On Local Economies
The "environmental crisis," in fact, can be solved only if people, individually and in their communities, recover responsibility for their thoughtlessly given proxies. If people begin the effort to take back into their own power a significant portion of their economic responsibility, then their inevitable first discovery is that the "environmental crisis" is no such thing; it is not a crisis of our environs or surroundings; it is a crisis of our lives as individuals, as family members, as community members, and as citizens. We have an "environmental crisis" because we have consented to an economy in which by eating, drinking, working, resting, traveling, and enjoying ourselves we are destroying the natural, the god-given world. ~ Wendell Berry, Orion Magazine 2001
Comments
Uh, oops..
I guess my first "accidental" post may present a more accurate representation of how I feel about the structure and operation of our current civilization.. What to say? or, where to start?
Are we finally beginning to near an environmental awareness saturation point? Al Gore's global warming PSA, Daniel Quinn's Ishmael comparing our way of life to that of the first experimentors in mechanical flight.. we won't really know we're falling until we're inches from the ground, about to impact. What to do? Where to start?! GAR!
Posted by: Rick | September 2, 2006 12:10 AM
Fred, let's at least try to find a middle ground with the likes of "Natural Capitalism" by Paul Hawken. At least this book preserves the idea that self interest is the fundamental driver of human behavior. If you have the time to read this, then please let me know your thoughts.
Posted by: Jim | September 2, 2006 10:25 PM
yo Jim....funny. And serendipitous.
I had found Hawkens (and Lovins) book, Natural Capitalism, a few days back while searching on info re "local economies" for an upcoming Floyd Press piece.
I spent a good bit of time on the Lovins Rocky Mountain Institute site where I was also interested in the Economic Renewal Guide http://tinyurl.com/h2ogw and the "prosperity without growth" idea that seems to be a desirable outcome for places like Floyd whose charm is partly a matter of pace, scale and size.
Posted by: fred1st | September 3, 2006 8:00 AM