Sustainable Societies

Sustainable Societies
Cameron White

For thousands of years societies have strived for sustainability. Sustain is defined as to keep from giving way, as under trial or affliction. This relates to societies contiual battle of sustainability. If the foundations of a society are weak that society will collapse. The foundations of a society that need to be strong can be divided into four different points. This four point framework helps to understand how a society becomes sustainable. These five points are resource management, insuring defence against invasion, culture and governance. Resource management involves utilising the natural resources available and managing their use. Insuring defence against invasion is about making sure that if they are invaded their society will not be completely demolished. Culture involves the society’s willingness to change if faced with a problem that relates to its culture. Also all of these points can be broken up into many categories, for example deforestation and having strong allies.

The first of these points is resource management. Over the centuries many societies have perished because of poor resource management. Although if a society can manage its natural resources well and keep a balance between demand and supply it may flourish.
The factor of resource management can be separated into many smaller categories. Some of these categories include deforestation, water management, use of minerals and metals, flora and fauna management and many more.
One particular society that has managed a particular sector of their resources well is the Japanese. Although not in the begging, in around the 6th century the Japanese started large scale deforestation because of the growing population. The ancient forests around the large cities were demolished for space and high demands of good quality wood for furniture and fuel. The next crisis was in the 16th and 17th centuries. This was because the new rulers of the time demanded large scale shrines and temples built. The rulers demanded the finest quality of wood.
This makes Japan seem as if they didn’t manage their natural resource of the ancient forests well, although it is what the Japanese did to solve the problem that they were faced with that makes their resource management effective. Post WWII Japan had a vast timber shortage, to solve this problem the Japanese government introduced high scale timber plantations and started to import vast quantities of timber.
A way of showing just how important it is for a society to manage its resources effectively is to show how badly things can turn when resources are managed poorly. A society that managed its natural resources appallingly is the Easter Islanders. The Easter Islanders created large statues known as Moai; some of these enormous statues were up to 80 tons. With the lack of machinery at the time sheer muscle power was used to make, and transport them. Many people were needed to create and move the Moai, so the islanders increased their population in order to build these magnificent structures. In order to support the large and growing population natural resources were depleted heavily. They deforested there land in order to move the monolithic structures and for fuel.
The Easter Islanders mis-management of their natural resources highly contributed towards the fall of their society. This shows how important managing the natural resources is for a society.

The next point in the four point framework is defence against invasion. There are also many categories within this point. They are having a large army, having good defences and allying themselves with strong societies. Being invaded can cause many problems within a society, these can include being killed by the invaders, catching diseases and the citizens being taken for prisoners or slaves. If a society has a large army it can defend itself against invaders and hopefully repel anyone that comes. Having good defences, such as large building built of stone gives the people time to build an army and try to repel the attacking invaders. Finally having strong allies means that help is always on the way if the society is ever attacked.
A sustainable society that displays some of these characteristics is the British Empire. For thousands of years it has thrived with the aid of its large army and navy. Despite the fact that England is a small country it has always had a large population and therefore the need for a large army and navy. At the start of World War One it had the largest navy in the world. The large army and navy have helped Britain to become sustainable as they have defended England and won many battles.
Also England also had buildings that acted as a line of defence from attackers. The English would build spectacular castles that would act as a defence because of their motes and their thick stone walls that could withstand the primitive weaponry of that age. For example Dover Castle in Kent, this castle was built in the 12th century under the rule of Henry II and it is built on the top of a hill and surround by a high, thick, stone wall. This makes it difficult to attack.
Having large armies, navies and building castles in a defensive manner Britain has helped maintain its sustainability for hundreds of years.

The third aspect of the four point framework involves culture. The culture of a society can be vital to the sustainability or collapse of that society. A culture needs to be flexible and accepting for a society to prosper in troubled times. If, for example there is climate change or a different dramatic change such as invasion, the culture and religion of that society must be able to adapt to the new circumstances. Most societies last for hundreds, if not thousands of years, in this time there is most likely to be some sort of change, whether it be the temperature rising or allies changing, the culture of that society has to change to accommodate for the change. That may mean growing different crops or making new alliances.
A society that shows an adaptation of their culture in order to not collapse was the Ottoman Empire. In 1453 AD the Ottoman Empire overpowered the Byzantine Empire and seized control over Constantinople. At the time Constantinople was predominately Christian, so all the impressive temples were dedicated to the Christian faith. When Constantinople became part of the Ottoman Empire temples such as the Hagia Sofia had to undergo change. The Ottomans culturally adapted their surroundings to adapt to their own faith, predominately Muslim.
There was another cultural change for the Ottoman’s during 1566 to 1683 A.D. In 1566 the ruler, known as Suleiman the Magnificent died and things started to go downhill from here. The once expanding empire came to a sudden halt. It stopped expanding into Europe and its economy became strained. Over the next hundred years or so the Ottoman’s were weakened with many battles. They then rebuilt there empire. The Ottoman Empire slowly adapted its culture to become more western and in doing so ensured its sustainability within the modern word.
A society that was unable to adapt to the changes happening was the Greenlandic Norse. The weather of Greenland didn’t allow the quick regrowth of plant life, this was a problem as the introduced farm animals such as cows, sheep and horses quickly stripped the land bare of vegetation. These farm animals then began to die out and the Greenlandic Norse had less supply of meat. A simple solution for this problem would have been to eat the fish and whales right on their doorstep, like the Inuit’s. But the people of Greenland tried to stay true to their European heritage, which meant not hunting and eating the marine life.
The people of Greenland’s lack of adaptation to the surroundings because of their culture aided in the collapse of their complex society. Had the Greenlandic Norse people followed the Inuit’s lead and hunted the marine life there would have been a much higher chance of becoming sustainable.

The fourth and final section of the four point frame work relates to governance. Governance is what can make or break a society. The government makes all the decisions and two of the previous points from the four point framework are up to the government. These points are resource management and defence against invasion. Governance can be separated into these categories and more, economy, response to crisis and keeping peace within the society. The economy of a society is vital to its sustainability, economy includes trade and taxes. If a crisis goes on ignored and ignored the severity of that crisis builds, if a government can recognize a threat to its society and put a stop to it that makes the society more sustainable. Peace within a society is almost as important as peace with other societies, having fighting with themselves causes inner weaknesses in that society.
The form of government in many places around the world, including Australia and the USA is democracy. What better a city to discuss the importance of governance towards sustainability than where democracy was born, Athens. The ancient Athenians developed a system of government that represented the people. The government was built up of Athenians who elected themselves. The Athenians way of thinking was that if people elected themselves to the government they would have a good cross section of the citizens. By having this, the Athenian democracy helped majority of the Athenian citizens in their day to day lives. This meant that the people of Athens were happy with the work of their government and so they supported it and listened to it. Therefore the city of Athens was sustained because of the peoples trust and confidence in their system of government.

Sustainability is what is desired by all communities, cities, countries and societies. For a society to be truly sustainable they need to be flourishing and strong for 300 years or more. All four points in the four point framework interrelate to give a guide as to what makes a society sustainable. This framework can be applied to a society in the past to examine the fact of sustainability. Although a society may not display all or any of these points but still last for hundreds of years. There are many smaller aspects of sustainability not explored in this report. I have tried to give a basic structure as to how societies become sustainable and what makes them sustainable.


Bibliography

World Rainforest Movement
Underlying Causes of Deforestation and Forest Degradation http://www.wrm.org.uy/deforestation/Asia/Japan.html

Harry’s Blog
“The Fall of Easter Island”
http://exsephiroth.blogspot.com/

Wikipedia
Dover Castle
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dover_castle

Wikipedia
The Ottoman Empire http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ottoman_Empire#Revolts_and_revival_.281566.E2.80.931683.29

Kate’s Blog
“Why the Greenland Norse Collapsed”
http://kated6.blogspot.com/

BBC
“The Democratic Experience” http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/greeks/greekdemocracy_03.shtml