Maude Barlow: Read me my environmental rights
In most legal systems, you have a right to freedom of speech or religion, but you don’t have a right to breathe clean air or drink safe water.
Media & Communications
A critical response to Michael Brownlee’s call for ‘Deep Transition’
I read Michael Brownlee’s recent piece “The Evolution of Transition in the US”, with a mixture of fascination and a sense of disquiet that increased the deeper I got into the piece. The concept of Transition has been regularly critiqued, a positive process which has helped to shape what it is today. Most critiques run along the lines of “Transition, nice idea, but it isn’t [ … ] enough”. So, for Alex Steffen, Transition isn’t technologically savvy or optimistic enough, for the Trapese Collective it isn’t politically savvy enough, for John Michael Greer it is guilty of “premature triumphalism”, for Ted Trainer it isn’t sufficiently rooted in alternative culture or focused enough, while for others it is too riven with New Age thinking and pseudoscience. Now, according to Brownlee, it is fatally flawed by not having the “Sacred” at the heart of what it does.
WikiLeaks (content) – Dec 5
– Leaked cables reveal Saudi minister of petroleum helped craft toothless Copenhagen climate accord
– WikiLeaks cables reveal how US manipulated climate accord
– WikiLeaks cables: Seven key things we’ve learned so far
– “We Have Not Seen Anything Yet”: Guardian Editor Says Most Startling WikiLeaks Cables Still to be Released
– Ongoing coverage
Web and democracy – Dec 5
– Next Generation Democracy: What the Open Source Revolution Means for Power, Politics, and Change
– Cyber-Con (US government and the online revolution)
– The Atlantic: The Shameful Attacks on Julian Assange
WikiLeaks (why?) – Dec 4
– Forbes: An Interview With WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange
– Ron Paul: ‘What we need is more WikiLeaks’
– Is WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange a Hero? Glenn Greenwald & Steven Aftergood debate
– Pepe Escobar: Cracks in the wilderness of mirrors
ODAC Newsletter – Dec 3
The Obama administration announced this week that it has reversed its decision to open up new leases in areas of the Eastern Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic coast. The intention to lift the moratorium which had been in place since 2006 was made weeks before the Deepwater Horizon oil disaster. See the recent UKITPOES paper for more on the likely impact of the Gulf of Mexico disaster on oil production…
The gas rush – treasure or timebomb? – Dec 3
-Secrecy of Fracking Chemicals Takes Beltway Spotlight
-Hydraulic Fracturing in the Spotlight
-US natural gas drilling boom linked to pollution and social strife – with video
-NY shale gas moratorium is a win-win
The amoeba of cultural change
In the Q&A section of public presentations we often get asked “How do you tell people about Transition …” Then the questioner launches into a vivid description of how his attempts have failed to get through to his Hummer-driving brother-in-law, or his boss who vacations in the Bahamas, or his fellow churchgoers who rhapsodize over malls and “bargains” at big box stores, or his neighbor with the pristine, overwatered chem-lawn.
Transforming higher education: Overcoming the barriers to better schooling
For many decades, America’s global leadership success has been attributed to its robust and rigorous public higher education system. The business model upon which U.S. public higher education is built has rendered it unaffordable to students, and it is in fragile fiscal health. There is little accountability. This article discusses that transition and offers a solution: an online education environment that capitalizes on the power of digital technologies, rich content, open learning systems, and the sharing of capabilities across campus boundaries to engage students already comfortable with online interactivity.
In Vancouver, a ‘crown jewel’ of local food is in the works
If you found yourself on the southern shore of False Creek at Westminster Avenue (now Main Street) on Saturday, Aug. 15, 1908 you would happen by opening day of Vancouver’s City Market. The grand building with dual bell towers and a generous waterfront promenade is plastered with signs advertising retail and wholesale “farm products” for sale and a restaurant serving “meals at all hours.” Could B.C.’s biggest city today bring back to life so vibrant a public space, building a key component in what could be one of North America’s most robust local food economies?
Deconstructing Dinner: A farewell…for now! (includes update on eggs investigation)
This episode #193 marks the final broadcast of Deconstructing Dinner before we embark on a much-needed break. Producer & Host Jon Steinman speaks about the need to step away from producing new shows and what future might lie ahead. Jon also shares some reflections on the past 5 years of producing this weekly one-hour radio show and podcast, and offers suggestions to those involved in the responsible food movement – a movement which this show has helped track its evolution and certainly one that this show has in many ways been a part of.
Voices – Dec 2
– Paolo Bacigalupi’s SHIP BREAKER: YA adventure story in a post-peak-oil world
– New issue of Transition Voice: Holiday of crumbling cash
– Thank You for Seven Years of Worldchanging (a farewell)
– Transitions Towns and the Post-Carbon Future of Albury-Wodonga (podcast)
– Code Green Communities – radio interview
