# Overshoot (book)

Overshoot: The Ecological Basis of Revolutionary Change is a book by American sociologist William R. Catton Jr. The book is a critical work that many consider one of the most essential yet overlooked books of the 20th century. It discusses humanity's overexploitation of Earth's resources, leading to a situation where our consumption exceeds the planet's capacity to regenerate itself.
It is divided into several parts, each addressing different aspects of ecological overshoot. It covers the historical development of human society, our dependence on unsustainable practices, and the need for a new environmental perspective. Catton emphasizes that humanity must recognize and adapt to the limits imposed by nature to avoid catastrophic consequences.
Catton urges humanity to adopt a more realistic and sustainable way of life on Earth. He warns that ignoring these ecological limits will have severe repercussions, and only by understanding and respecting them can we hope to create a viable future for ourselves and future generations.

## Background

William Catton came of age in sociology when the major debates were about social-only theoretical orientations (structural functionalism or consensus theory versus Marxism or conflict theory) and methodology (quantitative versus qualitative). His primary contribution was articulating an environmental sociological framework that challenged existing sociological theories in general from a completely different tack: synthesizing sociological and ecological theory.
Catton began writing the manuscript that would become this book during a three-year post as Professor of Sociology at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand, then returning to his home country in 1973 as Professor of Sociology at Washington State University. During this period, Catton, in collaboration with fellow scholar Riley E. Dunlap, produced a series of influential articles on ecological issues.
Catton joined Dunlap in 1978 to coauthor the first substantial paper that not only came to establish the field of environmental sociology but also advocated for a paradigm shift. Titled "Environmental Sociology: A New Paradigm," Catton and Dunlap grounded their critique of then-mainstream sociology as bearing the burden of (what they would later call) the "human exceptionalist paradigm," by which humans were presumed exempt from the ecological constraints facing all other species.
In their view, sociological research and writing were fundamentally marred. The mainstream failed to recognize that human dependence on finite natural resources (such as fossil fuel energy) along with human degradation of the air, water, soils, and biological processes on which humanity also depends would ultimately influence human social systems in powerful ways.

## Great Acceleration

Catton begins by recounting the story of Russian peasants in 1921 who chose to starve rather than consume the seed wheat needed for future planting. This story illustrates the concept of not stealing from the future, a principle Catton argues is essential for sustainable living.
At the end of World War II, there was a growing belief in science's ability to solve problems. The Atomic Age was expected to address energy issues, and technology was seen as a limitless resource, dismissing the Neo-Malthusian thinking of Henry Farfield Osborn Jr. and William Vogt. Optimistic predictions abounded, with the belief that human ingenuity and technology could achieve anything. With an endless supply of energy and a global technical-industrial civilization, economic growth was believed to be unstoppable. The only perceived obstacle was a shortage of trained scientists and engineers. Technology was expected to eliminate resource shortages.
However, this optimism was misplaced, as we relied too heavily on technology's assurances. In the 1970s, a more realistic outlook emerged due to realizing the limits to growth, as evidenced by a groundbreaking report by the Club of Rome and world events such as the African and Asian famines that ravaged millions and the OPEC oil embargo. This prompted a reassessment of our approach. Humans had placed too much faith in the capabilities of science and technology, mistakenly equating them with the advantages of inexpensive and easy-to-extract oil. The seemingly low cost and easy availability of petroleum in the 1950s and 1960s created a false belief that it was endless and could be mined forever without considering its diminishing returns. This misconception suggested that petroleum resources could be extracted indefinitely without concern for depletion, ignoring their finite nature. Marion King Hubbert, a geophysicist, challenged this notion through his concept of peak oil, which posits that oil extraction follows a bell-shaped curve: it rises to a peak and then inevitably declines. Hubbert’s insights revealed that geological and economic limits would cap oil extraction, effectively dispelling the illusion of infinite oil supplies. His predictions about U.S. oil production accurately forecasted a peak in the early 1970s, highlighting the reality of finite petroleum resources. It appears that humans have overestimated the impact of technology and underestimated the significance of natural resources.
To move forward, people must embrace conservation and curb technological optimism. Recognizing our planet's finite limits and resource importance is crucial. Catton's text urges us to reassess our expectations from an ecological perspective. While we have temporarily expanded the planet's carrying capacity for humans, this has often been at the expense of other species and through the depletion of geological reserves. This temporary progress now threatens human survival, potentially leading to population decline. Our reliance on technology has created a progress trap that endangers the environment and ecological systems essential for our survival.

## Summary

The book emphasizes the need for a new perspective on the unsustainable exploitation of resources, which threatens future generations’ well-being. It highlights the need to challenge outdated paradigms and emphasize ecological awareness. The book highlights what the author calls “the tragic story of human success,” a period of rapid population growth and technological innovation, which led to an overshoot of the planet’s carrying capacity. The myth of limitlessness, distorted by technological advancements and exploitation of new lands, has exacerbated the environmental crisis. The book also discusses the culture of abundance, which led to a belief in human exemption from natural constraints. The book calls for a shift in perspective, acknowledging the ecological reality of finite resources and adapting to them.
Abundance and liberty, once supported by ecological prerequisites, are under threat as living standards decline. The decline from what the author calls “the Age of Exuberance” has led to environmental changes and an overshoot crisis, causing declining living standards and political instability. Humans must acknowledge their role in altering their habitats and the interconnectedness of all life forms. The rapid growth and mechanization of agriculture have amplified this impact, suggesting a shift in perspective. Human advancements have increased our competitive edge over other species, but the assumption that technology and habitat creation could yield permanent increases in carrying capacity is flawed. The belief in endless resources and human dominance over nature has remained attached to the belief in limitlessness during the Age of Exuberance.
The text explores the ecological causes of unwelcome change. It also explores Malthus's 1798 Essay on the Principle of Population, the evolution of tool use, and the Industrial Revolution. Malthus suggested that populations grow exponentially, but subsistence increases linearly, leading to food shortages when the biotic potential surpasses their habitat’s carrying capacity. However, modern societies have relied on non-renewable resources and technological advancements to sustain growth, leading to diminishing returns and socio-environmental consequences. The Industrial Revolution began humanity's heavy reliance on non-renewable resources, leading to an unsustainable carrying capacity expansion. The transition from circular to linear ecosystems with increased dependence on non-renewable resources has intensified our ecological footprint and led to an unsustainable growth trajectory. The book also highlights the importance of understanding the history of these issues and the consequences of our actions and choices rather than the decisions of any single group.
"Underdeveloped" regions face significant constraints, influenced by climate and geography, which limit their ability to expand human ecological niches. Population pressure, mutual interference, and technological impacts can lead to catastrophic outcomes. Understanding these patterns is crucial for addressing our trajectory and mitigating the effects of collective overshoot. In 1977, then-U.S. President Jimmy Carter attempted a paradigm shift by advocating for conservation but failed to address ecological overshoot. To navigate the post-exuberant world, we must challenge outdated paradigms and embrace an environmental framework that recognizes our limits and fosters sustainable practices. As we look to the future, we have an important decision to make: we can choose to live in a way that's kinder to our environment, using resources wisely and within our limits. This approach allows us to take care of our planet. On the other hand, we can keep going with our usual habits, but this might make our predicament even worse.

## Reception and legacy

In his review for the Humboldt Journal of Social Relations, Robert Wisniewski commended the book for its revolutionary ecological perspective on global issues. He highlighted Catton’s radical and humane examination of humanity’s predicament and warned of an inevitable population die-off. He noted that although the book is intellectually demanding and requires a shift in thinking, its insights are enriching for those willing to engage with its ecological approach.
In the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Anne Ehrlich called the book a “required reading for decision makers.”
In 1995, Derrick Jensen similarly chose to highlight Catton's generosity of soul—despite the dark certainty of humanity's future. In his book Listening to the Land, Jensen chose to introduce his interview with Catton by way of this pull quote from Catton's book Overshoot:
   In a future that is as unavoidable as it will be unwelcome, survival and sanity may depend upon our ability to cherish rather than to disparage the concept of human dignity.
In 2008, the introductory paper (by Richard York) for the "Symposium on Catton and Dunlap’s Foundational Work Establishing an Ecological Paradigm" concluded:
   The effect of Catton and Dunlap’s work has been profound, since it opened up a large swath of new terrain to sociological inquiry. It made possible the growing body of research in sociology that examines both human effects on the environment and the effects of the environment on society.
York listed as "foundational" to the field not only the 1978 "New Paradigm" collaboration by Catton and Dunlap but also their coauthored papers published in the Annual Review of Sociology in 1979 and American Behavioral Scientist in 1980. Together, these provided "an explicit intellectual grounding for environmental sociology — defined as the study of societal-environmental interactions."
In an obituary for Catton published in the journal New Zealand Sociology, Riley E. Dunlap wrote:
   I always describe Overshoot as a superb ecological history of Homo sapiens and analysis of our evolution into what Bill called Homo colossus, yielding a profound understanding of our current ecological dilemma.
In his review for Public Health Reports, Harold B. Weiss highlights its enduring relevance and visionary insights. Weiss emphasizes Catton's argument that humanity's current consumption patterns are unsustainable, leading to ecological overshoot and future deprivation. Catton's work, described as both a paradigm and a temporal shift, critiques modern civilization's dependence on finite resources and warns of inevitable ecological decline. He emphasizes that public health achievements, like reduced mortality rates, may unintentionally worsen the crisis by accelerating population growth and resource depletion. Weiss raises ethical questions about public health’s role in this destruction and calls for a shift toward long-term ecological sustainability. Weiss underscores the book's challenge to public health professionals to consider long-term ecological impacts alongside immediate humanitarian efforts.
As with carrying capacity, overshoot is a standard term in the ecological sciences.
In his 2015 obituary for Catton, John Michael Greer put this ecological term into its activist context:
   The core of Overshoot, which is also the core of the entire world of appropriate technology and green alternatives that got shot through the head and shoved into an unmarked grave in the Reagan years, is the recognition that the principles of ecology apply to industrial society just as much as they do to other communities of living things.
The manuscript itself attracted an icon of the environmental movement, former U.S. Interior Secretary Stewart Udall. To write the book's foreword was a sign of the popular (and activist) reach the book would garner. That reach included wilderness advocate Dave Foreman, a cofounder of EarthFirst! and of Wild Earth magazine. In a reflection upon Catton's death, Foreman wrote:
   William Catton's Overshoot is one of the most important books I've ever read, and Bill was one of my greatest teachers." Catton attributed his own wilderness experiences in national parks of the USA as the source of his drive to understand ecological systems and ecological limits — including the fundamental ecological principle of carrying capacity.
In a 2021 guest post titled "Overshoot: Where We Now Stand," Michael Dowd wrote that Catton's book is "the single most important book I have ever read." He also quotes Richard Heinberg, saying:
   Climate change is not our biggest problem; overshoot is. Global warming is but a symptom of ecological overshoot.
The 30th anniversary of the book's publication elicited an 8-page article in Human Ecology Review urging academics to reacquaint themselves with Catton's synthesis:
   Environmental sociology and related disciplines should seek to rediscover the message in Overshoot and actively pursue a cohesive theoretical direction that challenges the assumptions that drive environmentally destructive behaviors and threaten humanity’s very survival.
Summing up the purpose of all his sociological writings after the publication of Overshoot, Catton wrote in 2008:
   From about 1980 onward, my writing, either solo or in tandem, has sought to spread awareness 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 technological 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.
Kurt Cobb, in his 2015 tribute to Catton, wrote:
   Perhaps the most important thing to note about Catton is that he did not blame anyone for the human predicament. To him that predicament is the natural outcome of evolutionary processes and the powers given to humans through those processes. That predicament is no more a product of conscious thought and intention than is the beating of our own hearts.
Tom Butler, former editor of Wild Earth magazine, inserted a dedication to Catton in the 2015 book he edited, which was titled Overdevelopment, Overpopulation, Overshoot. There, Butler described Catton as a "peerless teacher on the perils of overshoot."
In his 2023 review of the book, Paul Mobbs examined how humans resist obvious facts, notably about ecological limits and society's collapse. Mobbs emphasizes Catton's claim that humanity's development and resource exploitation have created an unsustainable scenario. In addition to warning about ecological fate, Mobbs emphasizes that Overshoot challenges the belief in technological salvation, emphasizing the need for a profound change in how we perceive and react to ecological crises, helping us understand humanity's relationship with the Earth and the need for change:
   [Overshoot] is not about the ecological processes of ‘overshoot’ and ‘collapse’ specifically; it is about us!, and how we collectively react to those issues.