A Change.

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
-William Butler Yeats

In the early 1900s W.B. Yeats’ in his poem, “The Second Coming” wrote about the drawing of an end, an end to the world as we know it and the birth of a new age. Of course Yeats, as scholars have cited, was referring to the end of the Christian eon but his prophetic poem seems apt for our ‘today’ even more so for our bleak tomorrow. Look at the world around us; we seem to be spiraling into chaos. Chaos through over-consumption at a pace that is rapidly depleting the resources at hand, we seem to be ‘consuming’ towards our doom. No longer is chaos a problem to be dealt with in the future. While the second coming may have been prophesized by Yeats, the question that arises in the scenario today is “Will the world emerge from the crisis we face today and be reborn, or are we doomed to face the pits of pandemonium?” Yeats hinted at the beginning of a new era, but that idea might not hold true for us. Will we be annihilated and be reborn from our ashes or will we cease to exist altogether?
The grand curtain of 2011 unveiled the Arab Spring movement, Occupy Wall Street movement, protests against the economic crisis that gripped European nations like Greece, Spain, Portugal and Italy, and protests held in Chile and Israel. All of these proved that the world economy is undergoing a drastic change and people are noticing and taking a stand. Corruption, capitalism, greed, exploitation are words we are all too familiar with, realities that we live with. In India, we saw the Anna phenomena grip the entire nation and force the authorities to take notice. For just one moment we thought things could change for the better and that we were capable of bringing about drastic change. The Lokpal Bill put forth by Anna and his team is still to be formulated leave alone implemented, the fervor that gripped the nation less than a year back is slowly deadening. The question that is on everybody’s mind is “What next?” and “Where do we go from here?”
The condition in which the world finds itself today is our doing, we may be quick to shift the blame onto others but the time has come to take responsibility for our actions. Jean Paul Sartre once stated that, “Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does.” We live but yet we do not want to be responsible for living. In a capitalistic society we lean towards a monetary transaction of life where the value of things is their monetary weight. The socialists have been pushed into hidden corners; their attempt to change the world has more than often backfired. When given the chance they have failed to implement their ideology.
Time and time again the issue of sustainable development has been discussed, debated and swept under the table. Today it is one of the crucial problems mankind faces; well it is not just mankind but all living species to be accurate. Nations all over the globe strive to achieve development, to be modern and to keep up with the so-called evolved nations, but in this race to catch up no one seems to be taking into account the disastrous outcomes that will follow. Is it denial or just pure neglect?
The fourth report of the United Nations Global Environment Outlook stated that, “by 2025, about 1.8 billion people will be living in countries or regions with absolute water scarcity, and two-thirds of the world population could be under conditions of water stress”. We know that the damage has been done but why are we not working towards securing a better future? Even now we continue to plunder our forests, gorge on our resources, create industries and harm the environment in all ways imaginable. Yeats rightly foretold that, “Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world”. All we do is helplessly look on while we head towards our doom.
At the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum, held at Davos-Klosters, Switzerland from the 25th to the 29th of January, 2012; Paul Polman the CEO of Unilever stated that, “There is definitely a readjustment that needs to happen in Europe, because, if you want to really simplify it, we've lived above our means, and we‘ve done that for too long, and the moment of truth has arrived.” This is the line on which my essay draws a strand. The Euro debt crisis is not only confined to the European Union but will eventually impact the rest of our globalized world. The entire world’s financial system is interlinked, so a problem for Europe is a problem for the rest of the world. Since the financial crisis of the United States in 2008-2009, the global economy has been hit pretty hard and has been heading downhill. The Euro debt crisis that came to light in 2009 proved that we were heading for a rocky future. That the United States and the European Union which are considered to be the major players in the global economy could be subject to a financial crisis exposed the vulnerability of the rest of the world. It is just a matter of time before the other nations jump on board the debt wagon. Polman’s quote is not only restricted to the Euro debt crisis but on the condition of the world today, the condition of humankind today.
We do not require statistics and data to figure out that the resources provided by the earth are not adequate enough to sustain us, let alone provide for future generations. What we have we are consuming at the speed of light and the strain on the earth is beginning to show. At a population of 7 billion worldwide, it seems incredible that we have lived comfortably so far.  Inequality, socially as well as economically, is rampant. People are dissatisfied with their governments, their quality of life and the entire system on which they function. The time of difficulty is fast approaching. The optimist in me would argue that things change constantly; we live in a state of flux. The future will bring better things, better opportunities and will provide us with alternative resources. However, the pessimist in me has more reasons to despair. Man’s greed will be his downfall. We are all aware of the infamous ancient Mayan doomsday prophecy that supposedly places 2012 as the year the world ceases to exist or the time when humankind will be wiped out. Sadly, the prophecy doesn’t seem to be entirely off, if we continue down this path of self destruction then humankind might cease to exist in our lifetime.
Modernization, industrialization, globalization, the evolution into a modern state etc. all concepts we once aspired towards, which have now become a reality, but the price we have paid for it seems exorbitant.  We live in an economy that functions on an economic structure, functions through economic means. We are defined by those economic means, so the fact that the essence on which we exist is under threat is a matter of grave concern, but then are we really doing much to change anything? I could go on and on about the reasons of the Euro debt crisis, the depletion of resources, the dangers we face and how over-consumption is eroding the foundation of our life, but then what would it amount to? Too many people have stated what is wrong and why it is wrong, fewer however have offered valid suggestions to counter the wrong being done, fewer still have implemented their suggestions to better the state of things. I am just another voice seeking a reason, a reason to have hope.
The chaos has seeped into the core of our beings; too many of us have resorted to violence to find a solution. It is an all too common cry that the system does not work, the system has failed us etc. but what we fail to understand is that the violence and chaos resides in us and to calm that storm is another matter altogether. Albert Camus once wrote, “We used to wonder where war lived, what it was that made it so vile. And now we realize that we know where it lives, that it is inside ourselves.” We are at war, after all, with Mother Earth. We are at war with corrupt governments, we are at war with financial crisis, we are at war with backwardness, we are war with corporate structures, we are at war with diseases, we are at war with pollution, we are at war with nations, and ultimately we are at war with ourselves.