Jeremy Rifkin

Youth and education

Rifkin was born in Denver, Colorado, to Vivette Ravel Rifkin, daughter of Russian Jewish immigrants to Texas, and Milton Rifkin, a plastic-bag manufacturer. He grew up on the southwest side of Chicago. He was president of the graduating class of 1967 at the University of Pennsylvania, where he received a Bachelor of Science in Economics at the Wharton School of Finance and Commerce. Rifkin was also the recipient of the University of Pennsylvania's General Alumni Association's Award of Merit 1967. He had an epiphany when one day in 1967 he walked past a group of students protesting the Vietnam War and picketing the administration building and was amazed to see, as he recalls, that "my frat friends were beating the living daylights out of them. I got very upset." He organized a freedom-of-speech rally the next day. From then on, Rifkin quickly became an active member of the peace movement. He attended the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University (MA, International Affairs, 1968) where he continued anti-war activities. Later he joined Volunteers in Service to America (VISTA).

1970s

In 1973, Rifkin organized a mass protest against oil companies at the commemoration of the 200th Anniversary of the Boston Tea Party at Boston's Harbor. Thousands joined the protest, as activists dumped empty oil barrels into Boston's Harbor. The protest came in the wake of the increase in gasoline prices in the fall of 1973, following the OPEC oil embargo. This was later called "Boston Oil Party" by the press.

In 1978, with Ted Howard, he founded the Foundation on Economic Trends (FOET), which is active in both national and international public policy issues related to the environment, the economy, and climate change. FOET examines new trends and their impacts on the environment, the economy, culture and society, and engages in litigation, public education, coalition building and grassroots organizing activities to advance their goals. Rifkin became one of the first major critics of the nascent biotechnology industry with the 1978 publication of his book, Who Should Play God?

1980s

Rifkin's 1981 book Entropy: A New World View discusses how the physical concept of entropy applies to nuclear and solar energy, urban decay, military activity, education, agriculture, health, economics, and politics. It was called "A comprehensive worldview" and "an appropriate successor to ... Silent Spring, The Closing Circle, The Limits to Growth, and Small Is Beautiful" by the Minneapolis Tribune

In 1989, Rifkin brought together climate scientists and environmental activists from 35 nations in Washington, D.C. for the first meeting of the Global Greenhouse Network. In the same year, Rifkin did a series of Hollywood lectures on global warming and related environmental issues for a diverse assortment of film, television and music industry leaders, with the goal of organizing the Hollywood community for a campaign. Shortly thereafter, two Hollywood environmental organizations, Earth Communications Office (ECO) and Environmental Media Association, were formed.

1990s

In 1993, Rifkin launched the Beyond Beef Campaign, a coalition of six environmental groups including Greenpeace, Rainforest Action Network, and Public Citizen, with the goal of encouraging a 50% reduction in the consumption of beef, arguing that methane emissions from cattle has a warming effect 23 times greater than carbon dioxide.

His 1995 book, The End of Work, is credited by some with helping shape the current global debate on automation, technology displacement, corporate downsizing and the future of jobs. Reporting on the growing controversy over automation and technology displacement in 2011, The Economist pointed out that Rifkin drew attention to the trend back in 1996 with the publication of his book The End of Work. The Economist asked "what happens... when machines are smart enough to become workers? In other words, when capital becomes labor." The Economist noted that "this is what Jeremy Rifkin, a social critic, was driving at in his book, "The End of Work," published in 1996... Mr. Rifkin argued prophetically that society was entering a new phase, one in which fewer and fewer workers would be needed to produce all the goods and services consumed. 'In the years ahead,' he wrote, 'more sophisticated software technologies are going to bring civilisation ever closer to a near-workerless world. The process has already begun."

His 1998 book, The Biotech Century, addresses issues accompanying the new era of genetic commerce. In its review of the book, the journal Nature observed that "Rifkin does his best work in drawing attention to the growing inventory of real and potential dangers and the ethical conundrums raised by genetic technologies...At a time when scientific institutions are struggling with the public understanding of science, there is much they can learn from Rifkin's success as a public communicator of scientific and technological trends."

In The Biotech Century Rifkin argues that 'Genetic engineering represents the ultimate tool.' 'With genetic technology we assume control over the hereditary blueprints of life itself. Can any reasonable person believe for a moment that such unprecedented power is without substantial risk?' Some of the changes he highlights are: replication partially replacing reproduction; and 'Genetically customized and mass-produced animal clones could be used as chemical factories to secrete—in their blood and milk—large volumes of inexpensive chemicals and drugs for human use.'

2000s

Rifkin’s book, The Age of Access, published in the year 2000, was the first to introduce the idea that society is beginning to move from ownership of property in markets, to access to services in networks, giving rise to the Sharing Economy. According to the Journal of Consumer Research, “the phenomenon of access was first documented in the popular business press by Rifkin (2000), who primarily examines the business-to-business sector and argues that we are living in an age of access in which property regimes have changed to access regimes characterized by short-term limited use of assets controlled by networks of suppliers.”

After the publication of The Hydrogen Economy (2002), Rifkin worked both in the U.S. and Europe to advance the political cause of renewably generated hydrogen. In the U.S., Rifkin was instrumental in founding the Green Hydrogen Coalition, consisting of thirteen environmental and political organizations (including Greenpeace and MoveOn.org) that are committed to building a renewable hydrogen based economy. His 2004 book, The European Dream, was an international bestseller and winner of the 2005 Corine International Book Prize in Germany for the best economics book of the year.

2011 and 2012

In 2011, Rifkin published The Third Industrial Revolution; How Lateral Power is Transforming Energy, the Economy, and the World. The book was a New York Times best-seller, and has been translated into 19 languages. By 2014, approximately 500,000 copies were in print in China alone.

Rifkin delivered a keynote address at the Global Green Summit 2012 on May 10, 2012. The conference was hosted by the Government of the Republic of Korea and the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI), in association with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). President Lee Myung-bak of South Korea also gave a speech at the conference and embraced the Third Industrial Revolution to advance a green economy.

In December 2012, Bloomberg Businessweek reported that the newly elected premier of China, Li Keqiang is a fan of Rifkin and had "told his state scholars to pay close attention" to Rifkin's book, The Third Industrial Revolution: How Lateral Power is Transforming Energy, the Economy, and the World.

Rifkin received the America Award of the Italy-USA Foundation in 2012. He currently works out of an office in Bethesda, Maryland, a suburb of Washington, D.C.

2014

In April 2014, Rifkin published The Zero Marginal Cost Society: The Internet of Things, the Collaborative Commons, and the Eclipse of Capitalism.

2015

Rifkin was awarded an honorary doctorate from Hasselt University in Belgium in the spring of 2015. Rifkin also received an honorary doctorate from the University of Liege in Belgium in the Fall of 2015.

In November 2015, the Huffington Post reported from Beijing that "Chinese Premier Li Keqiang has not only read Jeremy Rifkin's book, The Third Industrial Revolution, and taken it to heart. He and his colleagues have also made it the core of the country's thirteenth Five-Year Plan announced in Beijing on October 29th." The Huffington Post went on to say that "this blueprint for China's future signals the most momentous shift in direction since the death of Mao and the advent of Deng Xiaoping's reform and opening up in 1978."

Reception

According to The "European Energy Review" "Perhaps no other author or thinker has had more influence on the EU's ambitious climate and energy policy than the famous American 'visionary' Jeremy Rifkin. In the United States, he has testified before numerous congressional committees and has had success in litigation to ensure responsible government policies on a variety of environmental, scientific and technology related issues. The Union of Concerned Scientists has cited some of Rifkin's publications as useful references for consumers and The New York Times once stated that "others in the scholarly, religious, and political fields praise Jeremy Rifkin for a willingness to think big, raise controversial questions, and serve as a social and ethical prophet"

Criticism

Rifkin's work has also been controversial. Opponents have attacked the lack of scientific rigor in his claims as well as some of the tactics he has used to promote his views. The Harvard scientist Stephen Jay Gould characterized Rifkin's 1983 book "Algeny" as "a cleverly constructed tract of anti-intellectual propaganda masquerading as scholarship".

A 1989 Time article about Rifkin's activist methods (entitled "The Most Hated Man in Science") details reactions by scientists, especially geneticists, of that decade.

Books