Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Rampant consumerism doesn’t happen by itself: it is encouraged by an economic system that requires perpetual economic growth. When national economies show signs of slowing down, citizens are invariably called upon to increase their consumption
Thus one of the things that I want to explore in posts to come is how we got into ways of thought that treat modern industrial lifestyles as normal and desirable—how people in the industrial world, that is, got caught up in a self-defeating attempt to escape from nature, when human beings are at once inescapably dependent on nature and inescapably part of nature—and how that frankly bizarre habit might be swapped out for something saner.
The capitalist system, driven at its core by the maximization of profit, regardless of social and ecological costs, is incompatible with a just and sustainable future. Ecosocialism offers a radical alternative that puts social and ecological well-being first.
I’ve spent most of the past 2 years travelling with my partner Nati, trying to discover what is the most strategic & wise action to take in a world that seems to be accelerating towards collapse. After an enormous amount of consideration, I have a strategy that feels good enough to engage my will and commitment.
The notion of the city as a living system generates cultural energy, too: A narrative based on caring – for each other, and for our places – creates the meaning and shared purpose we’ve been so badly lacking.
Turiel’s proposal has raised a considerable debate among the experts, with several of them challenging Turiel’s interpretation. Turiel himself and Gail Tverberg (of the “our finite world” blog) discussed the validity of the data and their meaning. Below, I reproduce the exchange with their kind permission.
For the second year, Shareable partnered with Greenpeace and other organizations for MAKE SMTHNG Week, which ran from Nov. 23 to Dec. 3. The campaign was a huge success, with almost 400 events in 48 countries that focused on promoting repair, reuse, and resource reclamation, and over 10,000 participants online who shared their experiences with the #MAKESMTHNGWeek hashtag.
The imagination needs the whole body and all the senses. Sitting still and having to pay attention and only use some of your senses, it gets kids out of the habit of feeling the world and themselves.
Tis the seaso‘n when food is on most of our minds. What if next year or the year after some of that food was no longer available or even edible?
Resiliency isn’t about protection from calamity; it is about creating the kind of neighbourhoods we all want to live in. These are places where people belong, have a shared purpose, and serve the basic needs of the community including food, energy, and even jobs.
But farmers are not encouraged by market signals and mechanisms to be land stewards. On the contrary, modern day farming has removed much of the land husbandry and stewardship that was previously an integral part of a regenerative farming system.
We can’t count on governments alone to do the work necessary – governments, from Canada and America to Russia and Saudi Arabia to China and India, are still too often beholden to the fossil fuel companies. We need to keep pushing hard on those companies – and we will.
