William R. Catton, Jr.: Overshoot: The Ecological Basis of Revolutionary Change (1980)

This famous book outlines William R. Catton’s realization of “the urgent need for everyone, including sociologists, to recognize that our lifestyles, mores, institutions, patterns of interaction, values, and expectations are shaped by a cultural heritage that was formed in a time when carrying capacity exceeded the human load. A cultural heritage can outlast the conditions that produced it. That carrying capacity surplus is gone now, eroded both by population increase and immense techno-logical enlargement of per capita resource appetites and environmental impacts. Human life is now being lived in an era of deepening carrying capacity deficit. All of the familiar aspects of human societal life are under compelling pressure to change in this new era when the load increasingly exceeds the carrying capacities of many local regions—and of a finite planet. Social disorganization, friction, demoralization, and conflict will escalate.” (Catton, 2008)

Publisher University of Illinois Press, 1980
ISBN 0252009886
xvii+298 pages

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PDF (16 MB, glossary missing)