Pausing the game of growth
Here is a proposition: think of the economy as made of Lego. All rules to organise extraction, production, allocation, consumption, and disposal are social institutions. I
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World on fire 2020: Experts explain the global wildfire crisis
Across continents and climates, uncontrollable and destructive wildfires are becoming an expected part of annual calendars. This year has been a case in point.
Resources for a better Future: Renewable energy
A better way to define technology is to acknowledge that it is a global social phenomenon and a moral and political question rather than simply one of engineering.
Why We Need a Small Farm Future
If we’re to bequeath a habitable and abundant planet to our descendants, a key part of that reappraisal involves rethinking the relevance of small farm or ‘peasant’ societies that are often dismissed for their ‘backwardness’ or buried under an unusable legacy of romanticism and nostalgia.
Degrowth resonates: a reflection on DegrowthFest 2020
Degrowth resonated with many people in our community. That is the remarkable result of DegrowthFest, for me. I am thrilled but not surprised that so many friends and neighbors were keen on this movement and idea that is so dear to me.
A sociological farmer speaks…and answers questions about a Small Farm Future
But what’s perhaps of greatest import are the points where our human self-conceptions confront the wider world – and here farming looms large. Since I’m hopeless at multi-tasking, how fortunate, then, that I’m a ‘former’ social scientist and a farmer, albeit improperly!
Power After Carbon: A Book Review
Power After Carbon is an affirmation of an achievable low-carbon economy by one of the nation’s leading experts in the field. Fox-Penner clearly states there is enough technical and policy potential to eliminate long-term electricity growth for traditional uses.
Do you own your own face?
If we don’t own our own faces, then others can use them for whatever purposes they choose, not just governments or businesses, but also private individuals. The destiny of so-called surveillance capitalism is to put everyone’s face and thus identity up for sale in ways that subject people to increasing manipulation and even physical danger.
Some reflections on the difference between ‘Yes, but’ and ‘Yes, and’
While I entirely appreciate that ‘Yes, but’ has a role in holding those in power to account, it also suffocates and stifles and undermines. Just for those few moments, I allowed myself to imagine how our political debates might look if they had ‘Yes, and’ at their heart. I liked what I saw.
The Hemp Casita of Rezolana — Rising up from the Ground
Closely weaving together habitation, community, and society, Arnie pays attention to how culture was and is created.
A Pandemic Pivot
If the current pandemic is a test of the global emergency response system, the international community is flunking big time.
Echo
A poem celebrating the life and work of Rachel Carson, author of the environmental classic Silent Spring.
