On this website I present an analysis of the ecological crisis, a proposal for humankind's rational response, and a strategy for implementing this response.  My aims are to help our species survive the crisis and to preserve nature to the maximum possible extent.  I am particularly concerned about the global young, who face intense suffering and horrific mortality as the crisis unfolds.  My specific objectives are:

  1. To establish that revolutionary change is required to achieve these ends. Although governments are society's nominal leaders, they lack the political power to make the fundamental changes required for effective solutions.  Such changes will be possible only if society's true leaders - those who own and control the economy - are replaced by a sustainable group.
  2. To refute the lies and deceptions that have allowed these leaders to persist in their obscene inaction for over half a century. My main target is the IPCC, which misleads the concerned by acknowledging the greenhouse gas problems but rejecting any solutions that threaten capitalism or growth.
  3. To initiate the replacement of capitalism with a sustainable economic system. Because a new economic theory will be required to guide this transition, I propose The Economics of Needs and Limits (ENL) as a starting point for its development.

As explained further below, I am an independent thinker.  I have no institutional, organizational, or other affiliations that might skew or constrain my thought.  I have also worked hard to free myself from the thought control imposed by social leaders.  Thus, to the best of my ability, the ideas presented here are based on facts and logic rather than conventional pressures.

Frank Rotering Photo 2019
Frank Rotering (2019)

Who am I?

A Canadian social thinker, born in Amsterdam into a working-class family, who has studied the ecological crisis for more than thirty years.  I was a progressive for most of my life, but left the movement because it rejects the revolutionary change that is now necessary for survival.  I likely have Asperger's.

Why should you listen to me?

In expressing my views on the ecological crisis I have frequently encountered an attitude I call WTFAY: "Who the fuck are you?"  That is, "Why should I listen to someone without a PhD, professional standing, or an established reputation?"  Although such dismissals can be galling, the underlying question is valid: What qualifies me to offer analytical and strategic guidance with respect to the ecological crisis?

A minor qualification is that I have an undergraduate degree from Simon Fraser University, where I studied economics.  Far more important is my independence as a thinker.  To explain the significance of this attribute, note that the crisis is both unprecedented and profound.

Because it is unprecedented - global overshoot is unique in human experience - much of what is taught in academe and embraced by environmental thinkers is not just irrelevant, it is disastrously misleading.  This is why most of my intellectual development took place after I graduated, and why I had to unlearn the obsolete dogma I had acquired.

Because the crisis is profound - it cuts to the core of human life on this planet - the prevailing social order must be decisively transcended.  I have been aware of this requirement for many years and have made an intense effort to envision a post-capitalist world.  This has allowed me to produce a sustainable economic theory and to penetrate the lies and manipulations used by social leaders to maintain the ecocidal status quo.

Another important factor is at play here.  A lifetime of study has taught me that, although many thinkers are clever and some are brilliant, vanishingly few are intellectually independent.  I have been repeatedly shocked to see academics and others clinging tenaciously to ideas and approaches that have been completely invalidated by the Earth's catastrophic decline.  At a time when intellectual courage and creativity are desperately needed, many thinkers are tragic cases of arrested development.  I appear to be an extreme outlier in this regard.

So, who am I?  A fiercely independent thinker who for three decades has carefully examined an existential issue that can be effectively addressed only by fiercely independent thought.  The reader must decide if this is sufficient to heed my work.