Get Me Out of Here, Memoirs by Jeremy Steig

What a fascinating and insightful book! The pioneering flutist and prolific artist, Jeremy Steig, paints an interesting canvas through his own lived experience of how music has evolved since the 1960s. He tells personal stories of many jazz musicians in New York City, often from times when they were not yet well-known (as if jazz musicians would ever be well-known; they are to me, though, which adds to the fascination). But not only jazz: He played with a variety of upcoming stars in the Village, including Jimi Hendrix. Steig was an early pioneer of what was then called jazz rock, later fusion. He also tells personal stories about the music industry, which confirms that the record executives and produces have always treated artists as garbage.

But the book is also so much more. It paints an historical portrait of New York City and particularly Greenwich Village where he was born in 1942 and lived most of his life. He had a colorful family (to say the least). His father, William Steig, a cartoonist, created the character Shrek! His mother was an artist and his aunt was Margaret Mead.

Jeremy tells the story of how things changed and mostly not for the better. The days of safe and friendly streets lined with coffee houses where live music was played were replaced by crack dealers. Little by little most of the lively culture scene died out.

Jeremy Steig was a very important person for me personally. Since I was a teenager and an aspiring flutist, I listened to his records and admired his creativity, and the novel music he made inspired me more than most. From 2004 to 2009 Jeremy played regularly at the Cornelia Street Cafe in West Village. That’s when I finally got to meet him and his wife Asako who is from Japan, like my wife Yoko. The four of us once had a delightful dinner in New York.

In 2010 Asako and Jeremy moved to Yokohama in Japan. Finally, he found peace and happiness. Unfortunately, it would not last long enough. The last chapters in the book, the last ones of which are written by Asako, are bittersweet. I have to confess to shedding some tears when I read them.

Adventures in the Aid Trade: Forty Years Practicing Development in Forty Countries, by Richard Holloway

Richard Holloway is a veteran who has worked in the international development business for decades and lived in multiple countries. He’s avoided—mostly successfully—working with large aid organizations (he has worked on some projects funded by the World Bank and DFID) instead preferring to work with people on the ground through a variety of civil society organizations. This book distills his experiences and is intended as advice to young persons embarking on a career in the field. The lessons are valuable and the book is interesting even to someone like me who has had his own four decades in the air trade, albeit mostly at the policy level and not the “coalface” like the author (Holloway’s term).

The book also tells stories from his adventures in Africa, Asia, and the islands of the West Indies and the South Pacific. The chapters are organized in a similar fashion, starting with a description of the country and its situationula and what the author did there; followed by a sections on “What did I learn from the coalface?” and “What happened to it all?” This latter probes into whether anything good stayed after he left; i.e., whether the benefits of the projects he worked on were sustained. The chapters often end with “What were we thinking at the time?” explaining the logic behind the interventions and containing some published resources. Several chapters also have a section on “And on a personal note” which tells about the author’s life (and in later chapters that of his wife who made her own career mostly in UNICEF) in the countries through illustrating and sometimes amusing anecdotes. Richard Holloway is not a particularly eloquent writer. His prose is straightforward and does the job.

Some of the chapters stand out to me. South Sudan’s civil war is nowadays often in the news (although not as often as it would deserve to be). Holloway worked there in 1973-75, before the current troubles started, although their roots can be detected already then. He worked extensive periods in Bangladesh (1989-1995) and especially in Indonesia (1979-84 and 1999-2004). This latter also included work in Timor Leste as it became independent from Indonesia after a brutal war. His description of the gradual shift from emergency relief to long-term development with an emphasis on human rights is enlightening with a description of the complex socio-political situation in the new island nation.

To me, perhaps the most interesting section pertains to Myanmar (2015-16) and the travails of working in an ethnically divided country ruled by a violent junta. The latest of the many coups d’état there took place in 2021.

Several important themes arise. One of them is corruption, which is a way of life in many of the countries in the global South. Another is the frequent tension between civil society and the government. Holloway emphasizes the need for aid and development workers to thoroughly understand the places they work in. He urges aspiring development workers to start by being sociologists or anthropologists, understand the history, and to learn the local languages to the extent possible. Development must reflect the needs and aspirations of the people on the ground. It is very important to understand the people’s livelihoods to be able to support their own development efforts.

Blue Marble Evaluation: Premises and Principles, by Michael Quinn Patton

Blue Marble Evaluation is a call to action for all evaluators (and others) concerned with the state of planetary affairs in the new geological era of Anthropocene in which we live. What defines Anthropocene is that human impact on the Earth is so pervasive as to be the dominant force in modifying biosphere and atmosphere. Patton brings a palpable sense of urgency to the task of transforming evaluation to deal with transformative change. As an evaluator, Patton weighs the global challenges we are facing—including climate change and related phenomena, growing concentration of wealth and inequality, virulent infectious diseases and evolving super-viruses (yes, the book was written before the emergence of COVID-19), pollution, terrorism, refugee crises, etc.—against the positive trends (such as reductions in poverty and illiteracy, hunger and violence).  Striving toward a balanced assessment, he concludes that the “evidence points overwhelmingly … to a severe and growing crisis” (p. 19). 

Blue Marble Evaluation takes its name from the iconic photograph taken by the Apollo 17 astronauts on 7 December 1972, the first photograph of our home planet taken from space. This signifies the view of the whole Earth, which is fundamental to the Blue Marble Evaluation vision. Patton, a veteran evaluator and one of the most respected thinkers in the field, elaborates on the premises and principles of his vision for a renewed evaluation profession that is better able to respond to the global challenges. In the process he provides a biting critique of the narrow project mindset that dominates the evaluation practice today.

The book is organized in three parts. The first, The Blue Marble Perspective, presents four overarching blue marble principles: (1) Global thinking principle, (2) Anthropocene as context principle, (3) Transformative engagement principle, and (4) Integration principle. “The Blue Marble worldview constitutes a paradigm,” Patton writes (p. 6). Taking a holistic perspective and understanding global patterns and their implications is essential, as is thinking about all aspects of systems change at all levels from local to global. The integration principle emphasizes that transformation requires multiple interventions and actions on many fronts by multiple actors. Blue Marble principles should not only be applied to evaluation but also to design and implementation. Bringing the four initial principles together, Patton takes apart traditional project and program evaluation, as well as performance measurement and monitoring, as insufficient to addressing systems change at the global scale. He writes (p. 30): 

“Static and rigid randomized control designs—emphasis on control—are irrelevant to the uncontrollable dynamics of complex systems. Indeed, these traditional approaches to evaluation can create barriers to systems change by forcing transformational visions into narrow project boxes amenable to methods evaluators are comfortable with (e.g., logic models and specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, time-bound [SMART] goals). Innovations in evaluation include eclectic approaches created by tapping into a vast array of many-splendored, diverse, and innovative knowledge-generating and learning-oriented processes.”

Part II adds eight Operating Principles: (5) Transboundary engagement principle, (6) GLOCAL principle, (7) Cross-silos principle, (8) Time being of essence principle, (9) Yin-yang principle, (10) Bricolage methods principle, (11) World savvy principle, and (12) Skin in the game principle. Ranging from page 39 to 148, this section contains the bulk of the book. I won’t attempt to summarize it but will highlight a few points that I found essential. Patton discusses the need to think and act at the global scale and what this means. He provides a thoughtful critique of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted by over 190 countries all over the world. He rightly points out that they are actually not global, given that they are based on country-level targets. He wisely notes that “simply aggregating nation-state data doesn’t generate a global picture” (p. 44). Another important insight that flies in the face of conventional evaluation (and development) thinking—and with which I couldn’t agree more—is that there are no “best practices” because the context in which any intervention takes place is so important. “Global context informs local actions. Local contexts make global understandings meaningful and actionable” (p. 50). This up and down engagement between levels is the essence of the GLOCAL principle. Patton discusses scaling up as the most common way of having global impact, i.e. that successful initiatives are scaled out, scaled up or scaled deep so that they can reach more people and places. Scaling up is also at the heart of the operational model of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) where I work and just last year my office completed an evaluation of scaling up at the GEF. 

Apart from integrating across scales and geographies, Blue Marble principles call for integrating across silos. It is worth noting, like Patton does, that the SDGs, while intended to be integrated, also easily lend themselves to new silos. Yet in real life, the SDGs are indeed all interconnected and “evaluating the interactions between the SDG targets and indicators, both actual and aspirational, positive and negative, and short term and long term, offers significant opportunities for Blue Marble thinkers, designers and evaluators to contribute to the 2030 Agenda” (p. 65). (In full transparency, in the discussion on the cross-silos principle, I was very flattered to find Patton citing my work.) 

With the time being of essence, Patton addresses another key notion in evaluation and development professions: sustainability. According to the established principles promoted by OECD’s Development Assistance Committee, sustainability refers primarily to the continuation of project benefits after the completion of the intervention. Although, OECD/DAC has recently updated the definition to incorporate more of the environmental sustainability, there has been a lively debate about a stronger articulation of the environmental dimension. Patton’s discussion is most welcome as he elaborates on adaptive sustainability and resilience, making a clear distinction between engineering resilience (a performance-related notion that focuses on stability, efficiency, control and predictability) and ecosystem resilience that focuses on persistence, adaptiveness, variability and unpredictability. Aiming for long-term resilience and sustainability forces us to concentrate on the latter, in which case evaluators, too, must focus on adaptability of the system, rather than a static endpoint after an intervention ends and the benefits remain (pp. 78-82). Patton illustrates this with concrete examples, including some in which short-term focus on accountability undermined long-term sustainability. 

The chapter on the bricolage methods principle describing the evaluator as a bricoleur, a traditional French traveling “jack-of-all-trades” who would use whatever tools were at hand to fix a problem, hit a note with me. Similarly, evaluators have to use an eclectic variety of methods to fit the evaluation situation that they need to address. The Canadian evaluator Andy Rowe has similarly made the call for All Hands on Deck for evaluators to put their methods wars behind them and join hands in combating the greatest challenges facing humankind. Claims of “gold standards” (often made by those promoting experimental methods) sound ludicrous. To be clear, Patton is no Luddite: he fully acknowledges the value of new methods that involve, i.a., geospatial tools, big data and AI, but emphasizes the importance of choosing the most appropriate methods from an eclectic toolkit. Here he elaborates on six “bricolaged Blue Marble evaluation methods lessons” (pp. 114-116).  

The chapters on the world savvy principle and skin in the game principle are highly personal. The former emphasizes the global competencies that all evaluators should possess. He notes that the “profession of evaluation is fairly obsessed with competency” (p. 122) but that the concept of competence is problematic and can lead to “exclusion, reinforcing the status quo and power of the status quo” (p. 124). These again are concerns I can easily relate to, having been involved in evaluation groups that sometimes feel like aiming to be guilds with their exclusive approaches and membership. Without getting into detail about what being world savvy means, some of the central concepts include reflexivity and ongoing learning. 

The skin in the game principle will be hard for some evaluators to swallow (and I’ve already witnessed discussions to this end), given that evaluators (most of whom are social scientists by training) have been indoctrinated to think that we need to be neutral observers of the object of evaluation, looking from the outside in, without taking sides or showing emotion. Patton challenges this by making it clear that we should not hide our values, especially in the current world situation where our common future is at stake. Independence is usually seen as one of the most important characteristics of an evaluator, but in some cases total independence can even undermine the credibility of the evaluator. This might be the case with indigenous communities where a total outsider would not carry any credence. The evaluator would still use her or his best judgment weighing the evidence (for example not assuming that the local communities would necessarily always know best). He makes a clear and useful distinction between caring and bias (pp. 139-141). His argumentation stands on the broad shoulders of two evaluation thought leaders, Robert Stake and Michael Scriven, as well as others. He also makes a strong case for evaluation as transdisciplinary science, and for science as intervention aimed at generating knowledge and solving an urgent problem. 

The final part of the book outlines three Global Systems Transformation principles: (13) Theory of transformation principle, (14) Transformation fidelity principle: evaluating transformation, and (15) Transformational alignment principle: transforming evaluation to evaluate transformation. The first of these chapters is the most theoretical in the book. In it Patton attempts to move from a theory of change to a theory of transformation, doing so by integrating multiple theories to explain transformation. The theoretical frameworks he most relies on are network theory and innovation theory. He also expounds on a hypothesis developed by Jerald Hage, director of the Center of Innovation at the University of Maryland’s Department of Sociology who also was Patton’s dissertation advisor at the University of Wisconsin decades earlier. Altogether, the theory of transformation that Patton comes up with is a plausible one. It claims that transformation flows from an “understanding that the status quo is not a viable path forward and that networked action on multiple fronts using diverse change strategies across multiple landscapes will be needed to overcome the resistance from those who benefit from the status quo” (p. 168). This will lead to critical mass tipping points and consequently transformations. Earlier in the chapter Patton reminds us of the old truth found in innovation theory that it is futile to try to convince (and despair over) the often powerful interests that benefit from the status quo and resist change; instead, focus on supporting the early adopters and spreading their message until a tipping point is reached. This is a very useful message to keep in mind when hopelessness sets in ahead of the Sisyphean task of moving towards a more environmentally benign future.

In the chapter on transformation fidelity principle, Patton starts by reminding us that transformation has become a new buzzword but not everything touted as such is in fact transformational. Of true transformations in relatively recent history he names three examples: the end of apartheid in South Africa, the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the significant fall in new cases of HIV/AIDS. Transformation is difficult to define, but easy to recognize when it happens by (borrowing the term from the statistician Fred Mosteller) interocular significance (i.e., it hits you in between the eyes). Transformation can be defined as a sensitizing concept, “a way of talking about something that is not yet well understood, precisely defined, or operationally measured” (p. 174). Evaluating transformational change, however, is more challenging. Patton sets out to define an evaluation framework for evaluating transformation with the theory of transformation that he developed in the previous chapter. He reviews an influential evaluation of transformational engagement by the World Bank’s Independent Evaluation Group (using an approach that we adapted to evaluate transformational change at the GEF Independent Evaluation Office a few years back). While this approach was fine, it was, according to Patton, a definition-based, rather than theory-based evaluation. Interestingly, Patton concludes that “evaluating transformation must involve capturing the story, communicating the process and results, interpreting meanings, making values-based judgments about what occurred, extracting lessons, and facilitating visioning the way forward both short term ad long term. Telling the transformation story will involve mixed methods” (p. 185).

In the final chapter, Patton lays out the need to transform evaluation itself to evaluate transformation. This chapter also acts as a summary of the book and his thinking around the Blue Marble principles. He concludes that global sustainability should become a universal criterion in evaluation. The book ends with a vision of a global network of Blue Marble evaluators, a vision that is in the making to become reality.

Blue Marble Evaluation is a powerful book that transmits the sense of urgency, the very caring for the planet and the state of affairs that Michael Quinn Patton writes about. He emphasizes that while he has pulled the text together, it has been a collaborative effort with contributions from many people, including fellow Blue Marble evaluators, like Pablo Vidueira and Glenn Page (the acknowledgements run over 3.5 pages). The book is also amply illustrated, including with cartoons by Mark Rogers, Chris Lysy, Simon Kneebone and Claudius Ceccon. All of this collaboration is further proof that Michael Patton practices what he preaches. The book is also very erudite, drawing upon literature and theories of science, philosophy, sociology, astronomy and more in addition to evaluation. There are many practical examples from interventions and evaluations of different kinds, some more profound than others. All of this makes for interesting, if occasionally rambling reading as the reader is left guessing how it all comes back to the theme (spoiler alert: it usually does). And as Patton states, this is not a book about methods, but evaluators tend to be methods people so he writes quite much about methods. All of this may make the book quite a ride for a traditional evaluator versed in project performance evaluation. Those are some of the people who most should read this book. Having said that, I would recommend the book to anyone interested in evaluation and applied social science in the age of the Anthropocene.

A Planet of 3 Billion: Mapping Humanity's Long History of Ecological Destruction and Finding Our Way to a Resilient Future | A Global Citizen's Guide to Saving the Planet by Christopher Kevin Tucker

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This is a very important and sobering book that I wish everyone would read. Chrisopher Tucker, a self-described unrepentant capitalist, tackles the fundamental issue affecting the sustainability of the planet: human population. He clearly states his thesis: the Earth has a people problem.

There was a time half a century ago when ecologically-minded scientists, researchers and activists actively discussed the impossibility of unlimited population growth on a limited planet. It was inevitable that the population bomb would explode. This rational view was silenced from all sides. The conservative and often religious right was attacking it for promoting “unnatural” things, such as population control. It didn’t help that China (and earlier India) established draconian measures to curb population growth. The left saw it as blaming the victim: one should not try to interfere with poor people’s right to have children. The developing countries saw it as a white man’s ploy to keep them down, while at the same time many saw a burgeoning population as might that could help them to dominate their neighbors. And economists – those eternal optimists to whom growth of any kind is a value in itself and who see any negative aspect of growth as mere externalities that can be left out of the equation – put their money on human ingenuity and technology that would overcome any obstacle (this has so far worked to the extent that material lack has decreased, but at a huge cost to the natural environment). No-one paid any attention to the rights of non-humans on this planet, or even the quality of life or joy that nature would bring people. If you can’t measure it in money, it does not exist. Finally, Christopher Tucker has brought human overpopulation back into focus.

Tucker makes it clear that his is not a neo-Malthusian oeuvre and he recognizes the essential roles the level of per capita consumption and technology play. But his thorough and thoughtful analysis leads him to the conclusion that the Earth can sustainably support only a population of 3 billion – and that only if we cut out ecological footprint and waste significantly. He takes issue with the romantic view that pre-industrial people lived in harmony with nature. It was only because their numbers were so small that the damage they did was limited, but damage they did do by clearing land for agriculture, by cutting down forests for construction, energy and fiber, by hunting wild animals and grazing domesticated ones. Sahara once was a viable ecosystem until overuse of its fragile ecosystem turned it into a desert. Since Roman times, people fundamentally transformed Europe’s ecosystems. In ecological terms, humans are an invasive species.

The first half of the book provides a detailed overview of the Earth’s environmental history in light of human impact on it through population growth, industrialization, agriculture, development of new energy sources (notably fossil fuels whose introduction initially saved forest that were being cut down for energy, but which has later led to air pollution and climate change), infrastructure, transportation, urbanization, introduction of toxic chemicals, waste etc. He takes popular environmental theories and critiques them. A geographer by training, one of Tucker’s main contributions pertains to the insights into the geographical diversity of the world. Hardly anyone else has addressed this issue systematically. E.O. Wilson has proposed that half of the world should be set aside for nature, but Tucker reveals how challenging and complex this notion is. What do we mean by half when every geography is so different in terms of productivity, terrain, topography, climate and so forth, and when connections between regions are essential? Measuring half just by size is meaningless. And what do we mean by “protection” anyway? He suggests viewing the world through the perspective of ecoregions.

He embraces the ecological footprint thesis, but critiques it for also lacking a geographical perspective, which he convincingly inserts into it, while recognizing the enormous technical task of incorporating the geographical variables into the equation.

The book is a delightful exception to the current debate where climate change crowds out all other environmental issues (are we really only able to focus on one thing at a time?). Tucker doesn’t belittle the impacts of climate change, but hammers home the point how humanity is causing irreversible harm to the Earth’s ecosystems through so many other ways. One example is waste. We generate astronomical amounts of waste that fill the land, atmosphere and, not least, oceans – and have very few solutions to the issue. He also brings to attention forms of pollution that we seldom think of, such as noise pollution that is very hazardous to many animals from birds to whales.

The book contains some hopeful examples of how things may be changing. Circular economy where the waste of one process becomes an input to the next is one. He highlights Finland’s commitment to zero waste, including greenhouse gas emissions. Despite the acknowledgement of the need and good intentions, this is still difficult work in progress. I fully agree with Tucker that well managed cities are the only way of containing human impact on the planet, as sprawl is one of worst kinds of destruction as areas are transformed into artificial ones, roads dissect ecosystems. Lawns and parks may be green, but they are far from natural and only contain a fraction of natural biodiversity. Living densely reduces the geographic footprint and minimizes the need for movement. There are increasing examples of sustainable cities, such as Singapore (and the organization I work for, the Global Environment Facility, is one of the many that actively promotes sustainable urbanization), but too many cities, especially in the developing countries, are growing haphazardly wreaking havoc both on their human inhabitants and nature.

Agriculture is one of the biggest contributors to environmental change. Techniques such as vertical farming could significantly reduce the impact. Admittedly, it would be much harder to develop for animal husbandry. Growing meat for human consumption is extremely wasteful in terms of land, water and waste. The figures are stunning: there are 1.4 billion cattle, 2 billion domesticated pigs, 1 billion sheep, 450 million goats and 19 billion chicken on Earth (p. 229). Their only purpose is to feed people.

Through a sophisticated and convincing analysis – with transparent assumptions – Tucker concludes that the Earth’s carrying capacity of human population is around 3 billion people. This is a stark prospect, given that there currently are about 7.5 billion of us on the planet and the UN projects that the population will grow to at least 9 billion before it reaches its peak. However, it’s illustrative to remember that it was after World War II when the world population still was at that lower level. Since then, our lives and lifestyles have also changed dramatically. Today there are some 3 billion air passengers annually; more than there were people in 1950.

Tucker recognizes that bringing world’s population down to 3 billion will not be easy. He discusses the obstacles to this, including cultural and religious norms and, not least, classical economics that still believes that the alternative to eternal growth it stagnation. Even the field of environmental economics doesn’t go far enough, believing that a steady-state can be reached. We also often witness hand-wringing because of aging populations and population decline, especially in Japan and Western Europe. However, irrespective of what we wish, the world population will start shrinking at around year 2100, unless an ecological disaster catches us before that (it could also be a global pandemic – such as the current outbreak of coronavirus – that does us in). Sooner or later we will have to learn to live with a declining population. Tucker calls for a new generation of economists to focus efforts on de-growth economics. There is no law of nature that compels that our standard of living and quality of life should decline should growth stop (on the contrary, I would argue).

In the end, Tucker is cautiously optimistic, trusting that new ways of thinking and technologies will save humankind before it is too late. He rightly points out that either we start making these radical changes in society now or we will be forced to make much more unpleasant choices a bit later. He outlines an agenda – a cookbook, he calls it – for global leaders and global citizens that encompasses ten necessary areas of action to avoid catastrophe: 1) women’s empowerment that will lead to smaller families; 2) building sustainable, smart and resilient cities; 3) developing restoration and rewilding strategies for each ecoregion; 4) de-industrializing and reducing human footprint in critical ecoregions; 5) driving wastes out of capitalist supply chains; 6) demanding the design of low-impact infrastructure; 7) stopping impeding and diverting the natural flow of water; 8) stopping use of “growth” language in economic strategies and economic development planning; 9) reframing eco-engineering to focus on unwinding the most egregious ecological offenses; and 10) thinking critically about how the land rights model of capitalism has led to the denuding the planet and identifying alternatives that help strike a balance between human development and the ecological processes on which humankind depends.

Tucker discusses further each of these and how they might be advanced. Responsibility is given to governments and especially business leaders, as well as us individuals. We can influence matters globally through our actions by changing our individual behaviors (given the enormous role of cattle ranching in converting natural landscapes to pastures, depleting water resources, wasting resources as feed and producing greenhouse gases, reducing meat consumption is an obvious way to reduce one’s ecological footprint). Still, it seems to me unreasonable to expect all humans on the planet – especially as the majority are still lagging far behind the West – to bear the brunt of the responsibility, when it really is the system that is built on growth and waste and exploitation that needs to be changed.

When reading Tucker’s solutions, nevertheless, they appear doable from a technical point of view and there would be millions of people in the world who would agree to pursue these rigorously. But are they enough? It is hard to believe so, when one follows the political debate in the United States, the wealthiest and most powerful nation that also has the world’s largest ecological footprint per capita (then again, Chris Tucker is American, too, and his ideas certainly are bold). Similarly, in most developing countries getting rich is the greatest goal for everyone. Furthermore, developing countries are the place where future population growth will take place (mostly in Africa). The renowned environmentalist Gus Speth has summarized the situation succinctly: “I used to think the top environmental problems were biodiversity loss, ecosystem collapse and climate change. I thought that with 30 years of good science we could address those problems. But I was wrong. The top environmental problems are selfishness, greed and apathy … and to deal with those we need a spiritual and cultural transformation – and we scientists don’t know how to do that.”

Christopher Tucker ends his book with an Epilogue for Planetary Ethics, He provides a pointed critique of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as ambitious but a result of complex political compromises. He points out that there is gaping inconsistency between the socioeconomic development goals and the environmental sustainability goals (a fact that I, too, have pointed out in several of my writings and presentations) and population is entirely outside of the discussion (p. 251). In the end, he frames the need for a transformation in ethical terms. This is one of the best written and strongest chapters – and certain to offend some people. Tucker confronts head-on the issue that, if everyone recognizes the problem of overpopulation and the threats it poses to the global sustainability, the debate turns quickly to equity, because the world population and population growth are not equally distributed on the planet. “If humans, collectively, are doing harm to the planet who should have to sacrifice or undertake disproportionate effort to rectify the situation”, he asks (p. 253). One thing that Tucker does not consider adequately in the book is international migration that is already reshaping the world, driven by inequality, conflict and climate change.

It is also very refreshing that he calls a spade a spade when it comes to people’s cognitive abilities and psychologies. He recognizes that there is a minority of people who are not able to grasp the big picture. Then there are those who are ignorant, but more importantly the large portion of people – including many with a will to power – who are willfully ignorant, as they understand that acting on what they know would be against their own short-term interests. In the end, it is often difficult to differentiate the actions of the willfully ignorant (or outright evil) from those of the simply stupid.

The book also contains four open letters to arguably the most powerful individuals on the planet: the Pope, Jeff Bezos, Bill and Melinda Gates, and Xi Jinping.

The book is well illustrated with maps, data and graphs, which are also accessible through the website.

All in all, A Planet for 3 Billion is bound to annoy many people who do not (or more likely do not want to) believe the situation being that dire, who are reluctant to change their ways or who just think it all alarmist and unrealistic to achieve such a transformation. We’ll be alright as long as we don’t think about it. However, a fundamental change will be necessary one way or another (to paraphrase how kids used to threaten each other on schoolyard in my youth: you change now – or you cry and change!). Thinkers and activists such as the author are needed. But perhaps our best hope lies with visionary entrepreneurs who see not only the necessity but also opportunities for themselves in moving us towards a more sustainable future. There is also hope in young people who are increasingly aware of the destruction we place on our only home planet and who also have the most to lose.




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Footprints: The Life and Work of Wayne Shorter by Michelle Mercer
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Wayne Shorter is one of the greatest innovators in the music that is broadly defined as jazz. He is a most influential saxophonist whose tenor playing builds upon the foundations laid by earlier masters from Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young to Coltrane. On soprano, he was the foremost pioneer since the late 1960s. Most importantly, he is an extraordinary composer with an amazing breadth of knowledge and influences from Western classical to Brazilian music. Born in 1933, Shorter is also one of the last of the generation that revolutionized jazz who is left with us. The biography by Michelle Mercer is, thus, a must read for everyone interested in the evolution of music and the role of this giant in it.

‘Footsteps’ that takes its name from one of Shorter’s most famous compositions follows him from his early days in Newark, NJ, until almost today. Mercer has spent plenty of time with the man himself, as well as those close to him, gleaning tremendous amounts of information and an obvious love and admiration for him. The biography takes us through the major bands with which Shorter was affiliated throughout the 1960s to 1980s, all of them central to the development of contemporary music. First there was Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers in which young Wayne soon assumed the role of a prominent composer and musical director. Then came Miles Davis’ Quintet, which to me personally was arguably the best combo ever, with Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Tony Williams completing the roundup of geniuses. Wayne stayed with Miles to innovate with the new electric experiments on ‘Filles de Kilimanjaro,' ‘In a Silent Way’ and 'Bitches Brew,' turning to the soprano.

To the larger audience, Shorter is probably most known as a founding member and co-leader, with Joe Zawinul, of Weather Report. The band was active from 1971 to 1986 and achieved unprecedented commercial success for a “jazz” outfit. This was largely due to Zawinul’s directions that took the band from its early free electronic avant-garde increasingly towards funky beats and catchy vamps (think, ‘Birdland’ from the 1977 album ‘Heavy Weather’). When the super-bassist Jaco Pastorius joined Weather Report in 1976, he and Zawinul formed a powerful axis in the band’s music. In the later years, Shorter’s role in the band was audibly diminished, which has led many to speculate about the reasons. Given the centrality of Weather Report to Shorter’s career over a decade and a half, Mercer spends a significant portion of the book exploring the period providing many interesting insights.

It is also interesting to read about Shorter’s ventures crossing over to rock, and his thoughts about them. He had a long-term and very productive relationship with Joni Mitchell producing some beautiful music together. He also collaborated with Carlos Santana whose appreciation of jazz and musical inclinations coincided with those of Shorter, despite their different points of departure. Both, for examples, admire Coltrane. Arguably the best saxophone solo ever on a rock record (the only one competing I can think of is Fred Lipsius’ alto solo on ‘God Bless the Child’ by Blood, Sweat & Tears) was by Shorter on the title song of Steely Dan’s extraordinary 1977 album ‘Aja.’ It was very interesting to learn that it was constructed of fragments of several solos improvised by Wayne. Shorter would have had much demand as a session player for rock stars, but hesitated to sell out and declined almost all offers. The fact that he did collaborate with Mitchell, Santana and Steely Dan is testimony to the latter artists' musical sensibilities.

Throughout the years Shorter has made his own recordings, starting with ‘Introducing Wayne Shorter’ in 1959. His discography thus far contains some 25 titles under his own name as leader, the latest being ‘Without a Net’ (2013) with his permanent quartet with Danilo Perez, John Patitucci and Brian Blade. Many critics and fans welcomed the quartet when it was formed in 2000 as the first fully acoustic group that Shorter played with in a long while. He himself appears extremely satisfied with the group of younger but by now established musicians each with their own credentials as leaders.

‘Footprints’ is an intimate book with a close look at Wayne Shorter’s personal life. He has had his share of hardships, including the illness and death at 14 of his daughter Iska with his beloved second wife Ana Maria with whom he spent nearly three decades until she perished on the TWA flight 800 that exploded off Long Island in 1996. Over long periods of time, Shorter also struggled with creativity as a composer, only to find that it would always come back propelling him to write ever more inspired and complex music. In 1999, Shorter remarried and appears to be at peace with himself. He is a practicing Nichiren Buddhist and active member of the lay Buddhist organization Soka Gakkai (alongside many other artists, such as his close friends Herbie Hancock and Tina Turner). Here one would have wished the biographer take a bit more distance and not reporting everything about Soka Gakkai in such gushing terms. An interesting insight from the biography is also how films have provided important inspiration to the composer.

Reading the book made me go back and listen again to many of Wayne Shorter’s recordings from the celebrated old favorites ‘JuJu’ (1964) and ‘Speak No Evil’ (1965) to his latest with the new quartet. In between I rediscovered the ethereal beauty of ‘Odyssey of Iska’ (1970). The near magical wonder of ‘Native Dancer’ (1974) featuring Milton Nascimento’s unique and haunting singing I have been lucky never to lose in these intervening years. Like for many others, the following productions in the mid-1980s following a decade with no records under his own name had always left me somewhat cold, although I do remember hearing the Wayne Shorter band live in Rome, Italy, soon after the release of ‘Atlantis’ in 1985 and raving about it. I am yet to go back to that and other records from the period, which sit on my shelf waiting for me to gather the courage.

I did go back to listen to Weather Report. Not the all too familiar funk albums but the early ones that had been overshadowed by the later, flashier productions. The original eponymous album from 1971 rekindled the magic with its sparkles and lightness. With the third founding member, Miroslav Vitous (with whom the band would later break acrimoniously to follow Zawinul’s vision for a heavier, funkier sound) played a key role, as did the percussionists Alphonse Mouzon and Airto Moreira. There still were no synthesizers, with the Fender Rhodes and the occasional bass guitar as the only electric instruments. The subsequent albums – ‘I Sing the Body Electric,’ ‘Sweetnighter,’ ‘Mysterious Traveller’ – that appeared annually after the first album continued in the footsteps of the original. I am not saying that the later Weather Report productions were bad – on the contrary – but I personally miss the free-flowing mysticism of the early ones.

Amazing beauty and creativity can also be heard on one of Wayne Shorter’s newer recordings, ‘Alegria’ (2003), which contains the master’s compositions featuring, in addition to his regular quartet, a large orchestra with horns, woodwinds and strings, and additional guests, such as Brad Mehldau, Terri Lyne Carrington and the Weather Report alumnus Alex Acuña.

Wayne Shorter has had a long, varied and incredibly productive career. He has been, deservedly, recognized by the Thelonius Monk Institute of Jazz with a Lifetime Achievement Award (2013) and with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award (2014). We must be grateful to Michelle Mercer for bringing us a biography that is well-researched, intimate and provides the readers and listeners a look into the life and mind of this creative genius.


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