Jan
23
Georgia’s Water Crisis: The Ethics of Resource Allocation
Filed Under Mindful Ideas | Leave a Comment
As of this writing, the greater Atlanta area continues to be in the grip of one of the worst droughts on record. Hopefully it will rain soon and disaster will be averted. Regardless of how this particular incident plays out, it speaks to a growing social and ethical concern. The swelling population and irascible consumption of Americans is problematic on many levels, but one rarely visited issue is the ever-more-apparent reality that our current numbers may exceed the availability of our most vital natural resources, including fresh water.
Let us briefly consider some of the questions that have emerged during the Georgia crisis. Many Atlanta-area politicians have expressed outrage at wildlife management agencies who manage the headwaters of their water supply. Apparently, there is a mandate in place requiring that a certain amount of water be released from the supply reservoir and sent downstream in order to preserve the habitat of several threatened species of freshwater mussels. Numerous fish that live in the watershed are also reliant upon this daily purging. In the eyes of the Atlanta politicians, this represents an appalling act of waste. The federal requirement that water be released, they believe, takes a backseat to the water needs of Atlanta’s citizens.
Questions of species priority and the rights of nonhuman animals is a significant one in environmental ethics, especially as it relates to allocation of vital resources that humans, fish, and mussels have equal need for in order to survive. Although it is tempting and easy for humans to lay claim to whatever they need as a kind of natural birthright, the ethicist must ask if such a right exists and how one might justify this claim. One might argue that by allowing its population to exceed available resources, Atlanta has made itself vulnerable to natural selection. It hardly seems appropriate to punish mussels and fish for our mistakes, but this is precisely what many Atlanta lawmakers are suggesting.
Another important issue related to the ethics of natural resource allocation concerns future generations. Consider the Atlanta situation again. If we were to allow water to be diverted from the mussels and fish who live downstream to the citizens of Atlanta, countless human lives would be saved while numerous mussels and fish would die. Is that fair to future citizens of Atlanta, who might want the option of enjoying the mussels and fish? Is it good social policy to place band-aids on what is clearly a disaster waiting to happen, in the hope that someone else can figure out how to quench the thirst of Atlanta’s emerging megalopolis? Do we not owe our children the opportunity to live in a world that is not ridiculously overpopulated and that has fresh water available, not to mention mussels and fish?
These questions seem simple to answer, until we add that the most obviously appropriate solution, continuing to release water from the reservoir while seeking a realistic solution to this problem, must come on the backs of current citizens. For some reason, it is difficult to convince living humans to sacrifice for the sake of humans who are not here yet. But natural resource concerns require that we make these kinds of choices. In many areas of our country, water supplies are dwindling faster than they are being replaced, populations are swelling exponentially, and arid deserts that have been made to seem inhabitable are becoming increasingly less so.
There are no easy answers to questions about how to use, preserve, and share our precious natural resources. What is clear is that the ethics of such issues are not limited to how the current human generation might be impacted. A comprehensive approach to the relevant ethical questions requires us to consider the needs and rights of future generations and nonhuman animals, rather than the hedonistic self-preservation to which we have grown accustomed.