Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
An important part of many worldviews are key words that embody guiding principles. Freedom, liberty and justice represent three such words in the US, and in this post I’d like to explore a few that act as guiding principles in more limited contexts: sustainability, resilience and adaptability.
Modern society celebrates the suicidal consumption and despoilment of the earth by the rich, which will also kill countless others outside their ranks. As a society, we must learn to despise such acts.
Sustainability is not good for many businesses – in fact it means they’ll have to go out of business. This is what sustainability at its core is all about – things that are unsustainable will stop.
Globalization is a doomed venture in the face of more and more expensive energy costs, unfortunately before it falls apart it may destroy the local communities which will be the base of any alternative arrangements.
Framing a project or a business as "sustainable" no longer serves us. The dominant use of the word has ceased to mean what some of us orginally intended and, in fact, the term has been co-opted and watered down in many cases. Labelling something "sustainable" may even alienate potential allies, or at least people with whom you might want to get along. What do we really mean? What do we really want? Let’s find the new language set that can help us get there.
The beetle sighed. "This is all something you once knew, I think. It is something all beings have known from the beginning of time…It is a pity, this forgetting of yours."
Permaculture is notoriously hard to define.
On Tuesday, April 16, the Worldwatch Institute held its seventeenth annual State of the World Symposium to launch its latest book, State of the World 2013: Is Sustainability Still Possible? As contributors to the book, Pat Murphy and Faith Morgan were invited to attend the event, where Pat spoke on one of several panels. The complex topic of sustainability was addressed along with the need to measure it in order to prepare for the currently unsustainable future toward which we are making quick strides. The symposium was held in Washington, but an online live stream of the panels was offered for those of us who could not make it to D.C.
True resilience does not result from artistic metaphors, or by sticking veneers over the same failing industrial model.
