belief that ‘experts’ have everything under control, and no matter what happens, our current way of life can continue indefinitely.

“Someone, somewhere will surely think of something.”

Once they set out to complete their mission, the hero(s) learn that they cannot really trust anyone they meet along their journey, and must be very suspicious of strangers. ‘Hey, they want to steal our stuff! Do you want them to take away our freedom, too?!’ In their visibly collapsed world, the protagonists’ former neighbors are now their enemies: people they must be wary of, and whom they can shoot dead without moral qualms. The post-apocalyptic world has become a hostile, untrustworthy place with raiders lurking around every corner, waiting to ambush everyone who passes by. Every now and then our heroes stumble upon well-prepared folks living in their heavily guarded homes (with food, water and energy to last for years, of course), but they seem to be unwilling to help too. It’s everyone for themselves.

Thanks to many repetitions through countless movies, novels and the like, these cliches have become almost axiomatic: assumptions people accept without questioning. As a result, even the word ‘collapse’ has become a bogeyman, invoking images of ruins, grave danger and mass casualties, something no one wants to talk about, let alone live through.

This is why collapse is denied so vehemently, especially by the well-to-do and managerial classes. Having been exposed to so much collapse-porn, they are terrified of losing their cushy well-paid jobs, McMansions, and other privileges, so they rather opt to deny it altogether.

When it comes to the likely reality of collapse, nothing could be further from the truth. Apart from a truly apocalyptic event (a massive meteor strike or a nuclear war bringing on a winter lasting many years and a complete destruction of the ozone layer) collapse will look completely different. First, it is not something happening everywhere at the same time, leading to billions of casualties in a matter of weeks. Sure, one can always conjure up the worst of all possible scenarios, such as an abrupt shut-down of the entire electric grid (leading to the utter breakdown of our life support system), or a multi-breadbasket failure causing global famine.

For a full collapse to occur, multiple systems must break down simultaneously, which is highly unlikely. There are thousands of people working hard to a) prevent such things from happening, and b) to restore normal operation within days. No one is sitting on their hands waiting for such scenarios to unfold. While catastrophe might hit any area at any time, I consider the chances of this event going global to be relatively low.

Why is collapse inescapable then? Aren’t we the smartest species on the planet who can solve everything thrown at them? Although we are highly resourceful, especially when it comes to increasing profits, we have foolishly sacrificed long-term survival / sustainability for short-term gains. We’ve overplayed our hand, despite strong evidence that this could not possibly end well. Sure, we will continue to find ways to maintain our energy and material output — until we no longer can. Technology can and will help, but it is unable to reverse the depletion of rich mineral and fossil fuel deposits which made prior growth possible, and it comes at a cost.

In fact, we are accelerating towards a point of diminishing returns as we approach geo-physical limits. Soon it will no longer matter how much effort we put into solving the “problem” of mineral or fossil fuel depletion, the energetic and material costs will rapidly outgrow all the potential benefits we hope to gain. Such predicaments start very slowly, swinging back and forth between sustained operations and crisis mode, only to tip over into an unending series of emergencies lasting multiple decades. If you think that the world has gone crazy and is about to go even crazier as a result, you are not entirely mistaken. You are witnessing the collapse of modernity. (On the other hand, if you think, ‘no, this could not possibly be the case’, then I suggest that you revise your sources of information.)

Civilizations, just like oil fields, “don’t crash and burn, but follow an undulating path downward over years or decades.” - Art Berman

Decline is an unevenly distributed, bumpy ride back to a truly sustainable way of life. The longer this decline is postponed, and the larger the gap between what is sustainable and what’s not (aka overshoot), the steeper and deeper the fall becomes. While there will be serious ‘crash and burn’ moments, collapse is not a straight line pointing ever downwards. It is often interspersed with moments of respite, or even renewed growth, only to resume in the form of another massive downturn.

Meanwhile the system will constantly re-calibrate and try to restart itself… You know, those thousands of experts working overtime to save what they can. But even experts have their limits. They can do ‘magic’, but in many cases they are just fiddling around the edges, reacting to one emergency after the other. As the number of crises needed to be tended simultaneously rises, and as lead times for spare parts lengthen and shortages arise, many systems will be left in a permanent state of disrepair. Roads. Tunnels. Bridges. Dams. Water pipes. The electric grid.

Without a strong foundation to support it, any structure is doomed to collapse, no matter how carefully craftsmen try to maintain the ornaments on the facade. And the foundations of this civilization are crumbling. Fast. We are losing the biosphere and a stable climate, natural and mineral resources, a stable economic system, and working infrastructure. These are the real reasons we are facing crisis after crisis with no end in sight, made all the worse (and ultimately fueled by) the greed of our corporate overlords.

Our civilization is like an aging couch potato: sliding towards the afterlife one heart attack at a time, resuscitated by doctors again and again.

When it comes to the extraction and distribution of petroleum, we are already passing a major tipping point. From mining to agriculture, from long distance transport to building “renewables” almost all economic activity is underpinned by this highly polluting substance. Even though oil production numbers may keep rising for a year or two to come, the net energy we gain from petroleum products will inevitably max out. From that point on, energy cannibalism will use up an exponentially growing portion of whatever petroleum we may produce, leading to a permanent decline in net energy. The same is true for other minerals and sources of energy too, limiting any further growth of the human enterprise. The world is about to enter a game of musical chairs on a massive scale.

As a result, ‘Business as usual’ will soon no longer be possible. The abrupt end to global economic growth will disrupt all existing financial arrangements, based as they are on endless growth. After a brief period of money printing, a major debt crisis and another bout of inflation is all but guaranteed. Many manufacturing companies will go bankrupt due to increased energy and transportation costs, raw material and equipment shortages, and an overall collapse of profitability (especially in the material and energy intensive electrification business).

Yet the world will not end.

Yes, life will get increasingly harder and harder during the years and decades of the long emergency ahead. With rising fuel and fertilizer costs, droughts and heatwaves, agricultural output will become ever more challenging to maintain, and the costs of producing food will rise accordingly. There is a largely unreported wave of farmer’s protests underway across Europe for exactly this reason. The people growing our edibles can no longer see a viable way to stay in business: rising energy costs (diesel fuel) and the end to many subsidies have put them into an impossible situation. Will this lead to starvation and hunger riots? Hardly. To more centralization and falling quality? Almost certainly. Small farms will continue to be bought up by large agricultural firms who then will have even greater lobbying power and more access to government subsidies and tax breaks. Rising food prices for the people, and skyrocketing monopoly rents for the wealthy is the likely outcome.

Corporate consolidation will not reduce fuel and resource shortages; it will just exacerbate inequality.  As this process continues, food rationing could become the norm again, along with long queues for just about everything. If you don’t belong to the top 0.1%, you can say goodbye to holidays abroad, a new computer, or even a new toaster. Electricity will become intermittent, and rolling blackouts will become the standard measure to cope with shortfalls in generation and maintenance. Healthcare services and medicine could also become unavailable (or even more unaffordable) to the general public, leading to a decline in life expectancy and an increase in mortality across all age groups (except for the well to do with their private healthcare facilities).

Beset by an ever worsening economic outlook, an ageing population, shortages and wars, a decline in birth-rates (due to both soaring costs of living and infertility attributable to chemical pollution), a rise in infectious diseases and ‘deaths of despair’, world population could easily decline by as much as 2–5% per year. At such a rate our numbers would be halved every 2–3 decades, reducing world population to well under a billion by the end of this century. No novel viruses, mass starvation or global wars would be required - just civilizational decline, and a corresponding rise in excess deaths.

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As you can see from the picture above, collapse will look nothing like the movies. It won’t happen everywhere at the same time, and it will surely take more than a day or two to unfold. It will not lead to mass casualties in a week, yet it will reduce our numbers to a fraction of what they are today by the end of this century.

This decline is the inevitable conclusion to billions of people living well beyond our environment’s — and ultimately the planet’s — carrying capacity. Overshoot and the resulting resource depletion, pollution and climate crisis is what post-apocalyptic movies try to hush-hush away at all costs. But looking away will not help either. It is not cast in stone that Big Ag must buy up all farmland, nor that a global war must be fought for the last remaining resources on Earth.

Collapse is not something you can ‘bug out’ from in a shelter, either. It will last much, much longer than your resources could last, and ultimately you will be forced to cooperate with your neighbors as a matter of survival. While it is not a bad idea to have food and water stocked up in your basement for emergencies or disruptions, having a safety net of friends and family will take you much further.

Don’t expect that someone somewhere will come up with some solution either. Once started, collapse is irreversible. And newsflash: it’s already well underway. Increasing and maintaining complexity (including devising ever more sophisticated technologies, requiring ever more electricity and mining) would take an exponential increase in energy use, hence the term energy cannibalization. Slurping ever more oil from beneath our feet, or building ever more elaborate “renewable” devices using our rapidly depleating mineral reserves, will soon take more energy than it can  return to society. This is a process which can only get worse with more technology use. You see, it is technology (based on non-renewable resources) which is unsustainable, not fossil fuel use alone.

Once net energy peaks and starts to decline, it will mean a permanent economic contraction. Complex systems like corporations, governments or the world economy only “know” how to grow, they are not designed to function under conditions of ‘de-growth’. And while the rank and file working in governments and corporations will do everything they can to keep the system together, they will be fighting a losing battle. This is why large complex societies like ours become fragile: instead of voluntarily giving up functions, and simplifying to conserve energy, they do the opposite. They concentrate power even more, allowing their rent- seeking oligarchs to siphon off any remaining wealth, while the rest fights tooth and nail to survive under increasing ‘austerity’. At least until physics ultimately wins, and things eventually fall apart.

Photo by Minna Autio on Unsplash

At this point people — and that includes us, me and you, Dear Reader — will increasingly have to rely on local communities, personal skills, small farms and radically simplified governance structures. No one will come on TV to announce that collapse is officially here, and that you are free to go. These things will occur in parallel, and when our centralized systems finally give up the ghost, they will leave a vacuum behind. What will fill this void with, however, will be up to us. At least I hope so.

Until next time,

B

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