In the Jaws of Peril

There is a growing consensus that the world faces huge problems of sustainability over the coming century, and it is far from assured that our civilization will even survive. What are we doing to avert the multiple catastrophes that loom on the horizon – climate change, the ageing of the population, the inadequacy of energy and food supplies, overall environmental degradation and the risk of pandemics?

To combat all these threats will require massive investment in new technologies that can only grow from scientific knowledge. Most countries now pay lip-service to this objective. Yet few, if any of them are taking concrete steps to achieve it. Some are plainly moving in the opposite direction, such as the UK, which is slashing state expenditure on education and research and providing no incentives to the private sector to fill the gap.

In 1940, Finland faced an existential crisis, almost alone amongst nations. It won the admiration of most of the world for its brave struggle against tyranny. In the view of many historians, this played a significant part in stiffening the resolve of other nations that soon found themselves facing similar threats. Today’s existential crisis confronts us all, Finland included. Could Finland again inspire the rest of humanity to confront and contain the enemy, before it is too late to save the planet?

One of the most depressing aspects of the current situation is how governments are setting ambitious goals so far in the future that nobody will be able to hold them to account if these goals are not met. For example, the aim of halving greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 has been supported by many states, even though it has not been enshrined in any binding treaty. However, most experts agree that unless the bulk of the work towards this objective is done much sooner, the Copenhagen goal of limiting the rise in global temperature to 2 degrees Celsius is unattainable and, instead, a self-perpetuating cycle of worsening climate disruption is likely.

This type of attitude, embodied in Saint Augustine’s famous quote: “Lord, make me virtuous, but not yet”, carries the seeds of global destruction. It is similar, though far more serious in effect, to the blinkered attitudes of the ‘peace-loving democracies’ in the 1930s, which deluded themselves into believing that the totalitarian empires would never enact their threat to conduct a war of conquest against them, and thus resisted the necessary pain of rearmament and the enforcement of international legality till far too late in the day.

What is needed is for one or a few nations to break ranks, declare far more ambitious shortterm goals, and devise and implement a plan to achieve them. By showing that it can be done, and actually devising marketable technologies to do it, such nations will win not only the admiration of the rest of the world, but will ensure their own future prosperity by marketing those solutions globally. As the self-proclaimed global leader in technology, already investing more in research than almost any other country, and home to the Millennium Technology Prize, Finland is ideally placed to be such a pioneer. In fact, one could well ask, if not us, who?

It will take a lot of courage. The short term pain, in terms of reduced living standards whilst resources are diverted elsewhere, and the shock of adjusting to the changes that will be actively sought, may be considerable. It will require an informed debate, a united decision, and a plan to safeguard the most vulnerable, whether the plan succeeds or fails. Only a unified and stable polity such as the Republic of Finland, governed by consensus and by entrenched respect for democratic norms, could possibly undertake such a task. Yet in 1939-1940 that is exactly what it did.

Next year is the time for the parliamentary election in Finland. This is always amusing to a foreigner such as myself. It seems to involve a great deal of emotionally charged and even intellectually challenging debate, resulting in what, by world standards, is never more than a minute shift in electoral support for the parties, and a consensus government agreement in which all ideological differences are completely forgotten. Not to mention the personalized election posters which, as one foreign visitor innocently observed, look more like ads for a fashion store or hair stylist.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if, just for once, one or more parties made the declaration of ambitious sustainability goals, and the investment in science and technology required to achieve them, the central plank of its election programme? Wouldn’t it be even more wonderful if, after the election, like-minded parties sharing this view could somehow muster a majority and implement it?

What kind of goals am I speaking of? I believe that, if it is worth doing at all, in a way that captures the imagination and commitment of the public, FutureFinland should be a multifaceted project. It would be great to declare that Finland will be a non-petroleum economy by 2020. But if that would be achieved by replacing all food crops by those designed to generate high yield biofuels, we would at the same time be exacerbating, not solving the problem of sustainability in agriculture. We should aim instead to become a non-petroleum economy which also exports pineapples (using green transport).

Of course, we could just sit back and wait for other countries to wake up to the possibilities of doing all this. Thus, it may be Slovakia, or New Zealand, or even Iceland, that wins the admiration of future generations by charting a path to solving the world’s problems, securing its own place in that future. Indeed, Iceland is, paradoxically, a good candidate. A decade or so ago it made a collective decision to achieve the impossible, transforming a lump of volcanic rock stuck out in the ocean into one of the world’s main financial players. In a sense, the impossible was just that, and the resulting crash when it all went wrong has left Icelanders little better off than before, at least for now. Yet it has had two major positive effects: firstly, it has shown that great dreams can be realized, if a nation has enough will to achieve them. Secondly, it has demonstrated that a cohesive society that makes such a leap into the future can weather the storms of temporary failure. And Iceland already produces pineapples using green energy, in a climate even less hospitable than ours.

At the time of writing, Finland’s politicians are pre-occupied with minor tinkering with the tax rates. I do not believe this has the remotest chance of propelling us to world leadership in solving global problems. We need a wartime mentality that enables resources to be massively diverted into basic science and into providing sufficient financial and other incentives to scientists to induce them to translate discovery into real and immediate technological advances. As of now, just creating a spinoff company in Finland is a daunting task, let alone getting it resourced to the degree needed for possible success. This has to be fundamentally changed. And in all such investment, it must be recognized that 95% of basic science will produce only knowledge, and 95% of spinoff companies will produce nothing at all. It is for the 5% that Finland needs to mobilize the best brains in the world, using all means possible. Can we do it? I hope that we could.

Howy Jacobs on akatemiaprofessori. Professoriliitto valitsi hänet Vuoden Professoriksi 2009.