The real story on sustainable development may be a mixed bag.

Those who hold that globalization is a disaster for the poor are factually wrong. The living standards of perhaps 3 billion or more people have been increasing over the past 25 years and it is the diffusion of knowledge and technologies that has allowed for this.

On the other hand, there are the three deep negative trends. There is no doubt that there is profound and dangerous ecological stress at every scale of our human society. Significant places in the world face ecological collapse. There is no doubt also that, at the global scale, we are pushing limits of profound risk, whether over anthropogenic climate change, depletion of global fisheries, or loss of biodiversity.