Can we live inside the doughnut? Why the world needs planetary and social boundaries
This blog summaries a new Discussion Paper published by Oxfam. It does not represent Oxfam policy, but is intended to encourage public debate in the run-up to the UN conference on sustainable devolpment (Rio+20) in June.
When crossing unknown territory, a compass can be pretty handy. Achieving sustainable development for nine billion people has to be high on the list of humanity’s great uncharted journeys. So here’s an idea for a global-scale compass to point us in the right direction (Fig 1).
Fig 1. Planetary and social boundaries: a safe and just space for humanity
Source: Oxfam, inspired by Rockström et al (2009)
What’s going on here? Start with the outer ring. In 2009, a group of leading Earth-system scientists (aka Rockström et al) proposed a set of nine Earth-system processes (like freshwater use, climate regulation, and the nitrogen cycle) that are critical for keeping this planet in the stable state which has been so beneficial to humankind over the past 10,000 years (that’s the Holocene, and it’s nothing to sniff at: it gave us agriculture, and all that has followed…).
Putting excessive stress on these critical processes could lead to tipping points of abrupt and irreversible environmental change, so Rockström et al proposed a set of boundaries for avoiding those danger zones. Together, the nine boundaries constitute an environmental ceiling – what their authors call ‘a safe operating space for humanity’.
That’s a compelling approach to environmental sustainability, but humanity is glaringly absent from the picture. After all, an environmentally safe space could be compatible with appalling poverty and injustice.
So how about combining planetary boundaries together with the concept of social boundaries? (now focus on the inner ring of Fig. 1) Just as there is an environmental ceiling, beyond which lies unacceptable environmental degradation, so too there is a social foundation, below which lies unacceptable human deprivation.
Like what, exactly? Well, human rights provide the cornerstone for defining that, and it’s the question at the heart of revising the Millennium Development Goals after 2015 and creating Sustainable Development Goals at the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20) this June. But a first glimpse of 21st century consensus on unacceptable deprivation comes from the issues raised by governments in their Rio+20 submissions: they prioritised 11 dimensions of human deprivation, and so these form the inner ring of Fig 1.
Between the planetary ceiling and the social foundation lies an area – shaped like a doughnut – which is the safe and just space for humanity to thrive in. The 21st century’s unprecedented journey is to move into that space from both sides: to eradicate poverty and inequity for all, within the means of the planet’s limited resources.
Where are we now? Far outside the doughnut
Every compass needs a needle – and boundaries need metrics. Rockström et al stuck their necks out when they had a first go at quantifying seven of the nine planetary boundaries (acknowledging huge uncertainties in doing so) and estimated that three have already been dangerously crossed: on climate change, biodiversity loss, and nitrogen use.
I have stuck my neck out, too, suggesting indicators for eight of the 11 social boundaries. Humanity is falling far below the social foundation on each one, as depicted in Fig. 2. Take food, for example: 13 percent of people in the world are undernourished - that 13 percent is represented by the blue gap below the social foundation. Likewise, 21 percent of people live in income poverty and an estimated 30 percent don’t have access to essential medicines.
Fig 2: Falling far below the social foundation
So that’s the doughnut on a plate: planetary and social boundaries combined to create a safe and just space for humanity to thrive in.
But what does all this bring to the debate? Two messages for starters.
1. Who’s stressing the planet? The rich, not the poor
Bringing everyone alive today above the social foundation need not stress planetary boundaries.
- Food: Providing the additional calories needed by the 13 percent of the world’s population facing hunger would require just one percent of the current global food supply
- Energy: Bringing electricity to the 19 percent of people who currently lack it could be achieved with a less than one percent increase in global CO2 emissions
- Income: Ending income poverty for the 21 percent of people who live on less than $1.25 a day would require just 0.2 percent of global income.
The real source of stress is excessive resource use by roughly the richest 10 percent of people in the world – backed up by the aspirations of a rapidly growing global middle class seeking to emulate those unsustainable lifestyles. Thanks to the extraordinary scale of global inequality, widespread poverty coexists with dangerous planetary stress.
2. Growth on trial
The aim of economic development must be to bring humanity into the safe and just space, ending deprivation and keeping within safe levels of resource use. Traditional growth policies have largely failed to deliver on both accounts: far too few benefits of GDP growth have gone to people living in poverty, and far too much of GDP’s rise has been at the cost of degrading natural resources.
If respecting planetary and social boundaries is the objective, then - in wealthy economies at least - the onus falls on those promoting unlimited GDP growth to show that it can bring humanity within the doughnut. The G20, among others, stand for the vision of ‘inclusive and sustainable economic growth’, but no country has yet shown that it is possible. If unlimited GDP growth is to have a place in doughnut economics, it has a long way to go to prove itself.
Debate the doughnut
Any verdicts on the doughnut? Are social boundaries a useful complement to planetary boundaries? Does the combination bring a useful perspective to 21st century challenges? And what is it missing? Take a bite or toss it away - we’d love to know…
Kate Raworth is Senior Researcher at Oxfam. Add your comment here, to her new blog - Doughnut Economics - and download the full Discussion Paper: A Safe and Just Space for Humanity: can we live within the doughnut?
Comments
stretching the metaphor too far?
Thanks Kate – looks most interesting.
Just one thought about the metaphors involved in social ‘foundations’ and the environmental ‘ceilings’. It strikes me that many of the social foundations are themselves sitting on environmental ‘footings/piles’.
For example, we can’t feed the world unless agricultural ecosystems can function sufficiently well to enable nutrient uptake, pollination, etc. Similarly, making water available requires the water to be there and to be available and affordable, and this means making sure river catchments and groundwater systems function as well as they can; with minimal erosion leading to siltation, with minimal pollution, etc.
So perhaps ecosystem services and natural resources are the footings on which the foundations sit.
To stretch the metaphor even more, what connects the foundations to the ceilings? i.e. what are the ‘walls’ of the doughnut? (now this is definitely going too far!) For me it must the governance regimes for ecosystem services and natural resources that will enable us to sit our foundations on firm footings and ensure that we don’t crash into or beyond the ceilings.
I must stop now!
Best wishes
Gary
I agree that natural resources are the fundamental wealth
Hi Gary - I agree that natural resources are the fundamental wealth on which all life and well-being depends. Stating that in the language of nine planetary boundaries, you could say that the Holocene state of the Earth has been the ‘foundation’ that has enabled humanity to thrive. So the question is, how much pressure can be put on critical Earth-system processes before they are at risk of being pushed out of the Holocene state? Hence what matters is identifying the 'safe' upper limits of resource use, which I have called the environmental ceiling.
And I certainly agree that governance systems are crucial for holding this doughnut together...!
Implications for economic growth?
Thanks for this fascinating post. Bringing issues of social equity and environmental limits within the same conceptual framework has always been one of the great challenges for anybody thinking about the future of development, and until now I don't think it's been done adequately. But the doughnut idea does the trick - at least for me - offering a simple but profound framework.
But I'm left with a few questions, especially about growth. Are you actually saying that the pursuit of economic growth should be a secondary priority for government policy (in both poor and rich countries) - while the primary priority should be getting us within the safe and just space of the doughnut? Or can these goals be pursued concurrently?
Also, is the implication of your idea that entering into the safe and just space is, in effect, a way of defining what 'green growth' or 'sustainable growth' really mean? These fluffy concepts have been crying out for more precise conceptualisation - and perhaps this is what your doughnut ultimately achieves.
That’s a whole area of debate in itself.…
Yes social and planetary boundaries have implications for rethinking the aims of economic activity – and that’s a whole area of debate in itself.…I think that green growth must (in high-income countries for starters) mean that GDP rises while absolute levels of natural resource use fall. But whether that is possible or not has yet to be proven – see Oxfam’s paper Left Behind by the G20? for an exploration of this.
The need for new governance
Kate, I think you have done a great service by integrating the planetary and social in this way. To my mind you’ve set out a framework for the development of policy that would genuinely try to grapple with both the intellectual and practical challenges of integration. We’ve had many years of the ‘mush’ of sustainable development and its ‘balance’ of environmental, social and economic dimensions. The planetary boundaries concept offers a new framing for sustainability and your essential combining of it with social aspects which the economy should help deliver, provide a much clearer sense of how these dimensions are, rather, sequential and complementary. And ‘hear, hear’ to Gary’s comments – the Draft Declaration on Planetary Boundaries is a first attempt at setting out how governance regimes should start contributing to a safe and just operating space: www.planetaryboundariesinitiative.org
Doughnut or ring? It's the concepts that are important.
Thanks for these interesting ideas and the picture. Your original presentation of idea of the doughnut confused me a little - I think it was because of the natural 3-d-ness of a real doughnut which didn't seem to fit the concepts. However, the graphics here bring out more of a 2-d aspect which, I think, is clearer for what you are trying to do. I would call it a 'ring', rather than a doughnut - and maybe people are more prepared to live in a ring rather than a dougnut (!) Then again, perhaps the name is not so important! In any event the concepts are clear and well-formed and that is a good point from which to start to build. AS these concepts are now well clarified in the above, there might be scope to add to the picture the challenges and problems we face in achieving the right width of the doughnut. For me, the greatest challenge remains the fundamental one that as humans we value low-entropy goods, and low-entropy for us means gradual degradation and destruction for the planet. In any event, perhaps you could work towards a 3-d graphic showing the fundamental challenges both 'in' and 'out' of the page, associated with each of your environmental and social metrics around the ring.
Human psychology
I agree, the fundamental challenge to getting anywhere close to within this doughnut is human desire to consume and aspire. It’s not economics or politics, but fundamentally human psychology that needs to be transformed – is it going to be possible? A number of people suggested making the doughnut 3D, with the third dimension being increasing human wellbeing – to make it clear that living between social and planetary boundaries doesn’t automatically imply limits on well-being. But I’m a bit reluctant to make it 3D – it risks getting too complicated, too fancy for it’s own good!
Yummy
"Achieving sustainable development for nine billion people has to be high on the list of humanity’s great uncharted journeys."
It would of course be easier to provide food, water and energy for all, whilst staying within planetary boundaries if we didn't hit 9 billion. The UN's medium and high population projections both go beyond 10bn, but we should be aiming for the low scenario of peaking around 8bn. Given that access to reproductive health tools also goes hand-in-hand (both ways) with increased income, health, gender equality, and education, it makes a lot of sense to prioritise meeting unmet demand for contraception etc..
I do like the doughnut. It's a simple message but it's a good framework for new development goals.
But is it possible to display both metrics at once?
And might some misinterpret it to mean that we can't simultaneously be below the 'social foundation' and above the 'environmental ceiling'? Similarly, one should emphasise that high income and energy use etc. don't have to mean heading up to or beyond the environmental boundaires - we just need to decouple human development/prosperity from environmental damage (e.g. through cleaner energy).
Any ideas?
I agree a great deal with what you say.On showing both social and planetary metrics at once: it would be great to do, but when we had a go it looked too complex on the page. And technically it’s not yet possible because we don’t know enough about the scale of environmental resources required to meet the social foundation for all – ie how big should the ring of the social foundation be in relation to natural resource pressures?...But I’m still trying to think of ways to combine them – got any ideas on that?
Country flag icing will only make the donut more appetising
This paper is both important and timely. By observing the broad environmental parameters within which development must now operate, while sketching out the social floor that should underpin human development, you draw attention more easily towards the need for a more efficient distribution of a whole range of increasingly excludable core resources. I expect that concepts like the ‘social floor’ and a ‘safe operating space’ will only become more pertinent and fascinating as they are adapted regionally or nationally. This will be particularly true in G20 countries, because when viewed through the prism of the donut, it seems clearer than ever that stark intra-national inequalities in key advanced, emerging and 'emerged' economies could constitute a major political impediment to environmentally sustainable development. For example, if in the politically charged ‘no-money era’, Northern economies that enjoy high-GDP per capita ratios are set to struggle to reduce poverty and maintaining living standards at home even while pushing for maximum growth through their current economic model, then economic exclusion, and an unequal distribution of the proceeds of growth within rich economies may already effectively constitute a considerable headwind against global poverty reduction. I look forward to digesting donuts decorated with icing depicting the flags of G20 countries!