The issue of ocean acidification is fairly new to many people. Therefore, not many people have a lot of knowledge about the effects of ocean acidification on the ecosystem. The majority of the general public do not even know what ocean acidification is. Since the media mainly emphasize global warming and climate change, the public is only aware of these impending disasters. Without the general public to push for enhanced sustainability services, the policymakers do not necessarily address this issue when creating new legislation. Although policymakers have aimed to mitigate climate change and the potential effects of global warming, they have done little to nothing to save the ocean ecosystem. Therefore, they do not clearly have an understanding on how sustainability techniques that will help the ocean ecosystem. Regarding scientists, although they are experts in the field and are familiar with the ocean acidification problem, they usually only have a general idea of this problem and therefore, cannot give adequate solutions to the sustainability of the ocean ecosystem. Scientists seem to be more concerned about the fish and marine life and less interested in the sustainability of ocean ecosystem services. Also, professionals in the fish industry that strive off selling fish seem very indifferent to the sustainability of the ecosystem. Although they are aware that ocean acidification threatens the lives of fish and other marine animals, they still continue to mass-fish in order to stimulate and run their businesses. Similar to the fish industry professionals, stakeholders who depend on commercial fishing have the same ideologies regarding the sustainability of marine life. With all this being said, it is shown that people do not actually understand the repercussions we must face if we do not create laws regarding ocean ecosystem sustainability.

In order to promote sustainability efforts to the people, the first thing that we have to do is make people more aware of the problems of ocean acidification. A good suggestion would be to teach to students in schools not only the issues of global warming and climate change, but how that affects the ocean and marine life residing in it. In addition to this, students should be taught various ways to help sustain the ecosystem and conserve resources. The students could then go home, apply what they learned, and hopefully, their actions can influence their parents’ habits as well. If this is to work, scientists, as a collective group, have to research ocean acidification in more depth and come up with habits that the general public can and should practice. The media have to do a better job reporting and spreading awareness about this problem. While doing so, they must clearly distinguish this problem from global warming and climate change so that people know that they are doing things to address two different issues. In return, politicians and policy makers must be able to listen to their citizens and create laws that can help sustain the ecosystem. For the people in charge of the fish industry, as well as stakeholders in this business, they have to be able to realize that there are more important things at stake than their business. They have to have new priorities, which mean that sustainability of the atmosphere comes first. If all of this goes according to plan and people are more aware of the effects of ocean acidification, they can do a better job of providing services to sustain the marine ecosystem.

Throughout history, humans have been followed by overhanging problems that inevitably seem to create turmoil and collapse within societies.  Ancient Rome faced corruption, Ancient Maya faced an epidemic and collapsed trade routes, and the Han Dynasty faced irreversible social differences within the government, all of which led to societal collapses.  Current countries, such as the U.S., seem to be in similar situations to these late societies, with daunting problems that build upon each other and create a figurative Goliath.  In a speech given by the infamous Michael Scott, head of the Scranton branch of Dunder Mifflin Paper, he argues, “America is facing five Goliaths! Al-Qaeda. Global warming. Sex predators. Mercury poisoning. So do we just give up?” Despite naming only four so-called “Goliaths”, Mr. Scott alludes to the point that America seems to be one of those societies facing numerous potentially devastating issues that threaten the American way of life.  It has proved to be challenging enough to find ways to properly allocate resources towards these issues, and more issues keep adding to the list.

What the American society needs to do is address each problem with the same focus they have in areas where we have had previous success.  To beat global warming, we need to exploit our success in entrepreneurship.  To combat unrest and dispute within the government, we need to use our success in diplomacy.  Ocean acidification, a newly recognized issue that Americans seem to have thrown on top of our large pile of problems, needs to be overwhelmed by the amount of successful strategies America throws at it.

America’s strengths have allowed us to become the economic and military superpower that we are today.  However, we are per capita the second largest contributor to global warming and ocean acidification in the world.  With so much success and prosperity, one would expect that we would be doing more to reverse the bigger problems of the world.  We are in fact doing just the opposite by polluting at unacceptable levels, and this must change.  By exploiting our ability to advertise, create new businesses, use diplomacy, and provide an example for the world successfully, I think that we will have a chance against daunting problems such as ocean acidification.  Otherwise, Goliath will unleash his fury, and we will have to endure the storm.

References: http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science_and_impacts/science/each-countrys-share-of-co2.html