Chartbook 450: Modern growth surges. Or, why China's economic development is unique in human history.

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To the naked eye it is obvious that China’s spectacular growth surge from the late 1970s onward is the largest single transformation in world economic history. But how best to express and quantify this stark fact? I’ve been spending a lot of time recently with the energy and climate question (Btw apologies for the newsletter slowdown. Normal service will resume in a few weeks time). The history of global coal consumption certainly tells a clear story. Measured in coal, the history of our species falls into three phases. The first phase ran up to 1750, where the vast majority of human societies relied largely on a somatic, biological energy regime—firewood, human power, animal power. The second period stretched from the 1750s to the end of the 20th century. This was what we used to think of as the classic regime of industrialization, beginning with the industrial revolution of the 18th century and ending with the world as it stood in the 1990s. Over two centuries, heavy industry spread outwards from its origins in 18th century North Western Europe, to North America and Eastern Europe and extending, in the 20th century, to Japan. This was the world that defined the first phase of global climate politics and its North-South politics, the world of the Noordwijk conference of Rio in 1992 and the Kyoto Treaty of 1997. It continues to define the imaginary of much writing about the climate question down to the present day, especially in the United States. On this historical arc, the clean energy transition goes hand in hand with deindustrialization, inspiring talk of a “weightless”…