  We define stabilizability of an infinite volume height configuration and of a
probability measure on height configurations. We show that for high enough
densities, a probability measure cannot be stabilized. We also show that in
some sense the thermodynamic limit of the uniform measures on the recurrent
configurations of the abelian sandpile model (ASM) is a maximal element of the
set of stabilizable measures. In that sense the self-organized critical
behavior of the ASM can be understood in terms of an ordinary transition
between stabilizable and non-stabilizable
