During the twentieth century, the world’s popu- lation multiplied by four and the economy by more than forty. If the gap between rich and poor had stayed proportionally the same as it was in 1901, today all human beings would be ten times better off. Yet the number in abject poverty today is as great as all mankind popu- lation in 1901.

In 1900, the world still had untouched forests and fisheries, untapped oil reserves, unused hydroelectric potential, and vast expanses of farmland in prime condition. The amount of farmland per person has declined by 20% in

the past ten years. Production is maintained

by industrial techniques that treat earth as little more than hydroponic medium for chemicals. Groundwater is becoming contaminated and exhausted.

In 1991, the average Rwandan’s income was one hundredth of the average American’s. That did not improve when, three years later, nearly a million Rwandans died in the civil war; reckon- ing the dead as a proportion of population, this was the equivalent of slaughtering 35 million in the US. The twenty-first century may have began in Rwanda, not New York.