Climate Crisis in the Tropics: How is “Middle Earth” Transformed ... For the Worse?
A special series of newsletters leading up to my 1 May open online presentation
Every day is Earth Day on this substack!
Picking up from last Thursday’s post and building toward the 1 May roundtable …
What do I mean by “Middle Earth”?
In America’s New Map, I distinguish between lower and higher latitudes (those horizontal bars on the map), with the lower ones (smaller numbers) closer to the equator and higher ones (larger numbers) closer to poles. My definition of Middle Earth is thus centered on the equator, capturing the combination of (a) the “tropical climates” (noted below) and (b) the lower (in terms of latitudes) portions of the adjacent “dry climates.” Visually, this is the “middle” of Earth.
In terms of latitudes, then, Middle Earth stretches from the equator to 30 degrees north and south.
How to characterize Middle Earth?
We know that more than half of the world’s population is concentrated there, so, by mid-century, we’re talking about roughly 5 billion people.
Relative to the temperate zones north and south of Middle Earth, these peoples skew far younger and far more fertile, meaning the vast bulk of population growth his century will be concentrated across Middle Earth. Meanwhile, the advanced economies concentrated in the North will see their populations rapidly age and decrease in size.
As a rule, Middle Earth economies are either developing or underdeveloped, but the band is also slated to become where the emergent global majority middle class is increasingly concentrated, meaning this is where economists expect the most vibrant growth in coming decades — all things being equal.
How will climate change transform Middle Earth differently?
But all things latitudinal will become dramatically unequal due to climate change. As I noted in America’s New Map:
Two inevitabilities arise from the scientific community’s increasingly firm projections of climate change: First, higher latitudes (closer to poles) will experience significantly greater weather volatility— temperate zones made intemperate. Second, lower latitudes (closer to equator) will experience a harshening of their climes with increasingly frequent and extreme droughts accompanied by unlivable temperature ranges. In sum, the North’s climate grows frighteningly erratic while the South’s grows depressingly predictable.
Why thinking in North-South terms also makes sense
When you look at the globe and realize that the lower latitudes (Middle Earth) are going to be harshly impacted by climate change, and you know that thousands of studies have shown that species of all sorts are migrating up in elevation and latitude (toward the poles), there’s still this huge difference between what the Southern Hemisphere can accommodate in terms of migrating species (including humans) and what the Northern Hemisphere can — and will be forced to — handle.
Simply put: the vast bulk of reasonably habitable land (excluding Antarctica) lies in the Northern Hemisphere (68%) versus the Southern Hemisphere (32%). So, if Middle Earth is going to be put under a great deal of environmental stress this century, most species (to include people) are going to head north — versus south.
How bad will climate change be across Middle Earth?
Climate scientists and leading international organizations (like the UN) are coalescing around this view: Middle Earth (more than half the world’s population) will increasingly experience temperature and precipitation (rainfall) ranges historically associated with the Saharan Desert — namely, average daily temp pushing 90 degrees Fahrenheit or 32 degrees Celsius, along with stubbornly persistent drought conditions.
Does that mean Middle Earth turns into the Saharan Desert by mid-century? No. Desertification takes a lot longer as a rule.
But it does mean that Middle Earthers will be subject to Saharan Desert-like weather on a regular-bleeding-into-permanent basis.
See this map of worldwide population density and note how empty the Saharan Desert area is:
The same is largely true for most of Australia — also covered by desert.
Then look at the long box along the northern tier and spot what is presently extremely unpopulated but will — thanks to “climate velocity” — warm up considerably to the point of far more reasonably supporting life and even farming.
An example of this “climate velocity”
That orange shape is where wheat works most easily right now, and North America grows a lot of it.
The top of the wheat belt is presently at about 55 degrees north. By midcentury, it is predicted to extend as high as 65 degree north, or right about the latitude of Fairbanks, Alaska.
The distance between those two latitudes? Almost 700 miles — in less than one human lifetime.
Attention grabbing, isn’t it?
And this is where it dawned on me (and should dawn on you)
Follow my logic:
Middle Earth is going to be subjected to Saharan Desert-like weather on a regular basis as this century progresses.
Farming (crops, herds) is the primary industry in most of these countries, and it will suffer greatly from a harshening clime — to the point of forcing people off the land.
The Saharan Desert, as a rule, is vastly underpopulated as a result of that clime, and has historically featured weak and unstable governments beset with meager economies and civil strife.
If more than half of the world’s population (relatively fertile and young Middle Earth) is going to be subjected to Saharan Desert-like weather on a regular basis, then those regions will likewise find themselves beset with unstable economies and failing governments.
As a result, the world will witness a strong depopulation dynamic across those lower latitudes — as in, people will leave Middle Earth just like all the world’s species are migrating poleward. They will be seeking a better, more stable life, primarily because climate change is making that extremely hard or even impossible to sustain in their environmentally devastated homelands.
If we start with a pool of roughly 5 billion, then that can easily become — if only a fraction are put on the move — the biggest and most disruptive human migration in human history, and it will be overwhelmingly headed northward.
Why climate change will change America
We’ve already seen how immigration pressures have warped our political systems in the West in recent years. If those pressures are inexorably rising over the coming decades, then our political battles on this subject are only going to get worse — as in, debilitating.
For those of you who’ve seen the white-hot movie Civil War, then you know the heart-pounding scene when some anonymous militiaman points an automatic weapon at the main characters and asks: What kind of American are you?
The Jesse Plemons character quizzes them: South? Central? And then approvingly receives Missouri and Colorado as “real” and “100 percent” American.
That’s what I’m talking about!
In this dead-eyed soldier’s color-tinted view of America, there are the right kind and the wrong kind of Americans, and the wrong kind are legit targets.
Read the news out of Texas today and tell me we aren’t headed down that vicious path.
Which is why grand strategy applies to this situation
An external dynamic with this much capacity to determine our domestic political environment … that is something worth having an American grand strategy in response.
A grand strategy has, at its core, a vision of a future America within a future world that is shaped to our national benefit. It is thus world-shaping in its ambition, with the fundamental driver being our desire to not be trapped in a world of some other nation’s making — like, say, China’s.
Climate change and what it will do to Middle Earth is that big. It’s that America-shaping. It’s that world-system-shaping.
So let’s collaborate
That’s why I’m inviting any and all of you to my online executive roundtable on 1 May at 5pm Eastern [contact Liz Gaither at lgaither@throughline.com to confirm].
Grand strategies cannot merely be imposed from on high. They require whole-of-nation buy-in and that begins with all of us. So, if you’re willing to engage this ambition with Throughline and I, then I’ll be happy to see you on the 1st for my briefing and discussion.
Sign up to take the America’s New Map MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) at edX
