Abstract
The concept of a ‘triple crunch’ was first popularized by the New Economics Foundation (Simms 2008), focusing on high oil prices, the debt-induced credit crunch, and climate change—however, the analysis centered on the interconnected dynamic of what were ultimately symptoms of crisis, rather than identifying their core causal dynamics. The idea of a ‘triple crunch’ encompassing energy, climate and food crises must therefore be extended in the recognition, highlighted by the work of New Economics Foundation, of the role of credit—debt-money (the creation of money through the expansion of debt) as a key instrument used to sustain economic growth through the extension of the ‘financial system.’ While the abundance of cheap fossil fuels played the key role in permitting the expansion of the monetary and financial system—enabling exponential economic growth—from the 1950s onwards, the accelerating reduction in EROI has accompanied an increasing reliance on financialization: the shift from the expansion of money, to the expansion of credit (debt-money). Beginning concertedly in the 1970s, this has been most exemplified in the US Federal Reserve’s post-2008 rubber-stamping of quantitative easing to use money printing or credit creation (debt-money expansionism) as a mechanism to offset economic crises and bailout insolvent banks endangered by mass consumer defaults. The policy’s fiscal twin is austerity—clamping down on state expenditures in the form of public spending on infrastructure, education, health care and other forms of critical social investments and public services, while using state power to protect ongoing debt-based profiteering in the corporate-financial sectors (Smith-Nonini 2016).
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Bibliography
Ahmed, Nafeez Mosaddeq. 2010. A User’s Guide to the Crisis of Civilisation: And How to Save It. London: Pluto Press.
———. 2013a. Peak Oil, Climate Change and Pipeline Geopolitics Driving Syria Conflict. The Guardian, May 13, sec. Environment. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2013/may/13/1.
———. 2016b. At the Root of Egyptian Rage Is a Deepening Resource Crisis. Quartz. Accessed August 16. http://qz.com/116276/at-the-root-of-egyptian-rage-is-a-deepening-resource-crisis/.
———. 2016c. Return of the Reich: Mapping the Global Resurgence of Far Right Power. Investigative Report. London: Tell MAMA and INSURGE Intelligence. https://medium.com/return-of-the-reich.
Berger, Daniel, William Easterly, Nathan Nunn, and Shanker Satyanath. 2013. Commercial Imperialism? Political Influence and Trade during the Cold War. American Economic Review 103(2): 863–896. doi:10.1257/aer.103.2.863.
Bove, Vincenzo, Leandro Elia, and Petros G. Sekeris. 2014. US Security Strategy and the Gains from Bilateral Trade. Review of International Economics 22(5): 863–885. doi:10.1111/roie.12141.
Bove, Vincenzo, Kristian Skrede Gleditsch, and Petros G. Sekeris. 2015. ‘Oil above Water’ Economic Interdependence and Third-Party Intervention. Journal of Conflict Resolution, January 27: 0022002714567952. doi:10.1177/0022002714567952.
Bove, Vincenzo, and Petros G. Sekeris. 2016. Fueling Conflict: The Role of Oil in Foreign Interventions. IPI Global Observatory. Accessed July 19. https://theglobalobservatory.org/2015/03/civil-wars-oil-above-water-military-intervention/.
Kavanagh, Jennifer. 2013. Do U.S. Military Interventions Occur in Clusters? Product Page. http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_briefs/RB9718.html.
Morrissey, John. 2016. US Central Command and Liberal Imperial Reach: Shaping the Central Region for the 21st Century. The Geographical Journal 182(1): 15–26. doi:10.1111/geoj.12118.
Shaw, Martin. 2005. Risk-Transfer Militarism and the Legitimacy of War after Iraq. In September 11, 2001: A Turning-Point in International and Domestic Law? ed. Paul Eden and T. O’Donnell. Transnational Publishers. http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/12462/.
Simms, Andrew. 2008. The Poverty Myth. New Scientist 200(2678): 49. doi:10.1016/S0262-4079(08)62641-X.
Smith-Nonini, Sandy. 2016. The Role of Corporate Oil and Energy Debt in Creating the Neoliberal Era. Economic Anthropology 3(1): 57–67. doi:10.1002/sea2.12044.
Stokes, Doug, and Sam Raphael. 2010. Global Energy Security and American Hegemony. Baltimore: JHU Press.
Wilkinson, Henry. 2016. Political Violence Contagion: A Framework for Understanding the Emergence and Spread of Civil Unrest. Lloyd’s. http://www.lloyds.com/~/media/files/news%20and%20insight/risk%20insight/2016/political%20violence%20contagion.pdf.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2017 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Ahmed, N.M. (2017). Human System Destabilization. In: Failing States, Collapsing Systems. SpringerBriefs in Energy(). Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47816-6_6
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47816-6_6
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-47814-2
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-47816-6
eBook Packages: EnergyEnergy (R0)