The Hames Report

Food Security on the Menu

A world with 7 billion people, threats from a changing climate and unsustainable resource use are intensifying pressure on humanity and world governments to transform the way food is produced, distributed and consumed. This global issue brings both responsibility and opportunity for Australia.

The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation estimates 75 million to 130 million people were pushed into malnutrition and poverty when food prices spiked in 2008, and another 40 million joined them after this year's price spikes. There are many regions where large gaps exist between actual and potential production, and an estimated 12 million hectares of agricultural land is degraded each year.

Up to a third of all food harvested is lost or wasted as it is processed, distributed or consumed in our homes. Climate change is expected to exacerbate the problem: increasing temperatures, altered rainfall patterns and more severe weather will lead to dire social, economic and ecological consequences. Vietnam's fertile, low-lying Mekong Delta is already experiencing ingress of seawater.

The global challenge is to increase agricultural productivity and decrease our environmental footprint while adapting to changing climate patterns. We must increase global food production by 2050 by between 30 and 80 per cent while halving our greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture.

This is the task facing the Commission on Sustainable Agriculture and Climate Change. The commission, chaired by Britain's chief scientist, Professor John Beddington, is calling for urgent action by governments, international institutions, investors, agricultural producers, consumers, food companies and researchers. It wants food security on the agenda at the next round of international climate change talks in Durban, South Africa, in recognition of its inextricable link with climate change. The commission's blueprint urges seven key steps:

• Integrate food security and sustainable agriculture into global and national policies.
• Significantly raise the level of investment in sustainable agriculture and food systems.
• Sustainably intensify agricultural production while reducing greenhouse gas emissions and other negative environmental effects.
• Target populations and sectors globally that are the most vulnerable to climate and food insecurity.
• Reshape food access and consumption patterns to ensure basic needs are met and foster sustainable eating habits worldwide.
• Reduce loss and waste in food systems.
• Create comprehensive, shared information systems that encompass human and ecological dimensions.

I believe Australia will play a unique role in this transformation. Despite our highly variable and challenging climate, many sectors of Australian agriculture have achieved an extraordinary annual productivity increase of 2 per cent or more for the past 30 years. We feed 60 million people each year and we are one of only 15 countries that export more food than we import. The rapid growth of mega-cities in our region will mean growing markets for the food we produce.

Future climate change brings new challenges to lifting agricultural production, but Australia is well placed.

We hold the world record for the lowest proportion of rainfall ending up in river systems, with a staggering 89 per cent evaporating. Our temperate areas have the world's highest year-to-year variability of run-off. By 2030, climate change is likely to cut average river flows by 10 to 25 per cent in some areas of southern Australia. A key driver for achieving rapid adoption of new technologies and practices is partnership between researchers and farmers. Australian agricultural research has a long history of innovation and collaboration with farming industries and communities that can be harnessed to deal with the challenges of food security and climate change.

Across Western Australia grain growers have lifted production through better practices, such as conservation agriculture, despite lower rainfall. In Vietnam, where saltwater is intruding, some farmers have turned rice paddies into shrimp ponds. Our irrigators can now use precision satellite data, soil moisture and evaporation rates to determine precise irrigation times sent via SMS to their phones. Every one of these efforts can be scaled globally.

Real changes are necessary across the global food system if we are to achieve true food security for all. It will mean a shared commitment across society and around the globe.

This article was written by Dr Megan Clark who is CSIRO chief executive and a commissioner for the Commission on Sustainable Agriculture and Climate Change. The article first appeared in the Melbourne Age on 23rd November 2011 and is reproduced here with the author's permission.

 

Please Mind the Gap

I am normally wary of statements such as this changes everything. But there is something distinctly attractive about the Occupy Wall Street movement - especially if it is seen as a single thread in a tapestry of increasing social and civic unrest aimed at systematically deconstructing and challenging the more damaging aspects of our civilisational world-system.

The ground swell of civil upheaval we are witnessing around the world (admittedly for a variety of differing reasons) seems to offer the potential for a profound global awakening to the human condition that is probably unprecedented in modern times.

Before Occupy Wall Street any serious conversation about the negative aspects (misdirected power, corruption and discrimination) locked into the global financial system occurred rarely, and only then at private gatherings of cognoscenti or during off-the-grid brainstorming conclaves within left-leaning think-tanks. With little public discussion of the outlandish power of Wall Street and its links to the diminishing fortunes of the middle class it was fair to assume a deeply ingrained and pervasive public apathy. That assumption was wrong.

What had not been fully appreciated was the power of digital information and communications tools, and especially the new social media, to connect and ferment resentment among those who were doing it tough; people who were already feeling the pain from unemployment or from working in a system where senior executives could earn up to 450 times that of the average employee. Couple these factors to an increase in political inertia and corruption and the existential issues of a planet under threat from extreme weather events and climate change and we immediately have a recipe for revolution.

Occupy Wall Street is giving a voice to ordinary men and women who are victims of a world-system that is unsustainable. In fact, it may represent the best hope in years that "we the people" will step up to take on the critical challenges of our time. Sarah van Gelder (editor) and the staff of YES! Magazine claim that the Occupy movement is already "changing everything". In their new book, Occupy Wall Street and the 99% Movement, they name ten factors to support their thesis:

1. It names the source of the crisis
Political insiders have avoided this simple reality: The problems of the 99% are caused in large part by Wall Street greed, perverse financial incentives, and a corporate takeover of the political system. Now that this is understood, the genie is out of the bottle and it can¹t be put back in.

2. It provides a clear vision of the world we want
We can create a world that works for everyone, not just the wealthiest 1%. And we, the 99%, are using the spaces opened up by the Occupy movement to conduct a dialogue about the world we want.

3. It sets a new standard for public debate
Those advocating policies and proposals must now demonstrate that their ideas will benefit the 99%. Serving only the 1% will not suffice, nor will claims that the subsidies and policies that benefit the 1% will eventually "trickle down".

4. It presents a new narrative
The solution is not to starve government or impose harsh austerity measures that further harm middle-class and poor people already reeling from a bad economy. Instead, the solution is to free society and government from corporate dominance. A functioning democracy is our best shot at addressing critical social, environmental, and economic crises.

5. It creates a big tent
We, the 99%, are people of all ages, races, occupations, and political beliefs. We will resist being divided or marginalized. We are learning to work together with respect.

6. It offers everyone a chance to create change
No one is in charge. No single organization or political party calls the shots. Anyone can get involved, offer proposals, support the occupations, and build the movement. Because leadership is everywhere and new supporters keep turning up, there is a flowering of creativity and a resilience that makes the movement nearly impossible to shut down.

7. It is a movement, not a list of demands
The call for deep change (not temporary fixes and single-issue reforms) is the movement¹s sustaining power. The movement is sometimes criticized for failing to issue a list of demands, but doing so could keep it tied to status quo power relationships and policy options. The occupiers and their supporters will not be boxed in.

8. It combines the local and the global
People in cities and towns around the world are setting their own local agendas, tactics, and aims. What they share in common is a critique of corporate power and an identification with the 99%, creating an extraordinary wave of global solidarity.

9. It offers an ethic and practice of deep democracy and community
Slow, patient decision-making in which every voice is heard translates into wisdom, common commitment, and power. Occupy sites are set up as communities in which anyone can discuss grievances, hopes, and dreams, and where all can experiment with living in a space built around mutual support.

10. We have reclaimed our power
Instead of looking to politicians and leaders to bring about change, we can see now that the power rests with us. Instead of being victims to the forces upending our lives, we are claiming our sovereign right to remake the world.

Like all human endeavors, Occupy Wall Street and its thousands of variations and spin-offs will be imperfect. There have already been setbacks and divisions, hardships and injury. But as our world faces extraordinary challenges, from climate change to soaring inequality, perhaps our best hope is the ordinary people, gathered in imperfect democracies, who are finding ways to fix a broken world.

Occupy Wall Street and the 99% Movement, Edited by Sarah van Gelder and the staff of YES! Magazine. Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2011, 96 pages. $6.95 (30% off the cover price when you buy from YES!. All royalties from this book are donated to the Occupy Wall Street movement)

The Heretic's Curse

The Outlier

Throughout my career I have frequently been accused of being a heretic or, possibly more politely, an outlier – a prophet of things to come but hardly pertinent to present imperatives. In the latter context I am supposedly too idealistic. A dreamer, romantic, perfectionist perhaps. But most definitely not a pragmatist. These allegations have been repeated so often and in varying circumstances I suppose they must contain an element of truth.

As I recall they started at secondary school when I insisted on studying both music and science, a bizarre request at the time though not so uncommon today. Actually I recall the expression actually used by my teachers at the time was troublemaker. But troublemaker is close enough to heretic for you to discern a pattern. At university I protested about the incompetence of some of my teachers – although the sit-down strike I organised on the grand staircase of The Royal College of Music just prior to a visit by Her Majesty Elizabeth the Queen Mother was, I confess, a little over the top. It also resulted in my immediate suspension which was not the aim. Notoriety seemed to follow me after that…

When I became a university lecturer, a tendency to take pot shots at the ludicrous rules and regulations that simply got in the way of teaching guaranteed an eventual falling out with the authorities. My entry into the consulting profession was, befittingly, via the path of continuous process improvement, or Total Quality Management. I was recently reminded that the question I most often posed to my peers at that time was How could you not notice the stupidity of this? Which, to allay any suspicion that I was unfairly targeting one individual, was rapidly followed by Are we having fun yet?

More recently the pretentiousness of some of my clients, especially those who should know better, irritated me to the extent that they became the deliberate object for my tacit heretical inclinations. A few political leaders, senior bureaucrats and CEOs have been particularly intent on sustaining the “Hames as Heretic” myth. This is unsurprising. Let’s face it, those that aren’t actually psychopathic can be so….  Oh you know! Out of their depth. Confused actually.

With the possible exception of romantic, none of the labels that stuck express my preferred way of occurring to people - especially with those who do have the authority, capital or influence to actually change things for the better. Yes, I am certainly an advocate of change but it is still surprising to me how even that innocuous tag can strike fear and trepidation where it is least expected, especially in the Board rooms of banks, large mining and chemical companies, industrial military complexes and, naturally enough, the cabinet offices of our elected government representatives.

Of course there are many like myself who agitate for better futures, improving the ways we interact and work with each other, correcting injustices, and treading more lightly on the Earth. But in my old age I am becoming far more conscious of the need to provide my fellow heretics (or troublemakers) with the means to neutralise negativity and even outright hostility. For the value of alternative (oft perceived as dissenting) opinion cannot be under-estimated. Nor must it be silenced.

But herein lies an uncomfortable paradox: foresight gives rise to insights but insights cannot be appreciated without the gift of foresight. What could possibly be the reason to change what one does if there is no change in external circumstances? Heretics do not simply want to improve things. Their passion for change arises from their perception regarding the underlying rationale for change. It is in the communicating of both the need for change and the nature of such changes that the difficulties arise. As Nietzsche famously observed: Those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music….

So now I am going to get serious. There appear to be at least five reasons many people cannot "hear the music" to which most heretics dance. These reasons become barriers inhibiting the kinds of renewal (political, social and economic) many of us seek. They have nothing to do with technological invention, infrastructure or investment capital, and very little to do with politics. In fact all five of the factors I can identify are relatively intangible. What they do have in common is an affiliation to the cultural or psychological space within which we have typically responded to shifting ambiguous and uncertain conditions.

Very simply stated these factors are (i) the detachment of ideas from social relations; (ii) fears and apprehension engendered through an apparent lack of control as well as a distrust of other people’s motives; (iii) redundant mindsets; and (iv) the fragmentation of endeavours. Each of these barriers need to be resolved or accommodated in order for change to embed and, as a consequence, for us heretics to die with a smile on our faces. They are stated here purely as an indication of the depth of the problems we face as a species. Not heretics. Humans!

1. Detachment of Ideas & Social Relations
As the umbilical bond human beings have with each other intensifies we become more highly attuned to a global community of mind as an experiential phenomenon. Increasingly we feel an integral part of a cohesive human family. At the same time it can be deeply disturbing to have to acknowledge the harm we keep doing to each other.

When it comes to tangible events and issues, however, the opposite condition seems to prevail. Here, critical matters facing humankind are becoming decoupled from each other in our cognitive analysis of them. We no longer discern their inherent relatedness. On the contrary they most often occur to us as entirely separate issues. But in first seeking that which separates one idea from another we fail to discern and appreciate the key pattern that connects as Gregory Bateson so eloquently put it.

So when we tackle dynamically complex issues (like climate change, natural disasters, population growth or terrorism, for example) we continue to apply the same linear thinking, usually with even greater enthusiasm than before and in the knowledge that our solutions are not working and cannot possibly work, yet fail to go back to the drawing board in order to design a world-system where such undesirable symptoms would simply vanish.

There are some fundamental reasons for this, though I suspect most are by no means as indelibly etched into the human psyche as those alarmists who see the end of civilization looming in the rear view mirror, would have us believe:

Myopia: Because we operate within our own paradigmatic confines we can easily become blind to the obvious, including stuff that really matters. The signs of a world-system in trouble are evident, but only to those possessing sufficient bandwidth to perceive them as such. It is more common for us to be misled, distracted by the many thousands of iterations of just a few seminal messages that smudge clarity and mutate meaning into inconsequential nonsense. This consensual illusion has us believe we are operating with more information when, in fact, we are becoming indoctrinated with less information.

If that were not disturbing enough many warning signs are not appearing on our radar screens, either because they are imperceptible to us culturally, or are showing up only at the intersections of our knowledge. With few exceptions we are no longer in the habit of looking for truth at the edge. Instead our senses are glued to celebrity, scandal, disasters, sensational events conveyed in epigrammatic video clips and ephemeral tweets. Even if we were looking in the right places we lack the tools to bring into sharp focus what we might see there. In other words the territory has changed but our maps and reasoning have not kept pace. We have all become so busy interpreting what is going on from our own, deeply embedded, meaning structures that we have become blind to the obvious, the ordinary and the easily observed.

Despair: Most of us find the complex nature of change incomprehensible. Consequently most of us are out of our depth most of the time - deficient in the capacity to make sense of what is going on at anything more than a superficial level. Worse still, as hype around our most critical issues escalates, our ability to confront important matters is overwhelmed by a belief that such dreadful events can surely not be happening to us. It is simply too much to bear.

The result is that collective cognition shuts down - or diverts to less existential matters, like sporting events, entertainment, gossip and other comforting distractions. This is known as apocalypse fatigue. People suffering from this condition feel helpless to do anything about the issues confronting them. They would much rather ignore any threat to their own existence by acting as if it isn’t true, shrug their shoulders in despair, or turn away from reality simply because it is too dreadful to contemplate.

Ultimately there is only one question that really matters. Whatever happens over the next few decades the wealthy will survive. The four billion or so people who are not so fortunate will be wiped out. Do we really care? If so, what should we be doing about it?

Exclusion: The occidental mind is supremely rational, responding best to deductive logic which it values over alternative methods of knowing. Accordingly those of us in the West have been conditioned into building and dissecting structures one piece at a time. We have been taught to analyse and measure critical dimensions before applying problem-solving techniques to re-engineer those parts under stress.

Using this logic results in solutions ranging from the brilliant to the commonplace. Method, on the other hand, remains consistent - dependent upon ranking and available resources. So one or more parts of a structure (those perceived to be the weakest links) are improved while other parts are ignored. When we see deterioration in different parts of the structure we switch our attention to those elements and ignore the parts we were working on.

While we in the West have become very adept at this kind of structural reductionism we have neglected to develop similar expertise in the design of resilient and enduring systems. Our greatest weakness is in applying deductive logic to every challenge facing humanity. By excluding alternative ways of knowing, including indigenous wisdom, we are requiring all other cultures to engage through the ideology of the occidental mind should they wish to participate in their own survival.

Overload: We are assailed by all kinds of information every hour of our waking lives. It has been known for some time that too much information causes a condition known as sensory overload. This produces disorientation and a lack of responsiveness as well as lowering our ability to make accurate predictions.

Not only does sensory overload make it more difficult for us to express and comprehend complex systems, constructing effective long-term solutions becomes even more problematic when we are exhausted by the very information that might have the solution embedded within it.

Displacement: We have developed an uncommon ability to shift or assign blame. It’s someone else’s problem is a conditioned reflex most commonly acquired through our instruction-based, rather than inquiry-based, educational methods. As we are routed into careers, social memes, and classes, we develop a highly refined sense of what is in our purview. We seek public sector solutions to our wantonly excessive consumption. We rely upon government intervention when our sick and aging need care. We look to the police for community relations. We look to the clergy for morality. Regardless of evidence showing a lack of cognitive alignment within our collective transmuted accountability someone else should remains our dominant modus operandi. 

And then, when these systems fail, we animate them with our projections of an accountability that they never accepted in our opening premise. By focusing on the role of leaders and obsessing on artefacts of hierarchical structure we have lost our moorings on citizenship and personal responsibility within community. In reality we are the problems we project on others. But then we, too, are the capacity to solve the same.

2. Fears & Apprehension
In spite of a highly controlled machinery of denial, misinformation and propaganda pervading modern society a growing minority of people vaguely comprehend the seriousness of our predicament. A few are even trying to do something about it as can be seen by recent civic protest and social unrest. But having a partial sense of a situation beyond our control has also encouraged society’s communicators to go to town in ways that exploit our growing sense of angst and that are detrimental to longer-term planetary solutions.

For example, some journalists have leapt on discrete issues to push their own frenzied (often negative, cynical and commercial) self-interests. As a consequence most memes dealing with the contemporary human condition are conveyed via a strange mix of edgy fear coupled to competitive dogma rather than from a sense of hope, inspiration and abundance. It must be said that some recent strategies by celebrity politicians and well-meaning activists have also unintentionally contributed to an overwhelming feeling of helplessness that has much of humanity in a vice-like grip.

3. Redundant mindsets
Most of the seeds responsible for today’s rampant damage across so many sectors of society were sown during the industrial revolution. Those seeds (which economic historian Niall Ferguson identifies as the Protestant work ethic, democracy, medicine, consumerism, competition and the scientific method) all exhibited a way of thinking that was uniquely occidental in their approach to economic growth, innovation and development. According to Ferguson they were ultimately responsible for the success of Western economies. Unfortunately these same “killer apps” have recently culminated in blatantly exploitative mechanisms of production – variants of the capitalist ethos that have become driven by greed and are designed to promote the acquisition of wealth above any other goal. I have no doubt this development will turn out to be the Achilles heel of capitalism.

Unfortunately many developing states, including China , have started to emulate this model, or hybrids of it. But because of the exponential demand for food, water, energy and goods from the seven billion people who inhabit this planet, a perfect storm of economic and social flaws inherent in the original design is about to break. In spite of this, all relevant societal memes are predicated on the notion that the rational occidental mindset, values and beliefs (including that of competitive conduct) hold the key to societal renewal.

From a Western perspective this is hubristic narcissism at its worst. Western views of progress (often embedded in technological positivism) already border on the irrelevant in most non-Western traditions. Future solutions to the civilizational problem must of necessity "integrate and transcend" current mindsets if they are to be effective. That means giving an appropriate voice to those cultures, along with giving credence to alternative economic and social modes of development, and elevating the importance of universal cooperation.

The political inertia we see all around us does not spring from apathy or any lack of a desire to change but the prevalence of competitive behaviour and the lack of collaboration. Competition traps us in circumstances where it is expected that we fight others in order to safeguard our own narrow, parochial interests. Thus the lack of any real political leadership is first and foremost the result of us succumbing to an obsolete economic paradigm with its associated suite of constraints concerned with preserving the national interest.

The fact is we are beholden to mechanisms, from the nation state to the G20 and even the United Nations, that effectively hinder collaboration on a planetary scale. Conventional wisdom maintains that we are fundamentally competitive social beings. Most biological evidence points to the contrary. But this is part of the paradigm we must shatter in order for the communal needs and interests we all share to shine through.

5. The fragmentation of endeavours
If the lack of a unified vision or platform for change is a serious issue then the splintering of any common strategic focus and alignment are huge contributing factors to a demoralizing diffusion and dilution of energy. Currently there are myriad discrete and well-meaning initiatives, strategies, campaigns, movements and media all vying for our attention and funding across a range of theatres. Such diversity is overwhelming and a distraction in its own right. There is also far too much talk and not nearly enough inspired leadership for action attached to these ventures.

The key will be to find strategic acupuncture points that liberate new energy flows that concentrate and embed entrepreneurial passion and innovations within the world-system. A critical element in this regard will be investment capital for renewal. The injection of capital and resources from business and high net worth individuals is still channeled overwhelmingly into old ‘sunset’ industries and interests, including the servicing of war and conflict which is the world’s most highly profitable business. Two things must change:

1. Firstly new business models must be invented to challenge prevalent assumptions governing investment, value and profitable exchange, ultimately making it more attractive to invest in things like renewable energy, sustainable agriculture, charitable agencies and alternative governance systems
2. Secondly, however inconceivable or idealistic it might seem, we must wean ourselves off military combat. Peace is a prerequisite for societal renewal. We cannot create peace by practising warfare.

The Heretic’s Dilemma

So here is our poison chalice. For the first time in recent history we are faced not with a simple problem requiring a simple solution, but with a fiercely diabolical human condition – a world-system so immensely and dynamically complex that even the most sophisticated reductionist thought, coupled to rational evidence and the most incredible breakthroughs in technology, are totally insufficient to correct the unintended consequences of our defective design.

Heretics are often at the forefront of envisaging what can and should be done (in terms of systemic renewal) yet insist on using old tools and old thinking to communicate both what we perceive to be the predicament in addition to the potential solutions to that predicament. The alternatives, neither of which I can possibly recommend, are either to rein-in one's ambitions for change in compliance with a status quo that resists all attempts at renewal, or continue to use technological positivism and the unambiguous myths of human progress to make extravagant claims regarding the "inevitable fusion of man and machine" that, ultimately, create even greater anxiety in a system already burdened with uncertainty.

Of necessity we must devote far greater effort into designing entirely new approaches to communicating these matters or continue to suffer the consequences of being pushed aside as an irrelevance. The first task will be to address the cultural and psychological barriers that allow so many of us to cast aside both fierce logic and unbounded intuition in favour of blind habit. Little attention is being paid to that task at the moment.... 

Final thoughts

Come to think of it, who would actually choose to be a heretic? If I could go back to my school days, with the wisdom that comes from hindsight, perhaps I would choose to study music or science. But then again, I might just miss all the provocation and the notoriety. So.....

Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They are not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you cannot do is ignore them. Because they change things. They invent. They imagine. They heal. They explore. They create. They inspire. They push the human race forward. While some see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do. - Apple Computers

Occupy Your Mind

Regular readers will recall it is my occasional habit to reprint articles of particular consequence in The Hames Report. In that spirit I recently asked my US-based friend and colleague Dr David Martin if I could print a piece he had just published on his BlogSpot Inverted Alchemy. He did not hesitate.

But then I read this important piece again. And again. I realised that merely reprinting David’s article would not satisfy the insatiable desire I had to elaborate on some of his most critical points. Consequently I am publishing David’s article in italics below and then making some further comments of my own.

Returning from Salt Lake City to Charlottesville via Chicago provided a suboptimal venue to listen to the audio of Ken Wilber’s interview conducted by my friend Todd Goldfarb. It turns out that cheap courtesy headphones from a hotel gym have no sound dampening value to overpower the engines on a CRJ-700. The good news was that the audio quality was so dreadful that I had to concentrate. So, I sat next to the window, focused on the ground passing below and listened to Ken describe the passage of humanity’s transitions. And it was in the observation of the millions of acres of industrial farmland over which I was passing at 38,000 feet that I settled in on the puzzle: Is it possible to perceive human transformation as a first person actor or are evolutions of consciousness only discerned in retrospect?

Let me provide a bit of background. Todd and Ken were discussing the notion that we are on the edge of a new inflection of the human experience. This edge is, in part, defined by previous inflections (from archaic to magic to mythic to rational to modern to post-modern, etc.) and has several particular characteristics that are noteworthy. In his description of the ‘Integral’ transformation, Ken suggested that, in contrast to previous inflections, rather than rejecting past human narratives, a hallmark of this inflection is the explicit inclusion of wisdom and experience from all previous epochs. And, for a moment over Iowa, I found myself trying to reconcile this vision with the reality from which I had just come.

You see, I had just been at a board meeting where I had heard representatives from one of New York's leading investment banks talk about the merits of fixed income investments and had heard them discuss the fact that they were encouraging investments in revenue-based instruments (like water) rather than debt issued by cities and counties. After all, they argued, even unemployed poor people have to drink! The neatly groomed fields below me, the echo of merchants peddling water as a safe investment, and Ken all converged in an unholy trinity between Cedar Rapids and Oxford Junction. I can recall the moment. Ken was in the middle of one of his many “never before in human history” generalizations…

Who do we think we are? We have got a real problem. I have described with effusive affection my respect for Karl Popper on numerous occasions so I will not belabour his criticism of our Occidental hubris again. As I have commented in my recent posts on the Occupy movement, what I find most disturbing about our present consensus delusional state is the intersection of our belief that we access information and our resulting belief that we’re informed.

Has capitalism ‘worked’ when:

1. The largest communist country on earth actually owns a controlling interest in our debt and supplies a considerable amount of our consumables

2. There has never (since the Land Act of 1820 and the Morrill Act of 1862 to our modern military, technology, and service profit-subsidized government procurements of today) been a phase in US history where we actually had open, unsubsidized free markets; and,

3. Our income distribution and growth is at its all time greatest asymmetry?

Has our social conscience evolved when:

1. Ken Wilber describes our evolution past slavery, for example, at a time when there are more humans (per capita) in slavery today than at any recorded period of history

2. When we continue to promote 19th century narratives about wisdom traditions ranging from Egypt to Peru to Mongolia without consideration of the possibility that these civilizations actually may have out-engineered our self proclaimed modern marvels; and,

3. When ‘hope’ and ‘change’ has led to more remote control assassinations than the notorious Bush / Cheney regime?

It would be lovely to imagine a world in which we would hold ourselves to an abiding commitment that ‘evolution’ might actually involve some notion of improvement. Improvement of the means by which we interact with the Earth. Improvement in the manner in which we engage cultures diverse from our own. Improvement in how we assess the qualities of ourselves and our ecosystems. Improvements in how we engage in dialogue and discourse holding genuine respect for alternative points of view.

Alas the evidence shows us that we seem to be more drawn to evolution that involves the selective repression of ever larger numbers of voices – voices who have long memories and have alternative views to our own. Is humanity at a tipping point or are we walking past the masses from whom our ignorance has extracted humanity?

The fulcrum around which a real tipping will occur will be discerned when it is set into place by the hands of all tribes, communities, families, and peoples. We will know it by their presence; not tell them in their absence.

If one explores below the surface of this highly considered response to an experiential dilemma the implications in David Martin’s cautionary thesis appear to me to be profoundly disturbing. Not only do they call into question the degree to which we are actually sentient individuals (in comparison, say, with herd animals possessing relatively uncouth instincts and unvarying habits) they also point to Occidental “maturity” as a delusion in which many of us are still trapped.

This may be partly to do with the hubris arising from our recent technological prowess and subsequently assumed moral authority – though the latter (if it ever existed) is clearly in a state of rapid collapse today. It may even have something to do with the so-called six “killer apps” (i.e. competition, science, democracy, medicine, consumerism and the Protestant work ethic) identified by the economic historian Niall Ferguson as an explanation for the West’s prominent (now declining) position in the global world-system over the past 300 years or so.

More ominously, I suspect, is an ingrained belief that those of us with an Anglo-Saxon cultural heritage are somehow smarter, wiser and creatively superior than others. This is not just arrogance. It is intensely foolish. Yet if we needed evidence we have only to recall the number of occasions during the past half century where assumed Occidental superiority has led to our military powers trampling over the cradles of our civilisation in Africa, South East Asia and the Middle East. As David Martin queries: Who do we think we are?

I am reminded of some research undertaken by professor Robert Sternberg at Yale University who undertook and extensive study of stupidity, which he identified as a lack of applied wisdom rather than the absence of intelligence. Sternberg argued that specific aspects of life as a smart person actually cultivate stupidity. In other words that it sometimes takes a really smart person to do something truly stupid.

Sternberg concluded there are four main tendencies that lead us into this quandary:
1. Egocentrism – the fallacy whereby we foolishly come to believe that because we are so smart, the world does and should revolve around us
2. Omniscience – the fallacy whereby we foolishly come to believe that part of the reason the world revolves around us is we know much more than we do, or even all we need to know
3. Omnipotence – the fallacy whereby we foolishly believe such knowledge makes us invincible. We can do whatever we want and get away with it
4. Invulnerability – the fallacy whereby we foolishly believe we can get away with it because our intelligence makes us invulnerable to attack and even to criticism.

We move into a very vulnerable space indeed when we are either too smart (believing we know everything we need to know and that we can get away with any act) or too dumb (to realise we lack the cognitive capacity to recognise and overcome our stupidity). I suspect one of these characteristics are present in the majority of people occupying leadership roles today.

Of course the worst possible scenario would be if the world were led by really stupid people. However the situation gets almost as ludicrous when smart people use their intelligence or influence to quarantine themselves from the very feedback that would appraise them of the reality of a situation. This is commonplace in the corridors of power.

Furthermore, if we have already arrived at a point where we believe other people, or nations, or cultures, or social groupings, are less capable of defining a collective future for humanity and that consequently it is incumbent upon us to re-establish a future in which our failing social, economic, political and commercial systems continue to endure, then our collective stupidity is profoundly entrenched.

Like David Martin I fail to understand how we can imagine our society (i.e. we are implicitly referring to the so-called developed world remember) has reached the zenith of its evolution as a civilised global community, and that we are consequently approaching an inflection point that will enable us to include and transcend all previous experiences and knowledge, when we still reach for the sword before the pen; still fiercely exclude those who hold differing beliefs to us; still feed an industrial war machine that can easily annihilate humanity; are still fearful enough of the unknown as to worship primitive deities; still innately disengaged from the natural environment that sustains all life; still arrogant enough to believe our ways of knowing outweigh alternative epistemologies; and still bound up with our own overwhelming sense of individual pride and self-importance.

The single, most important, feature for enabling intentional evolution is expressed within David’s final paragraph. He says: The fulcrum around which a real tipping will occur will be discerned when it is set into place by the hands of all tribes, communities, families, and peoples. We will know it by their presence; not tell them in their absence.

Because of our tendency to deliberately exclude others we are not at a global tipping point by any stretch of the imagination. For that we need a critical mass of the world’s citizens to be able to convey new possibilities within a fresh narrative for humanity arising from a higher consciousness and sense of self-awareness. That will be a new human story.

In contrast we are still content to perpetuate ideas, principles, models and values that were outmoded long ago. Can anyone really state that our collective state of being (our empathic consciousness) is more advanced than that which existed fifty years ago?

That is not to deny a palpable feeling of anticipation, articulated by many in words and deeds and expressed in the Occupy Wall Street and other similarly motivated movements, that numbers of concerned people in Western society may be coming out of their hubristic slumber and awakening to the realities of the human condition. They may be challenging the linearly-constrained models that are still in play across our society and that have given rise to astonishing affluence and opportunity on the one hand and ingrained poverty, hunger, injustice and inequity on the other. They may be standing up and shouting “enough is enough” and that we must craft new intentions regarding our relationship to each other and to planet Earth if we are to survive the extinction of our species. But all of this in no way adds up to a universal tipping point.

I grew up in the United Kingdom immediately following World War II. Through my public school education I was inducted into a Western empirical culture that strongly believed in its own superiority and invincibility. As I became more accomplished and comfortable in that social milieu it did not dawn upon me that I was illiterate when it came to alternative cultures. Only later did I begin to comprehend that I existed in a bubble of blissful ignorance.

Vast numbers of people are in a similar state today. In an age of unprecedented travel they do not journey far from home. Their views are parochial. They watch the kind of infotainment on television designed to keep them docile, content and compliant. Inducted into a way of life they do not challenge they have little conception of what poverty or hunger (for example) actually means. Nor do they really appreciate the freedom, democracy or liberty they supposedly have in abundance.

As an Australian living in Asia while working across the Global South I am constantly dismayed and frustrated by the continuing conceit I perceive in the US-Eurocentric view of how things are and how they should be. Occidental traditions are relatively young in comparison with the great Amerindian, Indigenous, Oceanic, Indic and Sinic cultural mindsets. The sooner we are able to embrace these alternative traditions and benefit from their wisdom the sooner we may reach a genuine tipping point for the authentic advancement of humanity. That will be the moment we are able to shift from involuntary to intentional evolution. I hazard a guess that a shift of this nature, entailing a new inflection of the human experience, will not be triggered from those trapped in Western mindsets. In fact you can bet on it!

Disrupting How it Was

Unusually I have settled down to watch the evening news on television. I am astonished (and yet not) by the way the Gaddafi regime has simply crumpled under the force of people power. It sets my imagination racing as to what might be next in this unpredictable and rapid escalation of social unrest.

I am also fascinated by some of the more conservative reactions we are witnessing to what are essentially peaceful civic protests. Evidently some powerful interests, including once-venerated institutions and current power brokers, feel sufficiently threatened to suppress outbreaks of pure democracy such as these, particularly when they occur outside the established norms. We will return to this idea shortly.

In a recent speech Ban Ki-Moon, Secretary-General of the United Nations (UN), advanced what he called five global imperatives for the future of humanity. In brief they were:

1. Sustainable development (including lifting people out of poverty and advancing economic growth)
2. Prevention of conflict as a framework for international cooperation
3. Building a safer and more secure world by standing up for democracy, human rights and peace
4. Supporting countries in transition
5. Working with and for women and young people.

He also intimated, probably justifiably from his perspective given the hubris and empirical habits of some Western nations, that this was an opportunity for all countries to set aside their differences and narrow, short-term interests, in order to cooperate in addressing humanity’s long-term needs.

Anyone who knows the man would immediately appreciate the sincerity behind Ban Ki-Moon’s proposed forging of a common agenda aimed at ensuring peace, prosperity, freedom and justice. On the surface these five imperatives appear to be a consistent, well-intentioned vision, possessing all the gravitas one expects from a person in his position.

However behind the integrity of one individual there skulks a lumbering behemoth, an international agency in utter disarray and diminishing relevance. Looking closely at the language used in Ban Ki-Moon's statement I am inclined to challenge whether such imperatives are a genuine plea for a coherent societal metamorphosis - or just another of those ill-fated public-relations exercises that appear and evaporate so frequently from within our various political and diplomatic theatres.

Personally I doubt such grandiose aims can achieve anything much, at least within the framework of global officialdom; certainly no more nor less than has already been tried with other initiatives like the Millennium Goals, for example. But on what basis can I possibly make such a claim?

I am puzzled and constantly irked by five recursive issues:

1. Is sustainable development really possible if it includes both conventional approaches to economic growth as well as saving the natural environment? If not should we be designing new systems with new intentions, new priorities and a new language?
2. Is democracy as it is currently conceived and practised the only philosophy capable of building a safer and more secure world? Or are we at risk of using democracy as a virtuous substitute for something far more viable?
3. If these imperatives genuinely offer the opportunity to shape the world of tomorrow by the decisions we take today, what is it about the decisions we are currently taking that have failed to create the world we most desire?
4. If one necessity really is to liberate women and young people why is that demographic not already sufficiently represented in the forums convened for making the decisions that will create the future?
5. Are those individuals and institutions currently in positions of influence the right people and institutions to instigate and lead change? In that context is the UN the most appropriate agency to be tackling societal transformation? If not what alternatives should we be crafting?

Naturally all of these questions demand comprehensive consideration and plausible answers. There are undoubtedly numerous, equally valid, strategic questions one could pose. But for me the crux of the issue is to be found in my fifth and final question. Those responsible for making today’s decisions are the same people in the same institutions who designed the world-system to function as it does. They populate NATO, the UN and the G20. Imagining these same individuals and institutions can design a system capable of achieving such different outcomes is tantamount to believing in the tooth fairy.

But let us review the situation, keeping in mind reality and truth have become mutant hybrids in this continuously morphing world. In order to contemplate the contextual implications of my question, we must set modern society, in all its various dimensions, against the broader sweep of our civilisation’s past 2,000 years. That is not an easy thing to do. Individual and collective realities are determined and shaped by our “window” (weltenschaung) on a world that is so dynamically complex it is almost impossible to hit the “pause” button on any aspect of it long enough for it to become clearer to oneself, let alone others. To make matters even more complicated every discrete “window on the world” comprises implicit yet unique sets of filters driven by instinct, volition and transitory emotions.

For example, if you are the kind of person that trusts the boundaries drawn unerringly on maps, if you believe political ideologies endure in abstract purity, if you imagine that national agencies still shape international diplomacy and that elected representatives control a nation’s destiny, then you may find this question offensive or simply crazy. What “was” factual in the past, you might argue, remains intact today.

If however, you believe like me, that no two nations are alike (some prosperous and in decline, others impoverished yet making astonishing advances; some vulnerable to the forces of change, others inexplicably resilient; a few (such as the US) posing as empires alongside empires (China) posing as nations; city states such as the Vatican and Singapore; countries in name only like England, Scotland and Puerto Rico; and even a territory such as Palestine that has no universally-agreed state mandate as yet) and that, as a consequence, it is all but impossible to propose an all-encompassing definition of the nation state, then you could be forgiven for perceiving current globalised conditions as being closer to those that existed during the Middle Ages. Albeit on acid or cocaine! In that context my question would be entirely relevant.

But let us play with this notion and bring these two contrasting weltenschaung together. Viewed through a polyocular lens contemporary society is incredibly messy, yet also astonishingly abundant and diverse. Power functions asymmetrically in different ways via multipolar interactions that constantly wax and wane. A few transnational corporations are wealtheir than many nations, their entangled relationships an unseen manifestation of contemporary power. Even pluralistic social networks and online activists can wield considerably more political influence than national governments these days, which find themselves trapped in unending antiphonic modes of reaction and readjustment. Unlikely conjunctions of public and private interests generate novel yet potent forms of innovation. Entrepreneurial billionaires influence the agendas of social enterprise and fund others directly… This topsy-turvy world exists like a thinly-disguised membrane over the more Matrix-like world of competitive global trade and international policy making with which we are more familiar. But that is not to imply that it does not exist.

In this extraordinary multifaceted global milieu conventional borders and standard taxonomies have become almost meaningless in some contexts - yet remain immutable frameworks in others. Multinational organisations and universal governance structures such as exist within the UN can appear neutered in such chaos. What have been proven to work in situations of dynamic complexity are: (i) coherent whole-of-system designs with intimate alignment between the various components within the system (ii) greater levels of connectivity and collaboration at a local level (ii) more fluid, temporary and adaptive policies and activities, (iii) much less formality so as to increase the speed of learning and change. And these factors, of course, are precisely why I question whether the UN (or any equivalent agency) is responsive and adaptive enough to elicit rapid universal cooperation at scale.

Having described the incredibly convoluted nature of the context in which we find ourselves (that is the contemporary human condition) we can now bring greater degrees of granularity to my question as it concerns the nation state.

Actually an agreed definition of the term nation state remains elusive. Let us suppose the state is the government and its institutions, while the nation is the summation of the relationships we have with others who live in close cultural, ethnic, linguistic or geographical proximity to us and with whom we choose to identify. The nation state is the marriage of these two (partly discrete yet intimately braided) ideas.

Now let us consider how, over the course of the past 65 years at least, national devices for homogeneity (via partisan ceremonies and rites) versus statist mechanisms for coordination (via civic and political engagement) plus control (via protectionist legislation and administration) have often subverted the potential for these two ideas to harmonise in ways that would enable continuing relevance for the nation state as a mechanism of viable governance.

Over the past two decades there has been an explosion of social activism aimed at overturning one or more aspects of the status quo. We have witnessed extremes of nationalistic fervour (US patriotism after 9/11) and brutal oppression (Libya under the Gaddafi regime). We have watched the Burmese generals edge towards openness as their activities came under critical scrutiny, while other militaristic regimes have entrenched their hold on power still further in a myopic yet ultimately futile resistance. Online protest websites such as GetUp! have become commonplace. Meanwhile a growing tide of civic upheaval in mainland China is balanced by the emergence of extreme right-wing fundamentalism in the US.

Where there is oppression of any kind people will eventually rebel. The unprecedented social and financial interconnectedness of our times (facilitated in large part by new digital media) allows humanity as a whole to express outrage at the many blatant inequities and injustices perpetuated within our current economic and political systems. At its source, the universal cry for renewal as expressed through movements like Occupy Wall Street or contrarian online information sources such as Alternet (for example) can be compared to the widespread civic disruption spreading like a bush fire across the Arab world. There are at least four pertinent system-wide characteristics to note:

1. Civic disruption, wherever it has occurred, has generally been greeted by jubilation from a surprisingly broad range of citizens - irrespective of education, conventional allegiances or supposed embedded differences (such as ethnicity, religion and gender)
2. Traditional rules of organisation, intervention, diplomacy and negotiation (including making concrete demands and statements of objectives for example) are being avoided, wisely I believe as instruments such as these would merely accord further legitimacy to the ruling elites
3. In each case, sooner or later, the predictable response of the state has been to repress further civil disobedience by deploying police or military force to "end" the protest
4. Civic unrest (the overt strategy of a universal movement resisting categorization or a fixed identity but demanding whole-system change) is escalating. It is not going away!

In these acts of subversion or solidarity (depending upon one's point of view) the supposed raison d’etre of the nation state is being shaken to the core.

The UN currently comprises 193 member states. The invention of the modern sovereign nation in or around the 19^th century was designed (and further refined within the framework of globalisation) as a mechanism for protecting discrete interests and furthering explicit agendas - most often those of the elite within each nation. Because of this history it should come as no surprise that the inclination of the nation state apparatus is to compete with other nations (in ideas, politics, trade, commerce, crime, religion etc.) rather than to cooperate. We have seen precisely this predisposition play out during COP15 meeting in Denmark where the overwhelming scale of the task to overcome nation state and sectoral interests dashed any hope that we could craft a simple, universally-binding, consensus to lower carbon-dioxide emissions and thus combat climate change. The schemes some governments are pushing are still grounded in obsolete notions of scarcity, competition and economic growth.

While one could argue that this competitive inclination of the state served society well enough during the industrial age, contributing enormously to productive efficiencies and the creation of individual wealth, it is hardly an energising idea for our times. Recent events and new technologies have exposed its inability to adjust to contemporary realities fast enough. It has grown corrupt, stale and lethargic.

In the immediate aftermath of World War II the state’s interests started to align more with the motives of wealthy industrialists and corporations than with the needs of ordinary citizens. The promise of protecting and nurturing civic life and human rights (through the provision of education, employment, health and security) started to unravel and, as that occurred, the gap between the rich and the poor widened exponentially. Now the state found itself liable for a range of escalating inequities that became even more glaringly obvious with the advent of new information and communications technologies. Today, for example, it is commonplace for CEOs of major corporations to earn salaries many times that of their employees. Investment bankers who do not directly contribute to the productive economy take home millions of dollars each year in bonuses. Yet (until recently at least) we have quiescently accepted that non-sensical, obscene reality as a necessary evil. It is not!

Against the broader background of societal change, old institutions, their stewards and recipients, will whither and die - much more rapidly if they cannot shift course to reinvent inbred assumptions and transcend past habits. While the UN has had some limited success with cooperative ventures in certain diplomatic theatres, (peacekeeping for example) the degree of collaboration required to create a worldwide common agenda of the form Ban Ki-Moon envisages is simply unprecedented. The assumptions and habits of this massive organisation are gravitational in their inability to adapt quickly. Different or more aspirational goals are probably out of reach for the organisation at this juncture.

But while I harbour serious misgivings that the UN is an appropriate forum for whole-system change, the fact is no other formally-instituted forum currently exists that has sufficient credibility (and thence buy-in) from the world’s citizens. That is also the reason we are going to see an increasing number and intensity of insurgencies and demonstrations around the world. In that regard all eyes must now be on Syria, Yemen, Bahrain... In the future it might well be the US or China - for nothing and nobody is immune when revolutions take hold.

The exciting prospect such revolutions open up is for the emergence of new kinds of imagined communities that are at once more strategically appropriate and systemically viable for the issues humanity is needing to confront. The greatest danger is that we will avoid our destiny, repeating history and failing to learn from vital lessons regarding human nature under stress.

The UN was originally conceived and established to help sovereign states deal with distinct problems for which it had conspicuous (indeed obvious) solutions. It now finds itself increasingly out-of-touch in a world-system experiencing cascading organisational collapse. Indeed even the notion of a coherent international community seems more and more antiquated in a multi-polar universe where a variety of influential hubs, private corporations, fluid networks and gated communities coexist in a hyper-complex ecosystem. The world map of circumscribed geographies no longer accurately represents this fragmented reality. In this environment the very concept of the nation state is under threat – unless it can revitalise its penchant for competition in a manner that targets global issues (especially those identified by Ban Ki-Moon) rather than traditional national rivalries.

Meanwhile, weighed down by bureaucratic inertia, home to technocratic hordes more intent on setting targets and establishing new agencies than resolving complex issues or transforming society's relationship with itself, the UN exists because it does - not because it actually does anything transformational. Faced with wickedly complex issues in an increasingly borderless world (and largely incapable of perceiving the links in this world-system) the latest tendency has been to proclaim every issue - including food, energy, climate, population, health, terrorism and poverty - a matter of international security. This is a great ploy for fund-raising but not very useful for resolving complex, multidisciplinary dilemmas.

At a time when the UN is struggling to find its role in this messy, fracturing world, where no two states are the same and more diverse modes of governance (and indeed democracy) are emerging across all levels of society, Ban Ki-Moon’s task is not an enviable one. Of course it is always easy to find fault with a list such as his. However I suspect not much thought has been given to the implicit assumptions behind these imperatives nor, indeed, what it will take that is contrary to what is already being done – by the UN and similar bodies.

The greatest danger always is that the usual suspects will continue to do what they have always done, perhaps with more enthusiasm or resources than before, expecting that the results will be different. Or, if I was more cynical, that they will appear to be trying to change things when their actual motivation is to maintain the status quo. This concern applies equally to aurocrats and dicatators as it does to democratically-elected representatives. Indeed the leaders of the so-called "free" world are as culpable as those anywhere. That is the more disturbing concern.

Old King Coal: A letter to my grandchildren

Dear Eglantine, Addie, Bodhi, Rafael, Roman and little Mia (who is still preparing for her entrance into the world)...

I am sitting at home in my study in inner Bangkok looking out over Sukhumvit. Most of the central plains of Thailand are inundated with flood waters. It is raining heavily and the run-off from the north is fast encroaching on the city’s canals. The death toll currently stands at 289 and the economic cost is already running into billions of baht. At this stage 187 districts in 26 provinces are still under water, causing untold misery to more than 2.2 million people. Many citizens have been hording goods and supermarket shelves are now emptied of bottled water, rice, meat, fish and other staples. Watching the unfolding drama over the past few days it is so evident that officials are powerless to do much against the forces of nature. Parts of this city are sinking at a rate of 3 centimetres annually. It is no longer difficult to imagine a time when Bangkok becomes the Venice of the East once again!

Meanwhile my thoughts are with you, my grandchildren. In our sun-burnt country the government has been congratulating itself on passing legislation that puts a price on carbon. The bill is intended to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. This is crucial if we are to combat global warming. It has been a struggle to get this far. But don’t be fooled. The legislation is all but meaningless - full of exceptions and loopholes that encourage the maintenance of the status quo in those very industries that should be at the forefront of the transition to a carbon-constrained economy. The new law cannot possibly wean us off our irrational dependence on oil, gas and coal. It does not promote investment in the adoption of cleaner energy. In fact it does quite the opposite.

Like Thailand, Australia is in the front-line of global warming. Yet most politicians, their staffers and economic advisers do not really comprehend what is happening to the climate system on our planet. Indeed there are still those in parliaments around the world who remain convinced that climate change is a left-wing conspiracy or possibly a hoax perpetrated by the scientific community. Special interest groups and corporate money have hijacked the agenda, finding one excuse after another to keep polluting Earth while profiting from their activities.

Which is why I want to say sorry. I am sorry because my generation has failed you miserably. We have not been courageous enough to acknowledge our failure nor humble enough to take urgent corrective action. I am deeply ashamed to admit this to you and I realise I cannot expect your forgiveness. At the same time I want you to know that I did my personal best to draw attention to the reckless stupidity of my generation’s imprudent and arrogant intransigence.

Occasionally I have glimpsed hope. In far away places like China, Brazil, Africa and South East Asia my words have had significant impact. Prominent community and business leaders, government officials and parliamentarians have been gracious enough to listen, to reflect and to act on the basis that, even without complete knowledge, it is wise to take precautions when it comes to a complex issue like climate change.

In our country of Australia these same words have fallen on deaf ears – mainly it seems (ironically) from those who have been charged with the responsibility to lead. I have been branded an outlier. An alarmist. Even a heretic. Such labels are not personal, you must understand. People are simply afraid. When all is said and done there is nothing more terrifying for a leader than the imperative to act without any certainty about what to do. My powers of persuasion have been inadequate to overcome addiction to a system in which considerably more value is put on immediate economic benefit than on your future health and well-being. No other case can be put to those who value money more than human life. They remain oblivious to their ignorance and selfishness and we should not expect that to change. This means you must take matters into your own hands. You cannot wait for governments to act or for business to change.

So the legacy I pass on to you, my beloved grandchildren, is far from the abundant, promising one I inherited. It has been poisoned by rampant materialism, in-built obsolesence, and a culture of declining frugality. To make matters worse our thirst for material goods is aided and abetted by a vast public relations machine inciting us to buy more and more stuff we do not really need.

In 1945, the year of my birth, there were barely 2 billion people inhabiting our planet. The future for humanity was one of hope and optimism. Later this month, somewhere on the planet, a child will be born. He or she will become the 7th billion citizen of planet Earth. Yes the six billionth child is only 11 years old. By the time you leave university there will be 8 billion of us, all struggling to achieve a better quality of life, a dream that has become all but impossible to achieve - even in the world's most developed countries. The huge demographic shift in the human population since the end of World War II has had a devastating impact on the environment. A tidal wave of humanity is migrating into the cities. Crushing poverty is everywhere. We are locked-in to human-induced atmospheric pollution (from carbon dioxide, methane and aerosols) that will trigger more frequent and extreme weather events. Nutritious food, potable water and energy are becoming more scarce. Sovereign indebtedness and social inequalities put entire nations at risk. And if all of that wasn’t terrifying enough we are beginning to witness the collapse of life-critical ecosystems necessary to provide for our future well-being.

Yet amongst all this chaos the most affluent of us tenaciously aspire to even greater wealth and greater power. If this situation persists the demand on Earth’s finite resources will be excessive, conflict will increase and climate refugees will be counted in the millions!

I hope you will appreciate that, like many others, I did not realise how much damage I was doing. But now, having lived what many of my friends in Soweto, Belo Horizonte, Chennai and even Shanghai would term a profligate lifestyle, squandering so many of the vital resources you will need to ensure a healthy, stable and secure existence without so much as a second thought, I see that my extravagant ways have made things very problematic for you. It is not just me you understand. All of us with knowledge are culpable. Politicians and their advisers, industry leaders, courts, the media...

Politicians are paid to protect us but also to safeguard your future well-being. Instead, they repeatedly lie to us, cheating you of a secure future by advocating phoney carbon offset schemes, spinning fairy tales about “clean coal”, setting ineffective targets and legislating in ways that allow the dirtiest, most toxic, industries to continue polluting the atmosphere. Why? Because far too many people are profiting financially from our addiction to fossil fuels.

With leadership in abeyance, any pretence of a moral imperative quickly fades. In a situation where there is such a dearth of honest leadership from those in power there is no question that many corporations will feel free to continue plundering and scarring the environment, driving species to the point of extinction, ignoring grievances from local communities and writing off the destruction of nature as inconsequential to their mission. Driven purely by profits I have no doubt their intention is to extract every last drop of oil and gas from tar sands, shale and tundra. Unless, that is, the community rises up as one and demands that they stop committing ecocide.

The media is even more guilty of intergenerational crime. Instead of advocating the truth they routinely wheel out a few of the usual cranks and crackpots to cast doubt on the integrity and validity of scientific knowledge. As a consequence our most eminent scientists have become wary of giving policy advice to governments for fear of being labelled impractical idealists, dishonest or incompetent.

And even as the science community struggles to find better ways of communicating the urgency to those who have their heads stuck in the sand, we are racing towards an impending catastrophe that is not of your making and can still be avoided. This is my generation’s bitter legacy to you. You are now left with the problems we have knowingly created.

The real tragedy is we already know what must be done. Furthermore we have the technology to turn things around. The coal, oil and gas industries argue their continuing relevance based upon cost and availability. As far as the latter is concerned they are correct. There are vast amounts of coal still in the ground. But if we factor in the incalculable damage done by coal to people and their health, in addition to the various subsidies and licences granted the coal industry, it is patently clear that half-truths, subterfuge, vested interests and apathy on our part are the only things keeping “Old King Coal” a merry old soul.

Preventing runaway climate change and thus avoiding ecosystem collapse is avoidable if you act quickly. But you will need political will and huge amounts of investment capital. You must also be prepared to fight for your future. Peaceful civil resistance may yet be needed to overcome organised opposition from the fossil fuel lobby.

Here is what you must do. Stop mining coal as quickly as possible. Recent estimates point to around 170,000 deaths annually world-wide from coal burning-based electricity generation. It is by far the most dangerous fossil fuel in use. Phasing-out coal emissions and moving to solar, wind, thermal as well as 4^th generation nuclear energy (together with greater energy efficiency) is the safest and least costly route to a sustainable planet. But you cannot stop there. You must also outlaw hydrofracking, strip mining, mountaintop removal and similar ecologically-devastating practices. Find ways to limit or extend the use of conventional oil and gas. Restore the world’s forests and oceans. Impose strict mining constraints on unconventional fossil fuels such as methane hydrates and tar sands. Finally, but most importantly, reject the loophole-ridden “cap and trade” game in favour of a comprehensive “fee and dividend” system. No exceptions and no trade-offs. Only by these means can each citizen choose how to change their living habits so as to become more sustainable.

Alas there are many people with special interests who will try to stop you, stall progress and create other distractions. Possibly they do not have grandchildren. Or perhaps they are so selfish that any integrity they once had was sacrificed on the altar of money long ago. Be prepared for a huge outcry from the fossil fuel lobby. But do not be deceived by their crocodile tears. Eradicating fossil fuels as rapidly as possible will create more jobs, generate a far healthier economy, restore a safe climate and evolve a sustainable planet for you and for your children.

Massive change of this kind is your last chance. I am sorry it has come to this.

With love to you all

Grandpa.

Synchronicity, Myth, and the New World Order

Looking out upon the horrid ruin we seem to have made of the planet, in spite of the kind hearts and good intentions of the vast majority of human beings, it is hard to avoid the conclusion that some nefarious force has hijacked civilization, driving it towards ends that serve almost no one.

If we are headed for a future that no one would consciously choose, it stands to reason, some say, that we are not choosing; that something else, unfriendly to human welfare, is choosing for us.

Deeper study of certain pivotal events in history strengthens this conclusion. The official explanations of the Kennedy assassination or 9/11 are riddled with contradictions that are difficult to explain. Ominous coincidences pile up and make patterns, pointing toward a conscious agency orchestrating these events toward sinister goals. Diving deeper, one discovers patterns of patterns that ultimately coalesce into an alternate history of the world.

The alternate history explains world events as resulting from the machinations of a powerful, dark cabal of secret organizations comprising the global elite: the banks, wealthy families like the Rockefellers and Rothschilds, non-official organizations like the Bilderburg Council, organized crime, shadowy agencies within the government, secret societies like Skull and Bones and the Freemasons, and so on. Behind them all is a group even more secret, comprising the true rulers of earth, who count even prime ministers and presidents among their puppets. Some theorist say that these Illuminati who hold the reins of power are human beings; others say that they have extraterrestrial allies, or that this group is controlled by, or consists of, ETs. Their goal, it is said, is to impose a New World Order (NWO) in which their dominion is complete.

In addition, the dark cabal that rules the earth is purported to have powerful secret technologies at its disposal. Weather control, mind control, energy weapons, artificially created diseases like Lyme and Swine Flu, and other near-magical technologies enable them to destroy any opposition and control us in ways we barely suspect. Always they are seeking to impose new forms of tyranny, to extend their dominion over mind and matter.

The purpose of this essay is not to debunk conspiracy theories or uphold the dominant historical narrative. Rather, I will advance a third explanation that respects and transcends both. Most critiques of conspiracy theories dispute the author's evidence, logic, and sources, and impugn his sanity, intelligence, or integrity. I will not do that. While such critiques often have merit, they tend to go after the low-hanging fruit: the sloppiest authors, the weakest points of their theses, the most easily explained of their evidence. Giving the best of the genre a fair reading, however, the impartial reader realizes that something strange is going on.

Moreover, the NWO conspiracy theory, whatever its flaws, bears some important truths. For one thing, it speaks to our sense that there is something deeply wrong in the world, something that is right in front of our faces yet that we are too blind to see. The NWO hypothesis feels validating and liberating. In the end, though, many people find it to be disempowering; as I shall describe, it subtly feeds into the mentality behind the very same conditions that it aspires to change. It robs us of our power and helps maintain the status quo. How does this happen, and how can its liberating potential be realized? To answer this question, let us begin with a meta-level critique of the NWO thesis, and conspiracism in general, a critique that opens the door toward integrating both the NWO and the dominant narrative into a larger framework.
 
The Futility of Control

Are there really ultra-intelligent, ultra-competent people on top whose plans actually work and whose technologies actually succeed in molding the world to their plans? Or are the elites of our civilization as confused and scared as the rest of us, responding to events that, at every turn, take on a life of their own? The futility of control is written into the fabric of reality. Complex non-linear systems such as a body or a society are inherently unpredictable. Of course, those in power try to maintain control and often wreak awful damage in so doing, but generally speaking it is events that control them, and not the other way around.

Conspiracy theories ascribe a degree of competence, foresight, and efficiency to the controlling organizations that is generally foreign to human institutions. We live in a civilization built on control, on the idea that we can order the world through material and social technology and, once we perfect those technologies, win the war against nature, against disorder, against uncertainty. But in fact, the world is messy, chaotic, and unpredictable, and no matter how tightly we attempt to orchestrate events, control slips through our grasp like mud through a clenched fist. We are immersed in an ideology that says that with the next technological revolution, with next medical innovation, or the next set of comprehensive regulations, finally we will get all the messy variables under control and live in an orderly, secure world.

The conspiracists agree with a defining precept of our civilization: that the world is fundamentally amenable to control. They think that this power to control has been turned toward evil, but do not dispute the technocratic doctrine that society and the material world can be endlessly improved through the methods of science: gathering information, making plans, eliminating variables, applying force, and so on. To believe that the NWO conspiracy is even possible is to conform to one of the primary motivating and justifying beliefs underlying totalitarianism. The NWO believers are not as radical as they think.

We have been betrayed. After centuries of sacrifice on the altar of technological development, we harbor a deep disappointment and anger. We export that anger onto the Illuminati, or whoever it is that has robbed us of The Future. Surely this technological utopia exists - it has only been withheld from us, and the technologies of paradise turned toward nefarious ends. But the real problem is deeper than that. It is the paradigm of control itself that causes us to sacrifice everything in pursuit of a mirage.
 
The Dynamics of Command

A staple of conspiracy theories is the idea that "President Obama is a puppet" or that, "Even David Rockefeller is taking orders from higher up." So let us look into the social dynamics of hierarchies. For someone to obey orders, either the command-giver must have direct physical power over the subordinate (for example, a literal gun to the head), or both commander and commandee must be embedded in a social institution that legitimizes and enforces the command. An obvious example of the latter is the army. When a colonel gives an order to a major, the latter obeys not because he is afraid the colonel will beat him up if he refuses, but because both are part of a web of (mostly implicit) agreements. Ultimately, if he doesn't comply with the order, someone (say military police) might beat him up or imprison him, but that happens as well because the web of agreements includes consequences for violating them. We could say that colonel, major, military police, and the rest all share a common "story of the army".

What about the global conspiracy? What social institution exists that would legitimize orders issued to David Rockefeller or Barack Obama? The story of the army is embedded in larger legitimizing stories that ultimately encompass the legitimacy of the government, the value of money, an interpretation of history, a system a values and morals, and more. What infrastructure exists that would allow direct hierarchical control over Obama or Rockefeller? Hierarchies cannot exist in a social vacuum. They require a system of indoctrination and acculturation along with numerous supporting institutions.

Consider, for example, the idea that the World Trade Center towers fell due to demolition charges placed inside the buildings by government operatives. For them to be willing to do this, they would have to exist nearly in a separate social universe, inculcated with values very different from those of the rest of society. Contrary to the impression given by Hollywood movies, people don't commit acts like this out of pure unreasoning evil. They do so in conformity to a culturally-embedded world-view. I could see how Islamic Jihadists, inflamed by radical imams and outraged by the devastation that American imperialism has wreaked on their society, could hatch a plot to strike a blow at the "Great Satan". But what would it take for American demolitions experts to commit mass murder against their own compatriots? What would it take for you, dear reader, to do it? What kind of alternate education, acculturation, indoctrination would you have to go through to commit and then keep secret such an act?  Who would administer this education? How would the operation, and the whole educational and support infrastructure around it, be kept secret from the rest of society? Are the low-paid works in building security, or the majority of decent folks at the CIA or NSA in on it too? Basically, for a conspiracy of this scale to exist, there would have to be an entire parallel society hidden within our own, complete with a full set of parallel institutions to create people with a very different culture among us.

Reread that last sentence through a metaphoric lens for a hint of where this essay is headed.
 
Psychological addiction

I have noticed that conspiracy theories have a very strong emotional appeal -- at least to some people. Believers like to think that they are impartially choosing their belief because they are more rational, more intelligent, or more open-minded than all those benighted, deluded "sheeple" out there. Two people look at the same set of facts and draw different conclusions. Is that choice a function of intelligence and reason? Or could it be that we choose interpretations to meet psychological and emotional needs?

One indication of the emotional appeal of conspiracy theories is their addictive nature. When I visited the conspiracy state of being some time ago, I found myself constantly checking certain websites, and feeling a kind of gratification at each discovery of some new outrage. Other than that, it was a very dark and heavy state of being that I visited, full of gloomy cynicism and a superficial feeling of superiority that didn't even fool myself. I've heard from people for whom this became a full-fledged addiction. They spend hours every day reading about the machinations of the New World Order, and go through intense withdrawal whenever they miss their "fix". 

Believers spend lots of time getting "informed", but do they really act upon that information? Some do, I suppose: they move to an armed compound in Idaho or hide gold coins in their basement. But most go on with life as usual. How are they any different from their neighbors? Their eyeballs linger over Alex Jones' website rather than NPR's, but to what end? They may believe themselves to be among the canny, righteous few, fighting against evil on behalf of the ignorant masses, but mostly they do nothing. Like any addiction, addiction to conspiracy websites or the closely related end-of-the-world websites disempowers people, and actually helps maintain the status quo.

Belief in conspiracy theories is not one of several emotionally coequal world-view alternatives. It is part and parcel of an emotional, psychological, and spiritual state of being. That state of being is a victim state. The belief that events are controlled by malevolent people far more powerful than ourselves, that any attempt at change is futile in the face of the tremendous powers arrayed against us, leaves no alternative but to carve out a small, safe realm of rebellion-in-private. If there were indeed a global conspiracy, it would be quite happy with this result. Paradoxically, then, we might say that the idea that there is a global conspiracy is itself a lie propagated by the global conspiracy.
 
Non-falsifiability

One of the most common criticisms of conspiracy theories is that they are non-falsifiable, since any contradictory evidence can be written off as a fabrication, a false trail, or so forth.  A conspiracy, moreover, must be well-hidden -- lack of evidence is itself evidence! What is less frequently acknowledged is that the alternatives to conspiracy theories are very nearly non-falsifiable as well. Anyone who comes forth to expose a conspiracy can be labeled a fraud or a madman, and nearly anything can be written off as coincidence. We are faced, as we are so often in life, with two narratives that can, with perhaps a bit of stretching, account for all of the facts. How then to choose?

Much as we would like to think otherwise, evidence and logic cannot bring certainty. Nor, as numerous social psychology experiments demonstrate, are they the primary determinants of our judgments and choices. Despite the epithets hurled back and forth, neither side of, say, the 9/11 conspiracy issue is stupid. Critics of conspiracy theories paint their proponents as naïve, unsophisticated, and guilty of obvious selection biases and a host of elementary errors in research and logic. I have found such critiques unsatisfactory. They certainly apply to the worst of the genre, but not always to the best.

Reasonable people can, depending on their vantage point and life situation, look at the same set of events and form different beliefs about them. These beliefs then become a filter that determines what they see and, indeed, what they look for. It is as if they enter separate but parallel realities. As we shall see, there is more to this appearance than meets the eye.
 
The War against Evil

Among conspiracism's psychological payoffs that it provides someone to blame, to hate, and perhaps to fight in a world of otherwise incomprehensible injustice and horror. Paradoxically, even though it casts us as victims of super-powerful conspirators, it also provides a kind of control. After all, if the source of evil in the world today is the conspirators, then the solution is quite clear: expose and remove them. If there is no conspiracy - if, for instance, evil is endemic to the world or an emergent property of organizations - then we are even more helpless. Even if as a practical matter we cannot hope to defeat the conspiracy, at least we understand why things are the way they are. We know a solution, even if it be out of reach.

That solution, to put it succinctly, is to conquer evil. Conspiracism offers an external evil and thereby exculpates us from our own complicity in the awful things happening on earth today. We can think, "If only I were in charge, I would run things very differently than the New World Order Illuminati, because I am a decent person, not evil like they are."

The paradigm that sees human affairs -- and even cosmic processes -- as a war between good and evil has deep roots, originating with the first agricultural civilizations. It was then that the concept of evil arose, mirroring the growing oppositional relationship to nature implicit in the taming of the wild. Rather than being seen as integral parts of the whole, such things as weeds, wolves, and locusts became threats to human well-being and the object of extermination campaigns - campaigns that are still with us today. The chaotic forces of nature were identified with evil, while good was associated with the bringing of order to nature and to human affairs. If only, someday, our control over nature and society could be complete, the thinking goes, then good will reign on earth and suffering be minimized or even, with nanotechnology and neuro-engineering, eliminated. Evil will have been conquered.

When new political movements come to power, they often bring with them the idea of eliminating evil. Whether it is the Nazi Holocaust or the Stalinist purges, the result is usually bloody, regardless of how evil is identified. In other words, the idea of evil begets evil. We may add, then, a second paradox to the one above. In the war between good and evil, a great weapon of the forces of evil is the notion that there is a war between good and evil.

Conspiracism gives new guise to a very old thoughtform (that the horror of our world is caused by forces of evil) that is becoming obsolete. We can see its obsolescence both in our changing attitudes toward nature, which no longer hold it as an object of conquest and exploitation, and in newly ascendant spiritual beliefs that emphasize the integration and transcendence of dualities. In social psychology as well, a new movement called situationism contends that the totality of our external and internalized circumstances, rather than some disposition toward good or evil, determines our choices.

In fields as disparate as physics, psychology, ecology, and spirituality, people are understanding that what happens "out there" is intimately connected to what happens "in here"; that self and world are interdependent and mutually co-constructed. A dark conspiracy controlling world events mirrors the same inside ourselves. When I say "ourselves" I don't mean some people and not others and certainly not us good guys. I mean you, me, and everyone.

Herein may lie an important truth encoded in conspiracy theories: not a factual truth, but a mythological truth. There does seem to be a conspiracy running inside my psyche that keeps me enslaved to fear and greed; that indeed possesses technologies of mind control; that presents the whole world through a filter of lies; that is associated somehow with the reptilian part of my brain; that manipulates me to serve an agenda inimical to my authentic happiness. Everything that the Illuminati are purported to do to the world, we do to ourselves. Could it be that when we see an evil cabal controlling the world, we are actually seeing the projection of our own egos?

And, because our collective institutions mirror the prevailing psychodynamics of our time, could it be that story of the New World Order conspiracy, despite its flaws, gives us a window onto some important truths about our society?
 
The Matrix of Synchronicity

The aforementioned shortcomings in the New World Order (NWO) hypothesis are not cause to dismiss it entirely, for the nature of the flaws points to some deep truths. The conspiracists are onto something, something that is actually even more radical - and far more hopeful - than they imagine. So let us consider a riddle: If there is no conspiracy in the normal sense, then how to explain the evidence pointing to one? Let us not throw out the baby with the bathwater. When you look into the Kennedy assassination, or the history of suppression of unconventional energy technologies, or the cancer industry and the criminalization of alternative therapies, or any number of other issues, it sure can look like a conspiracy. If there isn't one, then we must discover some third explanation that doesn't turn a blind eye to some very incongruous events.

You may not think there is any such evidence. You may think that the well-documented human capacity to make meaning and perceive patterns where none exist is sufficient to explain the conspiracists' conclusions. After having read a fair amount of the literature with an open mind, I find that explanation too quickly dismissive. Even discounting the considerable selection bias that filters the evidence presented in conspiracy books, many of the coincidences remain striking. Moreover, there is something uncanny about the facility with which certain events lend themselves to conspiracy hypotheses. It is as if they are begging for it; for example, Jack Ruby killing Lee Harvey Oswald before he could talk in court about his motive for assassinating President Kennedy. It looks like a conspiracy. It smells like a conspiracy. But is it a conspiracy?

Previously I suggested that perhaps when we see conspiracies, we are seeing a reflection of something inside ourselves, building stories and imposing patterns onto reality. But perhaps there is more to the story. What if, in addition to predisposing us to see patterns that aren't there, our emotions and beliefs actually attract experiential data that fits them? What if, for example, the psychic energy beneath conspiracism organizes events to fit into a conspiracy pattern, so that it looks like a conspiracy even if there are no actual conspirators?

Consider some of the events surrounding 9/11: numerous military exercises that very day that tied up and confused a military response; blatant contradictions in official accounts in the near aftermath of the attack; suppression of the air traffic control logs for the flights; suppression of contradictory news broadcasts and their removal from news site archives; the miraculously quick identification of the hijackers despite the fact (at least according to some websites) that their names never appeared on the passenger manifests; the subsequent anthrax attack using anthrax from a government bioweapons lab; the 9/12 "Bin Laden Airlift" that evacuated members of the family from the United States, and so on. Each of these, on their own, admits to an innocent explanation. But to say that their confluence is mere coincidence strains credibility. One is tempted to conclude that these events must have been orchestrated somehow.

But what if they are coincidence - but coincidence isn't what we think it is? Perhaps coincidence is not random, but orchestrated (not by a conscious human agency) into patterns that conform to certain belief systems and meet certain psychological needs. As illustrated earlier, people with certain emotional or psychological needs are attracted to conspiracy theories. Well, the reverse might also be true: patterns of events that look like conspiracies are attracted to needs that exist in human society. Together these form what we might call a "matrix of synchronicity" that is grist to the conspiracy mill.

This possibility opens up even deeper problems, however. For one thing, it inverts traditional scientific notions of causality, resting wholly in the realm of the Aristotelian "final cause," the teleological explanation of, "It happened in order that..." That a constellation of events could just happen, without design, yet accomplish something seemingly purposive, is profoundly disturbing to the reductionism-steeped mind. For there to be design, we think, there must be a designer. From this perspective, conspiracism is actually not very radical at all. While appearing to occupy opposing poles of opinion, conspiracy believers actually agree with their conventional counterparts on a deeper issue: that overwhelming evidence of a conspiracy means there is probably a conspiracy. They merely disagree whether such evidence exists.

My disagreement with conspiracism is of a different sort. I accept (at least more than the skeptics do) much of their evidence, and I accept that it looks like events have been orchestrated by a conspiracy. But for the reasons given, I find the New World Order myth just as unsatisfying as the conventional point of view it merely draws specious signals from random noise.

I want to emphasize just how radically mind-twisting the matrix-of-synchronicity explanation really is. I am saying: "These patterns of events are drawn to history because we need them to flesh out conspiracy theories and give expression to the psychological energies driving those theories." It is as if events organize themselves around some kind of field that makes them appear to have a causal linkage even when they do not.
 
Shadow Realities

A second and related problem that the matrix of synchronicity opens up is, if anything, even more deeply challenging to our way of thinking. For here is another thing on which sceptic and conspiracist secretly agree: that there is an objective fact-of-the-matter as to whether a conspiracy exists. One side thinks it does and the other thinks it doesn't, but both agree that either it does or it doesn't. Both, in other words, agree on the doctrine of objectivity: that there is a reality out there, a set of events that actually happened, and that while our knowledge of them may be incomplete, the events themselves happened or did not happen independent of our knowledge of them. It is only a matter, then, of finding out the truth, the facts.

That both sceptic and believer share this doctrine is unsurprising, for it lies at the very foundation of the scientific method. We try to find out the way things really are, what really happened. Such locutions reveal the unquestioned assumption of objectivity.

But what if this assumption is false? What if there is no independently existing reality "out there"; what if reality is a dialogic construct between self and other?  I will not go to deeply into the philosophic history of this idea, except to say that I am not propounding solipsism and am well familiar with the classic refutations of it. For the present purpose, suffice it to say that perhaps conspiracies occupy an intermediate ontologic state, what one might call a shadow reality. They exist in a realm less real than, say, the U.S. Congress, but more real than Batman or Santa Claus.*

The realm in which the New World Order (NWO) conspiracies exist has its own history, its own logic, its own emotional complexes, its own experiences. The more one enters that belief system, the more experience confirms it. These confirmations can be very tangible: illness from chemtrails, sightings of black unmarked helicopters, discoveries of unidentifiable implants, anonymous death threats, and so forth.

I once had a conversation with a leader in the 9-11 Truth movement, a very credible, emotionally stable, down-to-earth woman, generous, broad-minded, intelligent, and full of good humor. She related quite a few strange experiences that happened at the peak of her activism. Once, she was pulled over on the highway by a squad of seven police cars, taken into custody, and then released hours later with no charges, no explanation, and subsequently no admission that it ever happened. She also received a strange package in the mail filled with Russian documents. We would like to think, either, that these events were orchestrated by some New World Order operative as a warning, or, that she is confabulating or consciously lying. What I'm saying here, however, is that perhaps these events were attracted to her because she had entered quite deeply the reality in which such things happen.

Let's take it further: What of the secret operative? Does he exist or doesn't he? Well, perhaps he too has a shadow existence: he exists in the shadow reality of the NWO, but not in the broadest consensus reality. What if the operative is, say, an insurance agent, who sometimes blacks out or is taken over by an alternate personality and does inexplicable things like take his grandfather's Russian papers from his attic and mails them to a random address that just so happens to be my friend's? A leading conspiracy writer, David Icke, comes close to saying this when he states, "...often the most significant operatives in the Illuminati hide behind apparently 'ordinary' lives while dictating the agenda and attending human sacrifice rituals." Could it be that these operatives are hidden, by their ordinary lives, even from themselves?

What if you went to ask the police officers who pulled her over, and they claimed with all apparent sincerity to have no memory of it. But suppose one says, "That's funny, something you said sounds familiar - I think I had a dream about this." Then, under hypnotic regression, he recalls just the incident the woman describes. Is this a "real" memory? You inquire further and find that several of the officers had a "missing time" episode that day. It seems like they pulled the woman over and then forgot about it. Was there some conscious agency that compelled them to do so? Or was it just a piece of the aforementioned matrix of synchronicity?

Following such questions, we eventually might develop doubts about what it means to say that my friend "really" was pulled over by seven police cars. We might look at the police record - did such an incident happen? We find no record. Of course not - it has been expunged. But maybe we do find a record, that disappears the next time we check. Maybe we, as investigators, get sucked down the rabbit hole: the more we investigate, the more evidence we find, but it is only ever enough to confirm it to ourselves, not to others. When we try to convince others, the documents we need are unavailable, key sources mysteriously disappear or change their story... We begin to wonder about our own sanity. We seem to be living in a world in which the conspiracy exists for us, but not for most other people. Yet it is not all in our heads - real things are happening to us.

It is as if the events are happening for you, but not for me; that in one universe, the police raid really did happen, and in another universe it did not - and both these universes coexist on earth. Steeped in the doctrine of objectivity, we would like to think there is a "fact of the matter", an absolute reality in which it either did or did not happen, independent of our knowledge. But perhaps reality is not like that. Perhaps reality is relational, co-created, and never just "out there."

The shadowy nature of these down-the-rabbit-hole realities comes through in certain conspiracist writings that refer to reptilian alien races, the true puppet masters, who control the Illuminati from the fourth dimension. This reference to the "fourth dimension" encodes an implicit acknowledgment that these beings don't "exist" in the three-dimensional Cartesian matrix of our objectivity-based worldview. They occupy an intermediate state, again, somewhere between Michael Jordan and Santa Claus.

Another clue lies in the common NWO belief that a gigantic network of tunnels, secret bases, and entire cities lies beneath our own, a whole parallel world. Is their existence literally subterranean, or is it, rather, subconscious? Or neither/both? When you go looking for them, you find them; or perhaps they come looking for you if you are in the right psychological state. You find mysterious maps, ominous references, eerie stories from retired Department of Energy officials. But, if you approach the matter from a different mindset and a different state of being, you find nothing unexplainable. The maps have other interpretations, the former officials seem not credible. For you, there is nothing to find. You occupy a universe in which it doesn't exist. Paradoxically, the conspiracists and the sceptics are both right.

In most organizations I have encountered there is a conspiracy of silence that hides the organization's true goals. This secret, shadow organization is nearly coextensive with its visible constituency, meaning that we are each members of the conspiracy to enslave humanity; we are victims and perpetrators both. At one time or another, all of us have contributed to the "reptilian agenda" of maximizing power and control over others. This agenda has a personal and a collective dimension. Personally, it is the egoic, even psychpathic behavior projected onto the secret rulers of the world. Collectively, it is the propensity of organizations, even those founded with great and sincere idealism, to succumb eventually to the service of their own survival interest. Their stated mission becomes an afterthought, a justification for their secret purpose of self-preservation. Certainly on a metaphorical level, the New World Order hypothesis is true. Follow it down the rabbit hole and it becomes not only true, but also real.

The divergence of reality and truth is confusing to the objectivity-steeped mind. To further confuse matters, shadow realities can have effects on each other. It is just like a quantum experiment in which each possible state of a particle has an effect on an observable system, even though when a measurement is taken, the particle is found to occupy only one of those states. In other words, the mere possibility of it occupying a certain state has physical effects.

In a similar way, perhaps our world occupies a superposition of states, one of which is the NWO state, and we can see the interference effects of that state even without its being "real". Its reality, and that of the conventional explanation as well, is indeterminate. It is only when we begin to investigate that we collapse the wave function and enter into one or another shadow reality.
 
The Mythic Truth of the New World Order

However rational and evidence-based we like to imagine ourselves to be, ultimately our beliefs are founded on faith. Few readers of David Icke actually do the footwork that would be necessary to verify his sources, and his sources' sources, many of whom, indeed, are already dead. If the NWO conspiracists are correct, then everything we have been told is wrong. For some, this is profoundly liberating; for others it is deeply disturbing. The former are predisposed to believe; the latter to reject; this predisposition then clothes itself in facts and evidence. Thus it is that facts and evidence rarely change anyone's mind - they are symptoms and not causes of our beliefs. It is only when life-changing events alter one's predisposition that room becomes available for new beliefs.

Our beliefs, and the states of being underlying them, do evolve and sometimes shift dramatically. This happens especially when for one reason or another, one's world falls apart. Because we live in a time of mounting crisis, the world is falling apart for more and more people, and the unraveling of the old certainties will only accelerate in coming years. At such times, we occasionally face a moment of choice, in which we can decide what to believe. But, recognizing that evidence alone is insufficient to guide belief, how are we to choose?

I suggest that we choose a belief, and the corresponding psychological state accompanying it, based on how well it aligns with who we truly are and who we want to become. This doesn't mean to ignore evidence, for quite often anomalous events can show us that our personal mythology is cracking apart, and that we are ready to moult. It does mean to consider how each belief-state feels, what it implies about the world, about human beings, and about oneself. How does it affect the answer to the question, "Who am I?" What needs does it meet? How does it hurt? What emotions does it evoke?

You can take a few moments to sit with an article from a conspiracy website like Project Camelot or 9/11 Truth, and then with a debunking article from CSICOP, and notice the ways in which each feels gratifying, offensive, reassuring, or threatening. Then I invite you to do the same with the third alternative that I offer in the essay.

This third alternative preserves the mythic truths of the New World Order hypothesis, truths that lie outside its interpretive framework. Here are two of them:

1. A nefarious power, inimical to human well-being, manipulates the course of human events from behind the scenes, seeking the total control of every human being.

Rather than an evil Illuminati, could that power be money? Some say that a global elite controls humanity via the money system, but could it be that it is rather the money system that controls the global elite? I'm sure many of you have known the feeling of being enslaved to money. The wealthy are not exempt, and indeed, possessing more of it, are even more deeply enslaved to its logic. It is truly an "invisible hand," a force that "makes the world go round." Moreover, the end toward which money compels us is one of misery and ugliness: the destruction of nature and culture, community and health, and all that is beautiful on earth.

Even those we might consider most culpable for the injustices and despoliation of our world act with little awareness of what they are creating. Whether they are hedge fund managers seeking to maximize a number (profit), or political leaders seeking to further "American interests," the reality behind these symbols is obscure to them. They are victims of their own propaganda, doing harm while sincerely believing to be doing good. It is easy to believe this of people in the middle and bottom of the pyramid, the ignorant and the duped. It is harder to understand how it could apply to people at the top, yet it is equally true - if not more true - of them. They are among the most hopeless dupes of all.

Money is not the only candidate for the nefarious controlling power. Various ideologies and their corresponding being-states, in particular those I call Separation and Ascent, are even more deeply responsible. They create a culture, and a self, that seeks to maximize security, predictability, and control; to measure and quantify the world; to eliminate risk and establish liability; to extend property rights and legal codes into every corner of life, and to monitor everyone and keep track of every thing. The destination of such a program is none other than what the conspiracists fear: a totalitarian "one world government."

We might say, then, that it is not those at the top of the pyramid that control the rest; it is the pyramid itself that controls all. But this pyramid, this Tower, built of the defining myths of our civilization, is evidently crumbling before our eyes. I am not necessarily saying, "It isn't the Draconian races, it is the money system (or the myth of Separation)." Rather, these refer to one and the same thing, viewed through a different lens. In one reality, it is money, in another it is the ETs.

2. We are subject to technologies of mind control that hold us in thrall.

New World Order conspiracists posit the existence of futuristic mind control based on alien technologies, beamed from the communication infrastructure, riding upon cell phone towers, television transmissions, and so on, or transmitted via occult symbology, subliminal messages, and neuro-linguistic programming techniques. There is truth in this, but the truth is deeper than the conspiracists realize. Television stupifies us not only through its content, but through the ability of the medium itself to usurp the image-making capacity of the brain and create intellectual dependency. Advertising and, more subtly, the narratives of the mass media condition our thoughts and desires, so that we become afraid of freedom and nearly incapable of rebelling. But these technologies are rather clumsy and overt compared with the way that institutions of our culture, by their very logic, limit the range and manner of our thinking. Education, science, religion, medicine, parenting, and the legal system all condition us to think in certain ways. But the most pervasive and powerful mind control technology, so ubiquitous as to be unnoticable, is undoubtedly the language itself.

Can we overcome dualism, when our language is rife with it? Can we transcend separation, when our language assumes it in its very structure? By their very existence certain words limit us to thoughts that subtly serve the status quo. For example, when I say that reality isn't what we think it is, by using the word "is" I reinforce the very independently-existing reality that I am trying to deny. More generally, as a system of signs, language distances us from the reality it is supposed to represent, allowing us to more easily treat the world as other. Sometimes, during meditation or mystical experience, the veil of language lifts and the richness of the unmediated world is revealed, and along with it the depth of our thralldom.

Again, even as it reaches its extreme, the system of mind control is crumbling. The devaluation of language that I discuss in The Ubiquitous Matrix of Lies has engendered a pervasive cynicism, a discounting of all speech, that renders the tools of mind control increasingly ineffective. So inured are we to a world of image and hype, that we believe little of what we are told. Switching to the NWO lens, we might say that the Illuminati are panicking, desperately ramping up their mind control efforts to less and less effect.
 
A New Story

There are many other mythic truths, and variants of these, that could be added to the list. To me, they carry a resonance that transcends interpretation. Here are a few to play with: "The institutions of power are carrying us toward a secret and horrible destination." "Many among us have been programmed through trauma to serve this end." "The servants of the conspiracy look and act as normal people - you can never tell who they are." (And maybe you could be one of them and not even know it.) "All that we think is real is an illusion." "Invisible shadow institutions lie hidden within the visible ones and serve purposes different from, or even opposed to, their stated purpose." The New World Order story dresses these mythic truths in its own language, and in so doing provides a valuable service, giving people access to them.

At some point, however, the story that was once enlightening becomes confining. As I have explained, conspiracy theories eventually bring most people to a kind of despair, even paralysis. When that happens, when the NWO story has run the course of its usefulness, it helps to have a new, larger story to step into. 

The new story says that the abiding intuition that you have carried perhaps your whole life, and which drew you to conspiracism in the first place, is true. The world is governed by a secret power that holds us in bondage to no good end. But the conspirators are not others, they are we, you and I and everyone. A secret agenda of domination and control has existed in nearly everyone, and a world embodying that agenda has congealed around us, attracted to the dark, reptilian energies we have harbored. The good news is that these energies have nearly run their course, as the world of control breaks down and the campaign to conquer and dominate all other being founders on its own consequences. Just as Voldemort was unable to possess Harry Potter because he couldn't abide the love within him, so also is the ruling power of the world unable to abide our growing realization of our connectedness. Love, the felt experience of oneness, is spreading as the walls of separation come down. They never were sustainable. Today, even the most deluded - the power elite - are beginning to recognize that. The reign of the Illuminati is nearly over. That is seems to be reaching unprecedented heights only bespeaks the imminence of its demise, the extreme of yang giving birth to yin.

The war of good versus evil was never anything but a lie. The concept of evil is perhaps the greatest servant of evil. "Is there such a thing as evil?" I was once asked. "Before you asked, the answer was no. After you asked, the answer is yes." But ultimately, evil and its expression as the New World Order, or as I would call it, the process of Separation, has like all other things its purpose in this universe. We embark on a journey of separation in all its forms, we reach its extreme, and we come back to Union at a higher level of complexity, enriched by our journey. To adopt one last time the vocabulary of the New World Order myth, we might say that the reptilian overlords or the Illuminati have fulfilled their purpose. Though some might try to hold onto it a little longer, sooner or later they will accept that their time is over, and they will bow out of service.

The greater truth, though, which contains but does not contradict the lesser, is that the Illuminati, the Reptilians, are you and I. On this level too, what I have said is true. Can you not feel the obsolescence of that part of you, the part that endlessly seeks to control the world, to dominate others, to maximize egoic self-interest? Is it not increasingly evident that its efforts have created only misery? Is it not apparent that, no matter how hard you try to remedy its failure by intensifying its efforts, its ultimate failure is assured? For all of us, the time is coming for that part of ourselves to bow out, so that we can step into service, into trust, and, collectively, into the more beautiful world our hearts know is possible.

* Note to Santa and the Caped Crusader: please don't take offense. I'm only invoking your names for rhetorical effect, not because I actually doubt your existence.

This essay was written by Charles Eisenstein, author of Sacred Economics: Money, Gift and Society in the Age of Transition, and is re-printed here with the author's permission.

Stepping Into Abundance - A letter to my children

On June 12^th 2011 at precisely 3.19pm in the afternoon at Bangkok’s Samitivej Hospital my tenth child (and your new brother) struggled into the world. After a gap of seventeen years I find myself a father once again.

This morning Nico clearly recognised Suna’s face for the first time and beamed directly at her. It was a moment to treasure - at once exhilarating and sobering. For it reminds me of the importance of purity, compassion and hope in a world littered with shards of despair.

Given the combination of modern health care, a nutritious diet and the elimination of many chronic diseases (and barring any unforseen accidents) this latest addition to our family can expect to live at least to the ripe old age of 100 years. This means he could well see in the year 2110, alongside his burgeoning stock of young uncles and aunts!

Yet this baby’s coming was not always so sure. He is a miracle child, not least for the fact that I am getting on in years and that his mother first fought cervical cancer and then endured an ectopic pregnancy before Nico finally made his presence known to us. Nevertheless he is a blessing - as each of you were in your own way and each of your own children continue to be.

Like any father I am immensely proud of you all. Yet I have also been saddened by the qualities I have observed in our family from time to time, traits that struck me as entirely self-serving yet somehow symbolic of the way the world crashes in on us rather than how it could ideally be.

I am not in the habit of lecturing you – nor of writing epistles of this kind. My preference has always been to give you the freedom for self-discovery while trying to shield you from the many traps and excesses that would otherwise besiege you. I tried. Mostly I failed. But that’s another story. I have been in the process of writing my autobiography for some years now. Because I was absent for much of the time you were growing up I want to tell you about issues and events that have been warped out of perspective - more by circumstances than by intent. But that, too, is another story.

People around the world constantly seek my advice about the things that matter to them. Occasionally huge deals and vital relationships hang on the reliability of my counsel. And if that counsel is so useful to governments, corporations and entrepreneurs perhaps it is equally useful to you. Perhaps there are a few scraps of wisdom I can pass on before I become too befuddled by age and senility sets in.

Next month I will be 66 years old. I still awake every morning with a sense of curiosity and joy for what the day has in store. But when entering the final stages of an abundant life it is also fitting to look back at the paths one has taken, reflecting on a journey shared with friends and those you have loved. My journey has been so rich, in large part due to each one of you. At the moment of my death, whenever that is, I will have few if any regrets. That is not to say my time on Earth could not have been easier. I have borne my fair share of hardships. There are always ups and downs to deal with but a sense of utter despondency has rocked me on only three occasions.

The first dealt me a blow from which, if I am really honest, I never fully recovered. The father I worshipped, the first to pick me up whenever I fell, the one person in the whole world who could do no wrong, suddenly vanished from my life. I was eight years old. There was no warning. I never saw him again. That incident shattered me. Invisible to others, the grief of that moment still resonates deeply within me.

I suppose you never really recover from such traumatic experiences. You learn to adjust to the pain. And time does heal to some extent. But what saddens me most is that I can never adequately explain to you how the shock of his sudden departure haunted every minute of every day during the time your mother and I made the agonising decision to live apart. Our relationship had eroded over several years such that there was no trust, no mutual respect left anymore. Our love, once so all-embracing, had simply run its course. There was to be no turning back.

Of course I never had any intention of leaving you. I loved you. You were my world. The legacy of my personal sorrow emanated from the growing realisation that my father had not loved me. This fact tore at my soul as I desperately tried to deal with the manner in which fate was to take hold.

Most of you are more familiar with the ensuing set of events as you were caught up in the tragic unravelling of what initially appeared to have given our family strength. After Valerie and I separated, longing for the life she had been denied by emigrating with me to Australia, your mum returned to England’s West Country at the first opportunity. I concurred with her wishes not fully realising at the time how impossible it would be for me to maintain a healthy, caring relationship with you all. For an otherwise intelligent person that degree of shortsightedness cannot be excused.

But that wasn’t the worst of it. On the rare occasion when it became possible for me to venture half way around the world to see you I was greeted with empty stares and open hostility from you, the people I loved most in the world. More times than I care to remember I made the return journey to Heathrow in floods of tears, stopping frequently lest I caused an accident from my uncontrollable sobbing and blurred vision. At least I did not leave you as my father had left me. A convenient rationalisation of course...

The third situation occurred much like the first. It struck cruelly, with no prior warning. Contrary to what you had been led to believe, I met Elizabeth a month or so after I left our family home in Orangeville and moved to Melbourne, where most of my work was located at the time. Our relationship was always very special which is why we remain good friends today. I was aware Elizabeth nursed concerns about being with a much older man, especially a driven workaholic with hypertension and dangerously high levels of cholesterol. At the time you all openly resented her which ripped into her generous and loving heart in a way you could not have known.

Seven years into our partnership Elizabeth had a brief affair while she was studying in Shanghai. At the time we tried to brush it off but decided to try and have a child as a way of resuscitating our relationship. It might have worked had not all Elizabeth’s anxieties re-emerged when she tragically miscarried our baby during a road trip in India. Just weeks later one of my closest friends died from a massive stroke. Rob was the same age as me. The foreboding was gathering and as I delivered the eulogy at Robb’s funeral my instinct warned me of some impending threat that would be beyond me to salvage. Sure enough that evening Elizabeth admitted she had fallen in love with someone she had met on one of her previous trips to China. He was her age. There was no contest. She left for Beijing two days later. I was devastated as were her family and all our friends. Unlike me they had had no inkling of the imminent change in our relationship.

I cannot recall receiving much sympathy from any of you. Even after nine years of seeing how happy I was with Elizabeth in my life some of you were probably elated by this outcome. It served me right for leaving our family. It was poetic justice after all.

Once again an act was drawing to a close and a new one beginning. The following days were a nightmare. Wallowing in self-pity I seriously considered suicide. My life seemed so futile and such a failure on so many counts. It was as though any meaning had shrunk to a pinpoint that was rapidly receding into an infinite blackness.

Fortunately one of you was there to console me. I don’t think I have previously conceded how you brought me to my senses Rosie - simply by being there. But as the veil of sadness slowly lifted and I began to focus more lucidly on my life’s true purpose I made a solemn vow: instead of sacrificing my personal happiness to meet the expectations of others, I would now do everything in my power to ensure my own happiness first. I would never again allow circumstances to dictate my path. Nor would I tolerate my personal well-being to be hijacked, for whatever purpose, in the future. I felt I had earned this.

I had made a similar vow the day before my thirteenth birthday. Back then it was a naive pledge to live an extraordinary life; not to be dragged down by the parochial banality I saw surrounding me at the time.

Little did I realise that within weeks, in a country I had never had any desire to visit, I would meet an inspirational woman and that my priorities would instantly change in ways I could never have imagined possible. There is always a sliver of light at the end of the darkest tunnel.

In any family there will be those who choose not to read moralistic correspondence from their parents. Some of you may even wince at my transparency. But my preferred way to express deeply-held thoughts and emotions is through my writing. So why do I think what I have to say is important enough to lay bare my feelings and reveal my innermost thoughts to you at this time?

There are several reasons but mostly it is because of my love for you and a desire that you feel able (compelled even) to lead happy and fulfilling lives. I also want to share with you some lessons I have learned during the course of my life in the hope that you can each extract just a little bit of wisdom that might be helpful to you when times are tough and when it seems nobody understands or cares about your suffering. There are four lessons in particular that are worthy of reflection:

1. Become more than just you

While every atom of our individual life experience is intensely magnified for us and remains the filter through which we view literally every aspect of reality, our persona often remains vague, skewed and frankly inexplicable to others – even those closest to us. We assume we know who we are and that identity is as clear to others as it is to us. Ultimately, though, we are the only ones blessed with such enlightenment. In this regard I am reminded of some wonderful words by the Sicilian poet Salvatore Quasimodo. It is one of my favourite poems: 

                        Everyone is alone on the heart of the Earth

                        Pierced by a ray of sun

                        And suddenly its evening.

You will have your own interpretations of this poignant poem symbolising life’s brevity. For me it puts into awe-inspiring perspective how insignificant are our individual hubristic masks. The conclusion I draw is that only by letting go of our delusions of self-importance can we adopt true compassion towards others and thus see the world more distinctly. I have learned I am nothing as an individual. Transcending egocentric and narcissistic ways leads to the realisation that I only exist in communion with others. My voice only makes sense in relationship.

2. Focus on the future

We are all nostalgic for the past at some stage in our lives. This need is perfectly illustrated by the recent spate of photos from the Hames archives we have been frantically posting on Facebook these past few weeks. Photographs are beautiful artefacts describing who we once were. But the resulting memories can also be seductive lies. Recent scientific studies into the chemistry of the brain reveal an astonishing phenomenon: memories are not fixed but reconstructed each time we recall what happened. This is not simply a matter of perception although emotions clearly play a role in what we remember. The startling reality is that we continuously compose and play with alternative drafts (intricately embellished versions of the truth) to match our shifting assumptions, inclinations and circumstances.

As time passes favoured versions of what happened fuse and reify in our minds until they assume the status of incontrovertible truths. For each of us you understand. Your truth is not necessarily my truth. Another’s version will be different again. There are always multiple shades of grey and unaccountable discrepancies even when two objective witnesses recount a shared experience within seconds of the event. There is never a single immutable truth. It is multiple. To think otherwise is to be profoundly deceived.

Where does that leave us in terms of the past? Many people prefer to live in the past. They find comfort in that. For me the wiser course of action has been to accept the imperfections of memory and to live with future uncertainties rather than to fret about past ambiguities that are probably irreparable. It has always seemed to me one can put one’s energies into the crafting of better futures or remain haunted by the ghosts of resentment, regrets and lost opportunities.

3. Cause no harm to others

Hurting people is the easiest thing in the world to do. Inflicting pain and distress on others can often be deliberate. Pure vindictiveness motivated by the basest of human values. At other times possibly just self-defence, thoughtlessness, or a temporary lapse in human decency.

Of course war, conflict and competition have been a part of our social fabric from time immemorial. Thus we can easily rationalise the damage we inflict on others. Over the course of my life I have tried to find reasons that might justify causing harm to others. I can think of none. Although the scriptures of all monotheistic traditions teach us otherwise, for me there can never be an excuse that justifies such brutality and pain. Of course we have become singularly adept at dredging up one reason after another to justify the most blatant of atrocities, whether it be the protection of freedom, democracy or human rights. In the end all conflict is driven by the politics of greed, power, envy and corruption. Hard as we might try we cannot escape that unpalatable fact.

Perhaps I am an idealist. I am undeniably a pacifist. I really do believe that our civilisation can not survive if we continue to wreak unrelenting destruction on each other and our environment. We must find alternative ways to resolve and transcend our differences. Humanity’s real need at this juncture is to step into abundance. We must nurture a far deeper appreciation of each other as a single human family rather than perpetuate a continued fracturing of community based upon trivial and cosmetic differences.

4. Forgive past transgressions

Finally we need to engender a capacity to forgive others without any expectation that our impulse to forgive will be reciprocated. After Nelson Mandela’s release from 27 years of detention as a terrorist his messages and actions were consistently true to this sentiment. His mere presence at events like the Convocation honouring him at Harvard, a university that had staunchly supported the apartheid regime, signalled a refusal to be bound by past wrongs. At that convocation Henry Lewis Gates spoke of Mandela as always being a free man. It was the man’s freedom from any need or desire to seek reprisals that shone through.

More recently after the massacre in Norway that killed 74 innocent citizens the mayor of Oslo, Fabian Stang, proclaimed to the crowd of 150,000: We will punish the guilty. The punishment will be more generosity, more tolerance, more democracy. Such magnanimity is overwhelming. But nothing expresses better what it means to be human.

If these four tenets or moral impulses are true for humanity why should they not also be true for our family? The great dilemma in all of these lessons is simply to point out the ephemeral nature of our existence, the great mystery of it all, and my desire to restore love, empathy and respect within our family.

For most of history human beings have based their actions on an hypothesis that scarcity pervades society. This is the creed that led to competitive behaviour. Why competition even underpins our health, welfare and education systems. Some of us win, others of us lose. This is a law of nature we are told. But it is nothing of the kind. It has been fabricated through self-interest and envy. I have watched it insinuate itself into the cracks that are even now splitting our family apart and I want it to stop. For whatever reasons, perhaps through collective amnesia, we seem to be missing a deeper appreciation and love of each other.

I have often been an absent and ineffective father. I readily concede that my work (to evolve society to a new consciousness) has frequently assumed priority over mere family matters. That was wrong and I hope you will find it in your heart to absolve me. My intentions were always virtuous. But to put the conscious evolution of humanity above that of caring for my own family was wrong.

My love for you is that of a father for any child. It is unconditional and will never falter. I had always naively assumed that I too would be loved unconditionally by you, my children. It was not to be. I am aware one or two of you believe I lack morals – although you are often slow to judge your own deeds. And a couple of you take me as a soft touch, assuming that I’m not quick-witted enough to comprehend the fact that I am being taken for a ride. That is no big deal. It is no doubt par for the course. But it pains me to think that the respect you should express for each other has taken a nose-dive in a family that was once so close.

My health is good and I expect to be around for many years yet. However it is important that you take note of what I have written here, even if you later choose to ignore it.

I have taken great care to be as open and as precise as I can be. So I would urge all of you to take responsibility for healing the wounds that have festered in our family for far too long. Try putting aside blame and half truths. And if it doesn’t work the first time keep trying.

At the very least I would hope we can all put the scars of the past behind us in order to focus on a future of mutual obligation and respect. Nothing would please me more than seeing each of you relate in ways that restore a strong sense of family unity. Equally I would love to see you repair ties with your mother - if only in a spirit of compassion. She sacrificed a lot for you. But she needs your love these days far more than ever before.

Above all I want you to embrace my youngest son and your new brother with all the love you can muster. He deserves to be held in our hearts as you all are held in mine.

With all my love

Dad

Thinking for a Change

The dilemmas facing humanity have become so complex they can only be resolved by comprehending the situation from a higher level of collective consciousness. Once that new state of awareness has been reached, however, we will be able to choose a profoundly different evolutionary path to that recently pursued with such self-interest and short-sighted enthusiasm.

Disruptions to the way planet Earth works, particularly those induced by the ingrained habits of seven billion people all aspiring to similar levels of affluence, can no longer be ignored. At some stage myths must give way to truths if disaster is to be averted.

As Paul Gilding points out so eloquently in his recent book The Great Disruption there is plenty to be positive about. But only if we think differently and more deeply about the human condition and rise above those beliefs and practices that have become an impediment to genuine progress.

Three priorities have surfaced from the fog of scientific evidence, propaganda (and sheer mischief) surrounding issues like climate change. First, policies aimed at putting a stop to unsustainable activities must be scaled up. Second, smart technologies must be applied to the underlying causes of our problems rather than to their symptoms. Third, we must reframe our thinking to embody entirely new possibilities for reimagining what we do (that is both socially desirable and economically feasible) and how we do it.

These priorities are as relevant for business as they are for governments and civil society. The time has long since passed when business could simply mind its own business. Indeed many of the institutions and practices conceived within the 19^th century model of industrial economism, a model that initially brought such affluence to so many, appear now to be steering us down a path to ruin. I am aware that it is impossible to prove such a thesis. But nor do I intend waiting until I have evidence I am correct.

There are many alternatives available to us, ranging from cleaner, adaptive industries and smarter, benign practices to fewer toxic raw materials and biomimicry as a model for organizing and innovating. Most of these alternatives are preferable to what currently exists. However we need to let go of old prejudices and fears that the future will inevitably be worse than the past if such new options are to be implemented quickly. This is the prime lesson informing Gilding’s thesis.

All of which is easier said than done of course. Tackling any one of these imperatives would be difficult enough. Finding ways to adopt all three presents a formidable challenge, not least because the customary ways for administering human affairs have shifted responsibilities to others. Deliberately reframing our thinking to escape the gravitational pull of the past will demand an expansive emancipation of mind, liberation from obsolete ideologies and dogma, and a collective, progressive and audacious awakening to higher levels of consciousness concerning our shared purpose.

Changing behavioural patterns is relatively easy. We do it all the time. Government policies, corporate marketing and public relations campaigns all effectively play on our desires or fears in order to manipulate how we behave. But whereas most present-day marketing efforts are commercially orientated, using psychology to escalate consumerism - even where prosperity without economic growth would be a more sane goal in today’s circumstances - we are failing to use those same mechanisms to endorse the reduction, re-use and recycling of our most precious resources. Clearly much has still to be done even in that regard. But changing our underlying beliefs is far more difficult.

Ultimately though, permanent behavioural change will stem from the structural redesign of our most life-critical systems – particularly those in which human beings interface with nature and with each other. It is often forgotten that all systems are perfectly designed to get the results they get. That is why natural systems remain so resilient.

The problem is that none of our social systems have been designed to consciously evolve. We are, quite literally, trapped in the past. That is precisely why our thinking has to change. In effect we must become architects of our own evolution rather than pawns in a game we assume to be controlled by others.

The inevitable transition to cleaner, low-carbon sources of energy (like solar and hydrogen for example) together with the use of smarter, more efficient, distributed networks that reduce the amount of energy we use, will eventually enable the complete eradication of toxic fuels. At the same time the industries spawned from this transition will generate untold wealth. Designing a sustainable and secure food system capable of providing nourishment for seven billion people or more is also desirable – and readily achievable. Re-engineering the fundamentals of the global economy to eradicate waste, promote equity and protect the resources we all share is also realistic.

But there is a catch. Before the trapeze artist leaps into space he must step off the platform on which he is standing. Systemic reinventions of this nature requires a strategic, emotional and “transcendent” commitment to the new story in addition to an appreciation of systemic design that is rare, so devoid of integral intelligence has our conditioning become.

In terms of systemic design and renewal there are two crucial keys to success. Both rely on our capacity and willingness to reframe our notions about what really matters, to boldly step into new ways of knowing and being, and to openly engage with others in that metamorphosis.

The first key is the ability to imagine and communicate an alternative social “meme” (together with compelling narratives) that supersedes more utilitarian goals – at least encompassing happiness, love and compassion in healthier balance with material wealth and well-being. This key unlocks hope and restores fairness. The second key is the ability to elude the curse of knowledge that traps us in an industrial past and allows us to make significantly different choices about the future. This key unlocks a sense of new possibilities and restores trust.

Unfettering an economy based on value exchange in the context of abundance (rather than one of compounding debt in a framework of financial scarcity, for example) could emancipate new forms of enterprise employing many more people than today’s sunset industries. Using renewable sources of energy to establish industrial ecologies that transform and adapt to a warming planet is far wiser than defending the past in an attempt to protect that which could destroy us. [Industry lobbyists take note!] Likewise, accessing peer-to-peer digital media to invite the collective expression of policies and even constitutions (instead of putting our faith in the increasingly detached whims of a few elected representatives) might provide a platform for a far more democratic and empathic society. And so on…

Such strategic choices become possible because of the most fundamental shift in human history: the emergence of a mode of inventiveness (comprising intelligence, foresight and wisdom) that allows new ways of being, thinking and doing to be envisaged and, through cooperation and invention, to be attained.

No doubt humanity can flourish. But only if we learn to transcend obsolete beliefs and fears to engage in deeper conversations that (i) include all salient features of the system we desire to create, (ii) anticipate the intended and unintended consequences of those desires, and (iii) lift the human spirit out of the mire of believing the past cannot be surpassed and that our situation is dire and will only get worse.

In facing a range of complex dilemmas it does us no good to continue to deny the truth. The global outlook is tense. Natural disasters, the spiraling cost of food, geo-political conflict and the collapse of natural systems all seem to herald an end-game in which the extinction of our species is conceivable. We are witness to cascading failures in the systems that support life. Family incomes are being squeezed. We try to do more with less. Politicians focus on trivia. Simple things seem not to work as well as they once did. We fret about how best to survive the present even though we care passionately about the planet and our children’s future.

Yet the solution is in our own hands. Burying our heads in the sand and ignoring reality will not help. Quarantining ourselves from reality we begin to lose the thread of affiliation that otherwise nourishes and sustains us. We cannot isolate ourselves from the truth however hard we might try. It only aggravates our anxieties.

Over a century ago an ambitious geo-engineering project was implemented. Responding to a major planetary issue of the time two German scientists, Haber and Bosch, made nitrogen-rich fertilizer available to farmers, thus significantly increasing the annual amount of nitrogen fixed on land. The unintended consequences were catastrophic: the human population mushroomed exponentially.

But having created the problem we must live with it. By participating in the actuality of our predicament we can restore hope while exploring practical pathways into the future. Our starting point is not the changing of a light bulb nor the purchasing of a more fuel-efficient car. On the contrary renewal begins with a sense of responsibility to each other and to the planet. Re-envisaging a new purpose for humanity must now become our prime goal. We must think big for a change.

A Moment In Geological Time

The sun rose again this morning. Looking out of my window, eighteen floors above the streets of Bangkok, I still see familiar skyscrapers punctuating the horizon. And as the ambient noise of human activity begins to cut through the lazy dawn it is clear that life is going on much as before.

Or is it? Something extraordinary is happening. You can almost feel it in the air. I do not mean the imminent arrival of my son Dominique Oliver Hames into the world, although that too is very special. I am not talking about an Armageddon following the return of Jesus Christ to Earth in a “rapture” moment or the likelihood of aliens observing us from afar even though there are possibly billions of planets, some just like ours, in the Milky Way. I am not referring to the waves of civil disobedience that have been sweeping across the Arab world of late, mixed reactions to the death of Osama bin Laden, the cascading failures of a global monetary system based upon compounded debt, nor even the inexorable rise of China and the corresponding economic and moral collapse of the US empire.

On the contrary I am suggesting a phenomenon that will have us scrambling to re-write textbooks and re-examine the most deeply-embedded of our hypotheses concerning human identity and purpose.

It turns out we are living through and contributing to a defining moment in geological time. As incongruous and as unlikely as it seems, the human species has become a force of nature, the sheer scale of our activities reshaping the Earth’s surface and the natural processes upon which all life depends. Unlike fateful events of a transitory nature this intervention actually does change everything! Not necessarily for the worse as many claim, although the final outcome is far from certain and probably will be for some time.

A number of leading Earth scientists have suggested this is happening from observing a set of life-critical, natural, recycling systems. For example, carbon and nitrogen cycles are both speeding up. While natural fluxes of carbon dioxide are many times larger than the amount put into the atmosphere each year by people burning fossil fuels, the effect of human intervention is disproportionate. It is possible that even a small increase can can cause a catastrophic tipping point to occur in the climate system. A recent report by the International Energy Agency now suggests human intervention in the carbon cycle will generate global heating of between 3 and 5 degrees celsius over two or three generations. That posits a degree of global chaos for which we are not at all prepared. 

Over the past century the nitrogen cycle has accelerated by almost 150 per cent. Although some of this increase is accidental it has mostly arisen through a deliberate attempt by scientists at the end of the 19th century to increase the supply of nitrogen fixates into the food chain. The Haber-Bosch process harnessed the atmospheric abundance of nitrogen to create ammonia, which could then be oxidized to make the nitrates so essential for the production of artificial fertilisers. Unfortunately Fritz Haber and his associates failed to anticipate the scale of unintended consequences flowing from this early attempt at geoengineering. Their intervention increased the human population by a quantum!

There are numerous other salient factors to be taken into account which arise from an acceleration in these natural cycles. The oceans are acidifying and warming faster than predicted. Sediment flows in the world’s great deltas, home to hundreds of millions of people, are eroding faster than they can be replaced. Seasons are shifting. Water supplies are threatened by retreating glaciers. Extinction rates are higher than normal. The Arctic ice shelf is melting, puncturing the permafrost and allowing vast stores of methane to leak into the atmosphere for the first time…

Human curiosity, possibly more than a sense of responsible stewardship, obliges us to enquire into the source of such shifts. It is actually quite simple. We have become Creator, architects of our own evolution, not only at a nanoscale level of genetic and cellular manipulation but at the macro level of geological shifts. In effect humanity’s disruption, modification and acceleration of natural processes has triggered the age of homo sapiens. The Anthropocene age has dawned and there are important consequences to consider.

The evolutionary clock is ticking loudly. As hard as we might try we cannot wind back the hands. Returning to a more reassuring or comfortable past is ethically untenable as well as an impractical illusion. Instead we must learn to live wisely with our creation. At a minimum this means safeguarding the continuing viability of life-nurturing systems - such as clean air and pure water; halting the rampant despoilation of natural ecosystems - such as the rainforests and the oceans; prioritizing our most critical needs (like nutritious food, love and happiness) more prudently and transparently; enhancing environmental, social and institutional resilience; commissioning new technologies responsibly; and creating an ecology of mind grounded in appreciation, abundance, sufficiency and collaboration.

Simply put, it is time to let go of past frameworks - and with it the fears, superstitions, protocols and practices that constrain potential and set us against each other – to design a future capable of generating sufficient well-being and prosperity for everybody. That objective will be impossible to achieve through incremental or cosmetic changes to current ways or fiddling at the inconsequential fringes of the existing paradigm. We need an archetypal metamorphosis: a suite of profound transformations  that will shift human praxis from competition to cooperation, from economic growth to well being, from inequity to integrity, from despair to hope and from inward-looking interests to a planetary consciousness.

I find the idea of metamorphosis, resulting from positioning human development at the centre of the natural sciences rather than some kind of peripheral sideshow, genuinely inspiring. On the one hand it sounds simple and obvious. Indeed it is. But in order to accomplish a panarchical transformation of such ambition and scope we would need to initiate a wave of societal innovation, the audacity of which is unprecedented. For what we are proposing here is nothing less than an awakening to a conscious human evolution where human purpose and intent is reconceptualised at its most fundamental levels. At the same time a transfiguration of this nature would presumably offer profound alternatives to the popularly held view (of a synthesis between biological and digital life forms) proposed by some overly-enthusiastic technocrats as the most likely future for our species.

Consciously designing a world that can comfortably accommodate ten billion people will require all the empathy, compassion, ingenuity and imagination we can muster. What I am intimating is a contemporary renaissance of humanity and the human soul possibly unlike anything we have previously envisaged.

Just as the natural world is working differently as a result of our presence, so the world we are creating will need to operate differently from the one which effortlessly accommodated two billion people at the end of World War II in 1945. We have to adopt ecological design criteria and alternative governance methods; invent more aligned, responsive and adaptive institutions based on an appreciation of the need to conserve our common wealth; find smarter ways of producing life’s necessities by working with nature rather than against it; reduce waste; establish an economy in which prosperity is decoupled from corruption and motives of greed or self-interest - all the while embedding efficiencies to ensure that our planet can continue to provide abundantly for us all and not just the privileged or wealthy few.

In that context it is vital we seek to transform how we think - about our relationship to the planet and to each other. This will require a profound transition of individual and collective consciousness. That is the extent of the task facing us. The scale of this challenge is astonishing.

To comprehend the dynamic complexities entailed in such a transformation we can use the carbon cycle, which I referenced earlier, as a typical example of the entangled nature of the issue. You are probably already aware of the claims being made by our leading climate scientists. But I will restate some relevant statistics if only to ensure you are up-to-date with the most recent science.

According to the International Energy Agency, Greenhouse gas emissions increased by a record amount in 2010, reaching the highest carbon output in recorded history. Not even the financial crisis, considered by many observers to be the most serious global recession of the past 80 years, has done much to curb rising emissions. The eminent economist Nicholas Stern, noting this fact, stated that the heating resulting from increased emissions "will disrupt the lives and livelihoods of hundreds of millions of people across the planet, leading to widespread mass migration and conflict."

In spite of an extensive and prolonged search from numerous sources I have found no credible information that is seriously at odds with this prediction - apart from the banal observation that we cannot possibly know for certain. This being the case, in order to avoid the most damaging effects of global heating annual energy-related emissions will need to be no more than 32 gigatons by 2020. If emissions in 2011 rise by as much as they did in 2010, that limit will be exceeded nine years ahead of schedule. This would make it all but impossible to keep the rise in global temperatures to within 2° Celsius, the tipping point, many scientists believe, before exponential feedback loops lead to abrupt, asymmetric and potentially irreversible changes to the climate system.

I confess that I find this news terrifyingly bitter-sweet. As the room for maneuvering contracts by the day, urgent action is still not forthcoming – even when it comes to the relatively less painful implementation of energy efficiencies through reduction, re-use and recycling. Instead, the reverse seems to be happening. For example, since the earthquake and tsunami damage to the Daiichi reactors at Fukushima earlier this year several countries have been re-evaluating nuclear power. Germany has seemingly declared a halt to its nuclear reactor programs although it had been on the verge of doing so for some time. Japan is teetering on the brink of electing to go down a similar path. Community paranoia over nuclear energy has been evident since the accidents at Three Mile Island (1979) and Chernobyl (1986). Yet it is one of the safest forms of electricity generation. It also happens to be one of the major technologies for producing electricity without carbon dioxide. The gap left by scaling back the world's nuclear facilities is unlikely to be filled entirely by renewable energy, meaning an increased reliance on fossil fuels, at least in the foreseeable future. Some of these can be made cleaner, that is true. But they remain damaging to our climate in spite of the reassuring messages being disseminated by the oil, coal and gas lobby.

Then there are locked-in emissions to consider. About 80 per cent of the power stations likely to be in service in 2020 are either already built or under construction. Most of these are fossil-fuelled power stations unlikely to be taken out of service early. So they will continue to emit carbon – possibly for a further 40 years or so.

Add to all of this the fact that the significance of climate change in international policy debates is being taken less seriously than it was a few years ago, mostly as a result of intensive lobbying and fear mongering from certain sectors of the business community, and that developed nations have really only managed to reduce carbon emissions by importing goods from countries like China, and we have a recipe for catastrophe. At least without a shift in consciousness….

It is worth repeating here that it is not just global heating caused by increasing amounts of carbon in the air that is of concern but how climate is intricately linked with other life-critical systems. For example, we are witnessing an unprecedented rise in the cost of staple foods like rice, grains and potatoes. Food is getting more expensive as successive grain harvests fail. Unless urgent action is taken to reform the global food system the cost of these staples will more than double within 20 years, forcing many more millions into poverty. Half of that increase will be directly caused by global heating while the remainder will be the result of a combination of factors including geopolitical conflict, soil erosion, a scarcity of arable land and water for irrigation, and access to affordable energy.

But let us step out of our linear thinking habits to incorporate ever more salient data. If we pause to examine the entire contextual system of human behaviour in the environment over a period of several hundred years (the panarchical relationship) the picture of cascading problems becomes much more evident. Take the sum of around thirty environmental trends (including for example, ocean acidification, worsening oxygen levels in large cities, loss of biodiversity, soil erosion, desertification, falling water tables, declining fish stocks, or methane venting from melting icecaps) and we can plot exponential deterioration over at least the past 75 years. It is clear our species is changing how nature works. There is no other feasible explanation.

When I was born there were just under two billion people on the planet. Later this year the figure will have grown to seven billion. By the end of the century it is likely to exceed ten billion. In spite of such ballooning population growth our desires and behaviours have not changed one iota. We still aspire to become more affluent than our neighbors. We still rely on technology to solve our problems. We still wait for a crisis before we act. We still delegate our responsibility for each other to those less capable than ourselves. I have no doubt that unless excessive consumption is outlawed, which is highly improbable, marketing gurus will continue in their obsessive quest of getting us to buy more and more stuff from manufacturers being urged to produce more and more goods, a large proportion of which will eventually go to waste.

The truth is there to see. Yet even now, against such dire scenarios, politicians and industry lobbyists in each of the great powers are eyeing up extraordinary and risky ways to extract the world's last remaining reserves of fossil fuels in the name of corporate profits and economic development. Furthermore they all seem to be willing to fight each other for resources that will pour even more carbon into the atmosphere, thus pushing the climate system into unknown territory.

How can this be? If it was simply the storyline to the latest James Bond movie we would applaud such imaginative fantasy and gasp at the implausible stunts. But Dr No and Spectre are no more than naive delinquents in this political playground. This is real. No repeated denials or political posturing is going to make it all vanish. Science is telling us that nature has limits and that we need to dismantle the fossil fuel industry (as it is currently structured) as fast as we possibly can. We cannot win. Yet we persist, choosing to ignore science, preferring the hubris of inaction and denying the risk to future generations and to the poor who have few means to protect themselves from the impacts of a changing climate.

It appears we are not fully awake to this reality but sleepwalking. Sleepwalking towards a crisis that is of our own making and that might still be avoided – if only we were more sensitive to the dangers and can see the wisdom of changing our minds about how we choose to live our lives.

Nor is being awake the only issue. As I have repeatedly said, changing our minds entails a shift in consciousness so that we perceive the systemic nature of the risks confronting us with greater clarity and can take appropriate and rapid corrective action. Only then will we be in a position to transcend potentially catastrophic consequences. In view of the implacable nature and recklessness of those who continue to pollute the atmosphere I wonder if this is really possible, especially in view of the increasing urgency of our predicament, given that individual epiphanies must necessarily occur along with any collective shift of consciousness.

After the debacle at the COP15 climate change talks in Copenhagen (and in spite of scientists warning us that climate change poses the greatest threat to our species in its history, that we are running out of time, and that we may even be facing the prospect of our own extinction) it is clear that many political and business leaders are inept at dealing with complexity. Moreover the majority are ill-prepared to tackle intertwined issues that would loose them votes or profits. Leadership has become a lost art. Disregarding autocrats and the existence of ingrained corruption in most sovereign states, nearly all representatives of the modern world-system are either unwilling or incapable of putting aside self-interest for the common good. Meanwhile public awareness will increasingly lead to frustration and protest. More attuned to the truth, yet distressed by its existential nature, communities around the world are increasingly opting to vent their anger and bemusement in various forms of civil disobedience and protest.

But if we are bemused by the extent to which human behaviours are causing climate change, concerned by the lack of clarity concerning the potential impact of continuing fires, droughts and floods on our lifestyles, and puzzled by the lack of concerted and coherent government action, at least let us be clear about one thing. We the people, social witnesses to official dithering, scare-mongering and apathy, are no longer the revolutionaries. Nor for that matter are the scientists, environmentalists or outliers crying out for societal transformation via a shift in consciousness. In this instance the real radicals are those political and industry militants, together with their benefactors, who refuse to relinquish their financially-driven motives, who will go to any lengths to protect their collapsing ideology and who mindlessly insist that climate change is a left-wing conspiracy designed to bring down capitalism. In due course this open defiance of rationality, coupled with a reluctance to put the common wealth before individual profit, must be called to account. Through inaction and hubris these radicals are pilfering the prosperity and viability of future generations. They are now the anarchists and their selfish sedition must not be allowed to succeed.

But how can we overcome such a compelling force when most of the investment capital required for securing even easy gains (e.g. the rapid advancement of energy efficiencies in conjunction with the deployment of proven renewable technologies) is stashed away in the vaults of governments and corporations fixated on quick profits, big profits and gratuitous homage to obsolete economic theories?

For me the real crisis facing homo sapiens is not climate change per se, nor any of the resulting effects articulated above, but the erroneous set of assumptions about human nature that condones excessive production and consumption at a time when the impact of such behaviours on those who do not have access to similar resources and opportunities are self-evident. Most of these assumptions, with their emphasis on individual self-interest and competitive materialism were laid down during the 18^th century Enlightenment. They have been taken, incorrectly as it happens, as fundamental to human endeavour ever since. Indeed these beliefs are trotted out with tedious regularity as the primary defence and rationale for globalisation. It is worth examining how these assumptions are flawed in today’s context. 

In his topical book The Empathic Civilization US economist and futurist Jeremy Rifkin is unequivocal about this issue. Human beings, he says, are naturally empathic. It is built into our biology. Yet most of our assumptions and hence our business, social and governance institutions, are founded on an entirely different set of cultural and behavioural norms. Namely, that we are intrinsically competitive. “In 19^th century Europe this impulse regarding human nature was mindlessly embraced by the newly-conceived sovereign states where they were commonly perceived as autonomous agents entangled in a relentless and never-ending battle with other sovereign states in the pursuit of material gain and the protection of its citizens.”

Rifkin notes that recent discoveries in neuroscience and child development (for example mirror-neurons - nerve cells that enable human beings and some other species to feel and experience another's situation and emotions as if they were one's own) pose a credible challenge to these long-held assumptions. The detection of mirror neurons suggests we are social and empathic creatures after all and that we constantly seek intimate participation and companionship with our fellows. This view also happens to reinforce observations made by Russian zoologist Pyotr Kropotkin who, barely 25 years after Darwin’s pioneering work, observed cooperation within and between species in the icy tundra of Siberia. Such discoveries overturn many of our previous beliefs concerning human motives. The growing scientific evidence that we are a fundamentally empathic species has profound and far-reaching consequences for society.

Uppermost in any ontological re-framing of the human condition, Rifkin postulates, is the proposition that human evolution can be measured not merely by the expansion of supremacy over nature “but also by the intensification of empathic connection to a broader diversity of living beings.” Throughout the sweep of human history we have seen successive technology revolutions leading to leaps in economic prosperity. They have also brought about shifts in consciousness, which has then led to further technological advancement… This cycle has also been accelerating until today’s scientific innovations have the potential to change paradigms in decades rather than over centuries.

Once again Rifkin’s assessment is precise. “Forager-hunter societies relied on oral communications and their consciousness was mythologically constructed. The great agricultural civilizations were, for the most part, organized around script communication and steeped in theological consciousness. The first industrial revolution in 19^th century Europe was managed by print communication and ushered in ideological consciousness. Electronic communication became the command and control mechanism for arranging the second industrial revolution in the 20th century and spawned psychological consciousness.”

Like Rifkin I have no doubt that today’s distributed technologies, peer-to-peer social media and the potential for cleaner, renewable, open source energies, will create an opportunity for human civilisation to transcend current dilemmas by virtue of the most momentous evolutionary step we will ever have taken. By abandoning parochial self-interest and embracing an appreciative sensitivity towards the diverse richness of life we will step into a new epistemology (a biospheric consciousness) where the depth of social intimacy and interaction will become both the primary design principle and central nervous system for a new pangaian society.

With good fortune and foresight that giant step might also steer the human narrative away from fear to one of hope and inclusion. In an age where information frequently overwhelms us, where faith has been torpedoed by its own institutions, where we can design, manufacture and acquire more or less anything we can imagine, and where our access to a range of mind-blowing experiences is virtually unlimited, we lack just one thing: an overriding sense of purpose for this Anthropocene age.

Why have we been given the skill to invent technologies that enable instant communication and constant connectivity? Where is the real added value? Is it just to be entertained or to hasten commercial exchange? Surely not. But what additional benefits are created, over and above material gain? What (if anything) in all of this nourishes the human soul or our deep desire for empathy through connection? What is the transcendent purpose that extends beyond mere tribal or religious affiliations and national identity to embrace the whole of humanity? And how should we engage with this? 

Along with these unknowns there are many reasons to be optimistic. Transcending the civilizational worldview can help create a new global ethos in which the rich and diverse variety of relationships comprising the planet’s life-sustaining forces can harmonise and come into a new equilibrium. It can move us beyond the disconnected, self-interested and utilitarian ideals that burden our daily lives with matters of ultimate inconsequence. It can rise above the state-dominated geopolitical mess we have fashioned to allow new forms of planetary management and governance to evolve. Above all it can restructure our lives to become more collaborative and empathic.

 

Forget the Facts

The sea hare is a gelatinous lump ordinarily found grazing on coral reefs, home to many far more eye-catching creatures. Nonetheless, the one captive in the aquarium at Heron Island Research Station, on the Great Barrier Reef, provides a mesmerising spectacle as it chomps through great bouquets of red algae plucked from the reef flat and delivered fresh each morning by a young marine scientist.

''We used to have two hares in the tank,'' she explained, ''but when there are two, they just shag continuously, fail to eat, then they die.'' We conclude that herein lies a powerful warning about the risk unrelenting pleasure-seeking poses to any species aspiring to long-term survival.

I've been thinking a bit about the sea hare this week while observing the fallout from the Climate Commission's report, The Critical Decade. Wondering, too, about primitive human biology, about what factors interfere with our survival instinct - fear, fun, greed, legacy, even good old distracting lust.

The report is a powerful enunciation of what science now knows about climate change and the risks it poses. That the atmosphere and the oceans are warming, ice is being lost from glaciers and ice caps, sea levels are rising and the biological world is changing. ''We know beyond reasonable doubt that the world is warming and that human emissions of greenhouse gases are the primary causes.''

In the nuanced language of science, it doesn't get much stronger. As the American scientist Naomi Oreskes has observed, ''History shows us clearly that science does not provide certainty. It does not provide proof. It only provides the consensus of experts, based on the organised accumulation and scrutiny of evidence.'' And here we have it.

So how do you respond to such confronting news? Do you weigh the credentials of the speakers, study the evidence? Or do you switch it off, turn the page, scream and shout? According to psychological research by the Cultural Cognition Project at Yale University, your reaction either way will have little to do with the strength of the arguments or the calibre of the science. It will have everything to do with whether it gels with, or offends, your deep-seated views about morality and how the world ought to work.

Yale law professor Dan Kahan's ''cultural cognition of risk'' theory attempts to explain public disagreement about the significance of empirical evidence by plotting individuals on two scales of cultural belief: individualists versus communitarians, based on the importance people attach to the public good when balanced against individual rights; and hierarchists versus egalitarians, based on their views of the stratification of society. Simply explaining the science to these audiences, he finds, will only serve to wedge the two sides.

The sliding scales are not unfamiliar. Think Tony Abbott as the archetypal suit-and-tie individual hierarchical - values clustered around free-market enterprise, personal achievement, industry, regard for authority (though not, it seems, scientific authority), traditional family, personal freedom; and Bob Brown is out there as your sandal-wearing communitarian egalitarian, protesting that pretty much everything Abbott cherishes damages all he holds dear.

Put a scientist in front of an audience of individual hierarchicals saying that global warming is high risk, and only 23 per cent of the audience will buy the speaker as trustworthy and knowledgeable. Same message, same scientist, and 88 per cent of egalitarian communitarians nod their heads.

Have the same author change tack to argue that warming is no great drama, and the Abbotts now lap it up (86 per cent), and the Browns wander off (46 per cent). The well-oiled machinery of manufactured denial knows how to push all these buttons.

Yale's audience testing finds the only factor likely to interfere with our psychological gatekeeping is if someone within our ''camp'' - someone we perceive as sharing our world view - says something unexpected. (Hence the reverberations in industry and markets when BHP chief Marius Kloppers last year urged rapid action to put a price on carbon emissions.) In short, evidence from someone you identify with will sway your view; science - facts - won't.

Same as it ever was, maybe. But new media helps us contrive a self-affirming information bubble, an echo chamber in which only our own beliefs are broadcast back to us. Debate in the US on the Yale findings prompted the reflection that our instincts in this regard mean - as one political scientist observed - ''we are not well-adapted to our information age''.

The findings also confirm that for all our modernity, tribal leaders remain critical. Leaders of all persuasions - political, religious, industrial, social - have immense power in influencing responses to the most diabolical of problems.

In the foreword to a new book debunking scepticism of science - Climate Change Denial: Heads in the Sand - Oreskes argues that fear is the major driver of denial. ''Fear that our current way of life is unsustainable. Fear that addressing the issue will limit economic growth. Fear that if we accept government interventions in the market place … it will lead to a loss of personal freedom. Or maybe just plain old fear of change.''

As economist John Kenneth Galbraith observed, all great leaders share one common characteristic - ''the willingness to confront unequivocally the major anxiety of their people in their time''.

This guest blog was written by Jo Chandler. It was first published in the Melbourne Age on Saturday 28th May 2011 and is re-printed here with the author's permission. Jo Chandler is a senior writer for the Age and the author of Feeling The Heat, which tracks climate field scientists.

 

Second Chance

Today President Barack Obama announced the assassination of Osama Bin Laden. After eluding capture for almost ten years, and following months of top-secret surveillance and detailed planning by the Pentagon, he was killed by a member of the US military's SEAL Team Six - with some reluctant assistance (or perhaps none at all) from the Pakistani government. Reaction to the news of Bin Laden’s death (at least in the West) appears to be one approaching almost total euphoria. That is understandable. For many people justice has at last been done. But it is not quite as simple as that.

Before we get too carried away we should take stock of a global system in which little has fundamentally altered. While the iconic value of Bin Laden’s death is self-evident it is by no means a strategic game-changer. In some respects it is irrelevant. Like the many-headed mythical Hydra of Greek mythology Al-Qaeda has spawned a global network of agile affiliate enterprises hell bent on disrupting lives and causing havoc wherever they can. While this ideologically networked group of fanatical offspring may still pledge symbolic allegiance to the Al-Qaeda “brand”, myriad smaller cells increasingly act autonomously, receiving nothing in terms of financial or logistical support from the parent organisation.

The death of Bin Laden may well provide an emotional setback for some of these terrorist groups and their interests. But to a great extent his messages and influence were already discredited, even in the Arab and Muslim worlds. Indeed the most radically anti-Western polemic (even from Muslim religious leaders like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran) categorically rejected the Takfir doctrines pursued by Al-Qaeda’s conservative leaders years ago. Far more pertinent are the peaceful protests currently sweeping across the Arab world. These uprisings have shown young people everywhere that liberation from persecution and serfdom is in the hands of those who seek it. The so-called Arab Spring has made Bin Laden’s darkly doctrinaire views utterly irrelevant to all but a few hardened zealots.

The genesis of terrorism goes back centuries of course. It has been part of the human condition throughout recorded history. On September 11, 2001, however, human progress seemed to descend into an altogether darker void.

But as most of the Western world watched in horror at the scenes being played out on the East coast of the US a far deeper tragedy was unfolding – a tragedy which some of us are still trying to express and from which recovery is by no means certain. For the tragedy to which I refer is the folly of man’s inhumanity to man, the utter futility of conflict and the mindless calls for vengeance. This is the deeper tragedy, arising from our most primitive instincts, we must all ultimately confront.

The images of 9/11 are incised into the mind. Like the day Neil Armstrong set foot on the Moon, everyone has a story of where they were that fateful day. Yet now, when one chapter closes and we look with hope towards a future where we can all live together in peace, the real legacy of 9/11 hangs like a shadow over our civilisation.

Ten years ago Al-Qaeda's high profile figurehead provided the US administration with the pretext to commence its calamitous hostilities across the greater Middle East. Predictably Washington's wars provided terrorist outfits everywhere with new recruits and burgeoning support as well as prolonging a cycle of violence that appeared to know no end. Today, once again, Osama Bin Laden presents us with the pretext to think again - but to do things differently this time.

Fresh opportunities have emerged and we must seize the day. The choice is stark. We can persist in our bloody and humiliating way to continue prosecuting this so-called “war on terror” – a war without end, executed in a mood of compounding fear and desperation and from which the most sane among us accept it will be impossible to extract victory. Or we can reimagine our collective purpose and the relationships we most desire with our fellow human beings by celebrating the integral nature of what it means to be compassionate human beings.

If we set our minds to it we can envisage a far less violent and more tolerant future. For example we could enter constructive dialogue with those whose views run counter to our own, seeking to include and transcend differences, rather than waging war as an economic imperative and as a knee-jerk reaction to difference. We could build schools and hospitals rather than expand our arsenals. We could make innovative technologies and medicines available to those less fortunate than ourselves rather than continuing to deny them the most basic of life’s necessities.

I recognise that will take courage and a spirit of generosity that we will need to consciously nurture. But surely that is what leadership is all about? Besides there are far more serious, potentially catastrophic, failures we need to attend to with a similar level of passion and commitment: food and water shortages, climate change, pollution, declining oil reserves....

Of course to pursue peace rather than conflict is not solely our decision. Similar opportunities to think differently and to change direction have been afforded others, particularly those in countries like Pakistan, Iraq and Afghanistan, which have been ravaged by war. It is quite feasible, for example, that leaders of the Taliban may now be more receptive to negotiating some form of power-sharing arrangement in exchange for closing terrorist training camps and curtailing the use of their lands for the export of terror. It is equally possible that the focus of the powerful US industrial war machine will shift to Pakistan, especially given the level of support and protection Bin Laden possibly received from certain sectors of the Pakistani intelligence and military communities.

Whatever happens Bin Laden’s name, his aura and his perceived martyrdom will continue to resonate for a few years yet. In the long term, however, it is not the hunting down and slaying of one man that matters but rather the various autopoietic transitions taking place across Arab and Muslim societies. The most effective power is that wielded through peace. Ordinary people protesting peacefully against oppression and injustice will eventually close history’s page on Al-Qaeda’s particular brand of terror.

In the meantime we have a profoundly important role to play. We must do our utmost to ensure these transitions occur peacefully and compassionately, even if our own current “brand” of democracy is not the end result. Putting an end to the excessive waste, collective insanity and moral failure of endless conflict by eradicating the militarisation of democracy is the most important challenge facing us. If we cannot change our priorities there can be no hope for a brighter future. The war-mongering of old empires will continue to impede real progress by turning the world upside down.

A Tale of Death & Resurrection

As I grow older, more tolerant of a variety of cultural mindsets, more accepting of diverse views, faiths and belief systems, I detect an alternative wisdom reaching out to me with a persistence that has become irresistible. This wisdom is at once profoundly unsettling and intensely reassuring. Indeed such ambiguity makes it tough establishing which of these effects is the more authentic. An unresolved tension between them seems both palpable and necessary – a finely-poised attractor between contradictory forces that redefines human purpose and meaning.

I cannot lay claim to this being a new wisdom, though it manifests as such to me. I am deeply aware that human empathy and a benevolent ethos arise from a common impulse, innately grasped by many indigenous groups, for example, and which I will refer to as communion for simplicity’s sake, and that contemporary science as well as various social experiments have validated its critical importance to the future of the human species.

This wisdom is hard for me to fully digest and even more difficult to describe; partly because it emanates from emotionally charged convictions I find awkward expressing but also because of its relatively ineffable nature - a genesis arising not from Cartesian logic or rationalism but from a common bond illuminating and reflecting the sacredness of life.

Traumatic incidents during childhood (my father deserted me and my mother when I was eight years old and the suffering of losing the person I idolized most still intrudes upon my life in so many subtle ways) led to my avoiding any expression of intimacy with others lest these were misinterpreted, exposed my vulnerability, or were seen as a sign of weakness. But no longer. For some considerable time I have felt the compulsion to speak my mind. I have been branded a heretic, zealot, contrarian, amateur and an outlier. I suspect none of these were meant as compliments.

The world into which I was born, immediately following the second World War, was one of a strange and disquieting serenity – at least to a young boy growing up in rural England. After a century or more of unbridled nationalism and six years of bloody conflict across Europe and Asia a feeling of cautious optimism prevailed. Naturally life was still tough for many, including my family. We were very poor. In England at the time there was food rationing and recovery was slow at first. Gradually, however, a new normality emerged. I mostly recall unpretentious pleasures: train spotting at Uckfield railway station, harvest picnics in the fields at summer’s end, carpets of bluebells in the woodlands, gathering mushrooms in the misty dawn, cricket matches on the recreation ground, charcoal burners in the woods, itinerant gypsies in their brightly painted caravans, growing currants, raspberries and strawberries in our allotment and waving to the Breton garlic sellers as they cycled through the village...

In 1945 there were fewer than 2 billion people on planet Earth. Jubilation of having achieved victory in a war that shattered the ceremony of innocence dominated newspaper headlines. Confidence was at an all time high. There were scars to get over, their recovery assisted by the new movies celebrating heroics and creating myths that willingly distorted the truth. The futility and savagery of war received scant attention. A few people started to protest over the threat of a nuclear Armageddon but there was no mention of global warming, climate change, population growth, unsustainable consumer trends, endemic poverty or state terrorism. Early warning signals of an impending disaster went unnoticed. The future looked bright.

The distraction provided by wealth creation and the acquisition of goods grew exponentially. Affluent parish elders distracted ordinary men and women by organizing coach excursions to Brighton or Bognor Regis for those who had no other means of taking a holiday. Meanwhile big business, backed by a resurgent advertising industry, turned its attention to manipulating a gullible public and facilitating an explosion of productivity.

The stage was set although few people recognized this at the time. Distraction came in the form of peace. And possessions. From a situation where even sugar and meat were in short supply we rapidly moved into a situation where literally anything could be manufactured and bought. Televisions, automobiles, fashionable clothes, exotic fruit, vacations and experiences. Tools and gadgets to fulfill every possible desire began to saturate the market.

To be well-to-do back then meant owning a farm, small business, or having a car and being able to commute to the nearest town. School, too, seemed pleasurably humdrum. All the world’s problems had been solved. I sat in geography classes facing maps of the world where most countries, or so it seemed, were colored pink. The pink of the British Empire upon which the sun never set. A world in which anything now seemed possible and where certainty insinuated itself into every crack and crevice of community life.

Of course that world no longer exists – if it ever did. For the most part it was a comforting illusion. But one issue now dominates the future of human progress – an existential and potentially disastrous issue that few people saw coming. A global population fast approaching seven billion inhabitants, most with aspirations of increasing material wealth based on assumptions of continuing economic growth, had to be set against a progressively volatile context in which deteriorating environmental conditions, higher food costs, less available energy, escalating socio-economic and geopolitical failures and iniquitous gaps between the rich and the poor formed a potentially catastrophic fusion.

Today the situation is clear. The condition we created, deliberately and without conscience, is forcing us to face a new destiny. It now exposes the vulnerability of our thinking and points to the need to embrace an appreciative communion of interconnectedness and cooperation in stark contrast to more conventional mores and expectations (habitually driven by greed, envy, scarcity, competition and fear) resulting from the globalized system of industrial economism.

Seeing a new reality demands both foresight and conviction around a renewed purpose and intent. Accepting this as essential to human progress is tough enough. Redesigning society in order to practice a more appreciative collective wisdom is an entirely different proposition. Transformation and reinvention are pivotal as is the acceptance of physical constraints and finite natural resources. This, in turn, means relinquishing many of the assumptions we have long held regarding what is fundamental to human prosperity and what is not, what value we should place on economic factors in comparison with health, relationships, cultural well-being and contentment, and what is viable praxis rather than simply foolish habit.

So how does this wisdom of communion manifest? I can only speak for myself. I am more conscious of patterns, more able to map connections between scraps of information that were previously disparate, that seemed relatively unimportant at the time, or that somehow I simply convinced myself to discount. I recognize that sets me apart from many others, although I sense a growing affiliation around such wisdom.

Accordingly I and those of a similar outlook and persuasion are becoming more attuned to a reality (and its consequences) that many others seem unready to accept, unable to perceive or simply shy away from for fear of its more confronting implications. It is as though a veil is suspended between them and the improbable reality of a future existence in which it becomes both possible and desirable for all living beings to share equally in Earth’s available resources in a sufficient, altruistic and loving manner.

In truth my gradual awakening to an alternative wisdom, enabled by the thinking of new friends as much as personal reflection, has become a burden to me as well as a privilege I feel bound to honor. It is also a challenge I cannot avoid. As the birth of my new son, a gift in every sense of that word, draws closer I am conscious of an expanded sense of self and my purpose in life. This expanded consciousness goes far beyond anything I have previously experienced. It has transitioned me into a more empathetic and loving state uniting emotion with cognition.

The truth is never enough of course. Immunity to the reality of the human condition (through the spin and widespread deception of a vigorous public relations machine) is so inculcated in society it is easy to live an illusion and ignore contradictory evidence. But as each day reveals more of a truth that will determine our fate on this planet, I also feel more and more frustrated by the status quo and a greater compulsion to do something (anything) to disrupt thinking-as-usual.

In my view it ultimately comes down to fairness and morality. The critical domain requiring our unconditional attention comprises those established patterns of globalized production, distribution and consumption that have become utterly unsustainable - given the changing context. The mode of economic thought we take for granted, indeed blindly insist on pursuing, is enshrined within this exploitative system. At its extreme it is epitomized by the US model of capitalism. This model, so easily corrupted as we have recently observed, is an expression of rules based upon assumptions that are deeply flawed though seductive, nevertheless, in the overall scheme of things: namely that scarcity and competition drive human behaviour and that continued economic growth is necessary in order to maintain the social order.

Those last three words the social order are crucial to any proper comprehension of the situation we are facing. The rules as applied are crafted quite deliberately to benefit a small sector of society - namely the wealthiest individuals, corporations and nation states. It is a relentlessly iterative and untenable formula: by fostering competition for business and trade between countries, corporations pay lower taxes and produce more goods for consumption on world markets. Thus economic growth drives material wealth simultaneously mesmerizing entire communities and resulting in an unprecedented psychological lock-in to excess, greed and waste. Coincidentally it also destroys many of the social, cultural, environmental and spiritual conditions vital for human contentment, health and well-being while undermining the rights of workers and marginalizing the poor who remain slaves to this system.

We are only just awakening to the veracity of our predicament. Since the 1920’s a well-oiled public relations machinery, arising from an unholy alliance between governments, the media and corporations, and exploiting Freud’s research into our psychological motivations, has manipulated public opinion, keeping us compliant customers instead of alert citizens. In the words of Walter Lippmann it has “manufactured consent” and it has done this extremely efficiently by playing to our unconscious desires.

Sadly the mass production and consumption of goods we are taught to want but rarely need has instigated the crises we see all around us today – from the rising cost of food, to ethnic conflicts, the provision of energy from finite resources, the impact of a global monetocracy upon indebted states and individuals, the despoiling of the natural environment and the criminal practices of dictators, autocrats and unprincipled politicians and industrialists.

The need to speak out has become overwhelming. A new narrative is required; one of hope and happiness rather than hate and humiliation. Imagine what the world might look like if the rules were designed differently. If, instead of competing on the basis of scarcity, we were to encourage collaboration to generate new knowledge, grow uncommon capabilities and share skills within a spirit of abundance and self-sufficiency. Of course competition would still exist, but in a transformed setting governments and corporations alike would compete in providing economic and socio-political security, low taxes on ordinary wage earners, a decent education and a healthy and sustainable environment.

Most of today’s grassroots social activists and young entrepreneurs are desirous of such a shift. Furthermore they now possess infinitely more computing power on their laptops and iPhones than the entire US government had at the time of the moon landing. All we actually require is to generate trust, unity and a sophisticated appreciation of how best to liberate this new moral energy of communion in order to achieve success.

If collective power can be wielded with empathy and integrity, with coherence and conviction, corrupt and unsustainable practices will be dealt a death blow and elected officials will be kept honest. We will not need to jump through hoops in seeking common ground with those that currently ride roughshod over our humanity or despoil nature in pursuing their own selfish ends. We can change the world. I know it. You know it. So what is stopping us?

New Windows onto New Worlds

Hypothesis:

Set against the rich tapestry of mankind’s evolution on this planet our current era seems increasingly to be characterised (at least through Western eyes) by escalating disquiet on so many different fronts. The scent of suffering and uncertainty hangs eerily in the air - the hint of fragrance perceptible only to those who have become attuned to a gnostic sensitivity informed by cross-cultural meme assimilation.

A feeling that our world is spinning even further out of control is made all the more palpable by three overwhelming factors:

1. Asymmetric affluence in the post-industrial world compared to the crushing poverty, inequality and injustice experienced by citizens elsewhere.
2. Western petulance and hubris that allows empires in decline to believe it is their exclusive right to resolve all their autogenous problems - even if they had the capacity to do so, which they do not.
3. Our willingness to reject serious public discourse in lieu of distracting media commentaries that divert collective attention via a squalid mix of sanitized news, entertaining pap and a seemingly endless parade of celebrities behaving badly.

Linear progress itself has become a dangerous delusion. One has only to reflect on the news headlines that bombard us throughout our waking hours: an unremitting nightmare of horror, corruption, ecological catastrophe and the spiralling costs of even the most basic elements required to sustain life – cheap food, potable water and plentiful energy. In all of this turmoil human empathy has gone missing. Purer intentions have been lost. We are in thrall to materialism; obsessed by economic and political power in ways that could easily wreck our way of life - if the past collapse of previous civilizations is any judge.

The future is indeed grim if we remain adrift in circumstances that threaten to undo everything beneficial, abundant and beautiful we have struggled to establish.

Unknowingly perhaps, but frighteningly real nevertheless, our collective actions have spawned almost perfect conditions for the mass extinction of Homo sapiens. The truly terrifying spectre is that we have developed an awareness to know this is the case as well as the intelligence to do something about it. But is it too late for wisdom to prevail?

Over the coming decades we will need to redesign the material basis of our civilization. We have no collective cognition of how to do this. There are no narratives in the archives of antiquity to which we can refer. There is no process flow chart. No rule book. No training manual. No compass directing us towards more desirable futures.

Nor is there much leadership evident as yet. Indeed the very premise of hierarchical leadership may alienate the impulse required of us to transition. The few rare cases of politicians, bureaucrats and business tycoons who do care appear traumatised by the extent, scale and complexity of the problems facing us. Like rabbits caught in the headlights, their inclination is to wait and to wonder, or to make attempts to be seen to be doing something but with little aligned commitment and action. Astonished by global forces they happily unleashed, particularly their systemic nature and fickle twists and turns, most leaders seem paralysed within the here and now of “business as usual”. Except now there can be no such thing.

As a consequence their reactions are typically confined to an evasion of long-term issues, a denial of the limits imposed by physics and an assumption that we are all witness to the same truths and aspire to similar goals. Denying realities that resist conventional analysis they choose instead to quibble about today’s trivia in a concern to protect national interests, dithering and chattering about matters that are ultimately of little consequence.

But wait. Perhaps we have been looking in the wrong places for workable solutions. Despair, after all, does not loom large in humanity’s chronicles. The human spirit is far too resilient and adventurous for that. Optimism and hope can spread its wings given the chance.

Already an emerging consciousness is evident in certain quarters, particularly among the young who are not weighed down by the gravitational pull of the past and also in parts of the world relatively unsullied by the crushing dominance of the prevailing materialism of the civilizational worldview. This is especially apparent in parts of Asia and across the Global South.

In pockets around the world a cadre of enlightened, purposeful and interconnected individuals is emerging. Many of these people live in places where their voices have been hard to hear above the din of imperially mandated bluster. Their ideas, often transcending discrete cultures, ideologies and history, have been routinely excluded from mainstream debate because of poverty, geography, ostracism and oppression. Which is insane. Their unique experiences can help us comprehend what needs to be done and we need to listen loudly to propositions that offer genuine alternatives to the overbearing Western paradigm that locks us into a cycle of endless economic growth, escalating production and excessive consumption.

But in order for these new voices to be heard, their ideas incorporated into global dialogue and their advice acted upon, we all need to think differently. Innovation has to embed at the level of human purpose and needs to be reflected in society’s institutions. Only then might we create a context that allows us to see differently. And seeing differently is necessary if we are to behave differently.

Releasing us from the shackles of current dogma will not be easy. The way forward cannot be found in finely-tweaked approaches to political convention, competitive states or bullying nations - even less in continuing to dominate nature or ignoring the impact of seven billion people on the Earth’s biosphere. On the contrary it will mostly likely be embodied within yet-to-manifest knowledge – at the interface between past, present and possible, in what I refer to as epistemological foresight.

Epistemological foresight implies reaching back into past patterns as well as forward into future possibilities in more integral and substantive ways. Integral hindsight and integral foresight are warp and weft - part of the same dance: we need both in order to liberate the wisdom that lies within the expanded now of new consciousness.

Epistemological foresight has rarely been used as an enabler of intentional evolutionary design and it is no accident that the overwhelming narrative in today’s society is one of futile blandness. Foresight as most commonly practiced (with its emphasis on coherent trends and its appropriation by pop science, engineering and technology) oscillates between tedious logic at one extreme and seductive clairvoyance at the other. Too many futuring projects remain prisoners of convention. Why?

For one thing foresight has become just another instructional toolkit. It is no longer transformative, either in form or content. Furthermore it has become paralysed by a cognitive paradox: we seek to understand an indistinct future using patterns and metrics decipherable only from past performance. Our basic tenet, that we are able to discern future signals of consequence, even defining their characteristics, assumes a humility evidenced by few foresight practitioners. Therefore our ability to anticipate significant inflections and signals relies far too heavily on the recognition of past patterns – the antithesis of foresight!

The great French 20^th century philosopher Henri Bergson asserted that the tools of the mind become a burden on our imagination when the environment that made them so necessary no longer exists or has morphed into something quite different. I believe we have unwittingly allowed the practice of foresight to fall into that trap.

It follows that the future praxis of strategic foresight offers us a rare opportunity to create unique value through demolishing orthodoxies that are well past their shelf life while liberating new wisdom. Whatever form that might take, and whatever tools are used for that purpose, we must remain mindful that the ultimate goal is (a) to design engaging methods for imagining viable pathways that (b) shed light on how we can make provision for the future needs of humanity (c) in ways that lead to more intelligent, resilient choices and through the demonstration of more coherent, empathetic collaboration than has previously been possible.

Epistemological foresight[i] (a deeply resonant framework for comprehending and reacting to panarchic[ii] relationships at a paradigmatic level in which intuition and reason are interwoven across individual and collective levels of human experience) offers us one such pathway. But only as long as we remain open to the implicit systemic and existential challenges this framework introduces. The most difficult of these challenges is the need to transcend the civilizational worldview to which most of humanity unconsciously subscribes in one way or another.

Epistemological Pathologies

The civilizational worldview is as natural to us as the air we breathe. We are unconscious of any other framework. And while some of us may resist certain facets of this worldview at an instinctive level we still respond autonomically to its general principles - an implicit framework guiding meaning-making and which we assume to be just a normal part of being human. In effect it is the life-condition we discern, experience each day of our lives, and in which we are immersed from birth.

This worldview has endured at least since feudal times and possibly much longer. Along the way it has been reified by sundry beliefs related to human purpose and capability, tested by competing ideologies and sustained by five moral impulses.[iii]

These theories, ideologies and impulses have been progressively moulded into a set of deeply ingrained tenets defining what the majority of humanity believes to be real and consequently incontrovertible truths concerning the human condition:

1. A ruling power elite serviced by a cooperative yet subservient underclass of slaves or serfs

1. Wealth and power acquired by the elite at the serfs’ expense and protected via (state) political, military or policing mechanisms
2. An all-encompassing religious or mythical structure (in which the elite are commonly depicted as representatives of a deity or divine beings) typically used to manufacture consent
3. An industrial war machine viewed as a crucial, often principal, driver of the economy and in which all aspects of production are controlled by the elite (through such things as language, access and skills acquisition etc.)
4. Sport, entertainment, education and media are used as a social distraction in ways that help maintain compliance within the social order
5. Nature and the environment are exploited as a “god given” right
6. An irresistible narrative within society based upon competition, indifference and scarcity - rather than cooperation, empathy and abundance.

This set of seven attributes does not imply a universally applicable monist integrity. On the contrary our worldview is a chameleon, changing its tone, color and intensity according to its surroundings or, in a social context, its culture. But the critical thing to appreciate is that this worldview was invented by us. It is a social construction and, as such, can be remodeled - if that is what we want.

Consequently a more profound dimension of the worldview that we must take into account is the variances that occur within and between different cultural mindsets. The fact that we do not take these mindsets into account most of the time is one of the most glaring reasons for transcultural misinterpretation and international follies.

Of course taking cultural mindsets and their associated value systems into account can complicate matters considerably. Let me explain. There are three overriding lenses in our current world-system: these are the Occidental, the Sinic and the Indic mindsets. Each aspires to perceive knowledge accurately yet interprets truth, beauty and goodness in different ways.

The Occidental mindset, for example, overwhelmingly sees reality as a logically explicable system of physical artifacts, calibrations and observable phenomena. This mindset has been dominated by scientific rationalism, in spite of the philosophical outcry cautioning us that this viewpoint only illumines a path to perdition. Indeed the German writer Goethe claims in Urfaustus that putting one’s faith in Newtonian principles is tantamount to selling one’s soul to the devil.

In comparison, the Indic mindset sets far greater store on iterative cycles of internal reflection and spiritual transcendence, the prominence accorded to the relationship of the individual soul to the manifestation of external phenomena amounting almost to an ecological metaphysic. The Sinic mindset is different again, cherishing balance in all things – the feminine yin and the masculine yang preserving a delicate equilibrium between extremes.

There are other secondary mindsets that were once considerably more important in locally circumscribed situations than they are today in a global context. The ancient Amerindian, African Ubuntu and various Indigenous mindsets, for example, hold far less sway in today’s world, largely because they signify values, relationships and ideals that do not sit comfortably with our addiction to material wealth and scientific progress. These islands of humanity serve as critically disregarded laboratories where gender, social order, symbiosis and persistent narrative can still inform many of our inquiries. For that very reason we should be paying much more attention to them, specifically in terms of how we might develop a greater consciousness of evolving to a less exploitative worldview where communities can live in harmony with each other and nature. But that may take a radical metanoia on the part of society at large.

Finally, to make things even more complicated, there are subtle hybrids that blur the granular distinctions between mindsets - as in the recent amalgam of the dominant contemporary mindsets across much of Asia, resulting in part from globalization as well as the (intended and unintended) remnants of imperialism.

Thus a multitude of different interpretations and understandings can materialize from societies functioning within differing cultural mindsets – to the extent that extreme behavioural divergence between them is often evident even though the worldview itself, we must always remember, is a shared phenomenon.

So, depending upon our cultural upbringing and mode of induction into the modern world-system, as well as an individual’s developmental stage of consciousness, we will inevitably perceive, translate and respond to any crisis within the civilizational worldview through a distorting lens and with an intensity that differs from one society to the next, reflecting deeply implanted cultural attributes.[iv]

Because of this we also have a tendency to apply differently nuanced operating models (including the language used to express priorities and principles) to policy, governance, organizational and management issues that may give the impression of contradictory interests and needs. This impression is part illusion and part fact. A reality check can be undertaken by comparing such apparently conflicting interests with how the five moral impulses play out in each case. These checks invariably surface basic needs and habits that are universally applicable to the human family, irrespective of other incidental and local factors.

It is only comparatively recently that there has been any rigorous critical appraisal of the civilizational worldview – something almost unattainable from within. But there are now sufficient numbers of highly complex, interconnected, escalating, seemingly irresolvable problems created or nourished by this worldview, that are leading many thoughtful individuals to question how much longer its entropic nature can persist before unraveling into chaos. This is not whimsy but a grave epistemological issue and one best suited to exploration through epistemological foresight.

Given diverse crises facing humanity[v], particularly the perfect storm of intersecting economic, energy and environmental issues, we are reluctantly coming to terms with the proposition that there are indeed fixed limits to orthodox models of growth and development it would be wise not to ignore.

The human condition cries out for an alternative paradigm - an ecology of mind crafted to be intentionally viable and resilient and based upon design criteria that will make provision for the needs of humanity as a whole rather than pandering to a wealthy minority. The case for a new design, together with the process of letting go of stuff we still take for granted, becomes apparent when we look at just one of the many crises facing us. Consider this passage….

A Case in Polarization: The Environment

Eleven of the past fourteen years have been the hottest on record. The Nepalese leadership recently held a cabinet meeting on Mount Everest in order to draw attention to rising temperatures that have dramatically reduced snowfall over the roof of the world. The government of the Maldives held a cabinet meeting underwater to highlight the threat of global warming to the low-lying Indian Ocean nation. In Bolivia, glaciers that hold the nation’s water supplies are rapidly dwindling. The Arctic is melting so fast the ice cap is likely to have disappeared by the end of the century. Even East Antarctica, long stable, is now losing ice.

Elsewhere drought, floods, earthquakes and fires wreak havoc. Deforested peat lands in Indonesia are drying out and burning and the future of the Amazonian rainforest is similarly endangered. In parts of Australia drought and flood, once cyclical, are now considered a permanent condition. Rivers everywhere, including the mighty Ganges, an inextricable part of India’s physical and cultural landscape, are drying up, leaving only desiccated earth and dust bowls. The marshlands between the rivers Tigris and Euphrates, fabled site of the Garden of Eden, a land so rich in soil and water that it would quench the needs of its dwellers throughout eternity, emits the unmistakably pungent stench of a dying ecosystem.

Meanwhile the massive floods that killed hundreds of people in the Philippines this past summer are becoming the norm. Nor are such extreme weather events confined to the tropics or the polar regions. Agriculture in the United States was ravaged in 2010 by droughts in Texas and California, heat waves in Louisiana and Nebraska, floods in Minnesota and torrential rains in Illinois.

In Venice, a major trade hub and maritime power in the Middle Ages and still one of the most idyllic cities in the world, the number of permanent residents is hovering at around 60,000, having halved during the past fifty years. Why? Because Venice is sinking into its own foundations. Bangkok too, once romantically referred to as the Venice of the East and my home for the past six years, is sinking into coastal mud at an alarming rate of up to three centimeters each year.

Marine life, too, is being killed indiscriminately. Only 10 per cent of all large fish (both open ocean species including tuna, swordfish, marlin and large ground fish such as cod, halibut, skate and flounder) remain in the sea. Toxins and pollutants combined with current rates of ocean acidification could potentially deprive future generations of all wild seafood. We are now causing species to become extinct faster than they are being replaced.

On every continent desperate nomads are migrating further and further from traditional homelands, many of them inhabiting the vast urban metropolises which are now home to over 50 per cent of the world’s population. As many as 200 million people are destined to become climate migrants by 2050, destabilizing the global economy in a process that will inevitably result in escalating poverty, inequality and conflict.

As far as we can tell, this précis of accelerating climate change is not hyperbole but, on the contrary, a fairly measured evaluation of the contemporary predicament. When filtered through the rational lens of Newtonian physics and Darwinian evolution we observe a cataclysmic canvas. What is not commonly understood, and even less frequently stated, is that all these visible symptoms of a society and a planet in a state of distress are the predictable consequences of how we have deliberately designed things. They are a result of the civilizational worldview working as it was intended.

But is this the only truth? And, if so, is it adequate to comprehensively explain what is happening to the human species and to Earth? Is this depiction of an environment in stress the only possible interpretation? Let us examine the evidence more deeply through the lenses of different cultural mindsets.

1. The Occidental Lens: Environment in Crisis

To any reasonable witness schooled in the scientific method and Cartesian logic, no other reading can be put on the evidence. Pure reason demands that we construe the testimony as a crisis out there – a crisis located within the environment. That is what we know. All else is of little consequence.

But what if this is an inadequate or even an inaccurate image of reality? Could we be overlooking something significant by focusing only on what can be observed? Might there be vital information hidden within the collective gestalt for example? Much depends on where we choose to look - and through which lens.

At face value we interpret the evidence as a disturbing account of an environment in an acute state of collapse. Moreover, the causes look suspiciously anthropocentric. However, the subcutaneous code reveals an even more alarming prospect; namely the advancement of a morbid pathology where nature is perceived to be the problem to which we must urgently respond. But what should the nature of that response be? What treatment could possibly be effective in the circumstances?

The rational Occidental mind reacts instinctively in the belief that if technological thinking caused this problem then technology can also solve it. As a consequence we get caught up in predictable attempts to achieve a universal consensus through international legislation: laws, rules and processes designed to mitigate perceived threats by cutting the consumption of natural resources, slowing pollution from fossil fuels and adapting infrastructure. Is that a sufficient or even a sane response given that these attempts, too, seem to be failing? Or is such an impulse to regain control over nature merely hastening our self-destruction?

If our most basic hypotheses about how the universe works are correct then the various courses of action we see all around us, especially from governments as well as organizations like the UN, are probably sensible. If, however, our assumptions are categorically wrong (and there is a growing body of opinion that this is the case) nothing less than a fundamental change of mind concerning how we perceive reality is required. For without such a deep-seated metanoia it is highly improbable that more epistemologically appropriate solutions will emerge.

Let me be clear. The data contained within the statement we are examining are not untruths, although sometimes the hypothesis as conveyed may seem propaganda-like, especially to climate change cynics. On the contrary, the passage actually uses visible events to express a crisis in precisely the terms one might expect from the Occidental mindset: a series of observations with associated metrics, calibrations, statistics and analysis, all trying to make sense of the most subtle of changes in the external environment. My anxiety is threefold:

1. Surveillance stops short at a critical juncture between sensing (what is going on) and making sense - in other words the opportunity to bring fresh insights from alternative epistemologies and different stages of consciousness into strategic prominence is ignored
2. We impatiently disregard information hidden below the surface of our perceptions even though the process of meaning-making can be far more profound at the levels of cognition and emotion
3. No attempt is made to integrate information from our individual and collective inner worlds – all attention is focused on the external world.

Also of concern is the content and tone of messages that play into the dominant media meme[vi] vis-à-vis climate change - one that is increasingly projected onto such subject matter through alarmist, at times almost hysterical articles, opinion pieces, websites, television news, cinematic fiction, summits and conferences. Containing a range of disconcerting details, statistics taken out of context and dumbed-down opinion, the green meme of impending human catastrophe has become the dominant global narrative within the context of our relationship to the environment and, not surprisingly, it is generating anxiety and paralysis within communities. Indeed it is a first-rate example of what happens when awareness of any situation is amplified but without any prior thought being given to the consequences of such raised awareness in the collective psyche.

Not surprisingly this meme underpins many of the scenarios saturating our waking hours - choking optimism and playing to our fears, doubts and superstitions in ways that abandon any sense of a better future. Scenarios depicting positive outcomes are scorned or considered irresponsible by the merchants of doom and gloom.

In this psychotic state almost everything about the past (including, of course, the socio-economic platform that gave rise to affluence and to modern lifestyles) takes on a romantic perspective, while almost everything about the future is couched in depressing terms. Regrettably our nostalgia for the past is a seductive lie. It merely engenders apathy. Instead of aspiring to fresh goals we do everything in our power not to lose that which we once had. Energy dissipates right there!

As a consequence zero-sum games remain the actuality. Entangled in a transition we never intended and hardly thought possible, one that threatens to depose some of our most fundamental tenets and over which we have seemingly less control by the day, we are traumatized by an ominous sense of foreboding and the ennui of uncertainty.

Instead of embracing an energizing potential for renewal, especially the possibility of attending to inequities generated by increasingly predatory forms of capitalism, we descend prematurely into melancholy, grieving for the sacrifice to come and striving to avoid the pain of disassociation. In most cases that just means carrying on with life, turning a blind eye to worsening forecasts and devastating events, doing what we can to protect our own parochial interests, and all the while putting our trust in promises of further economic expansion and growth when that is clearly the root cause of our current mess. How absurd!

In these circumstance is it really any wonder vast numbers of citizens just switch off, get angry, or try to deny the limits inherent in nature that stare us in the face? Why should it surprise us when individuals search for ways to evade discomfort and to conserve, or even improve, their present life-style? Why should we all not join those climate prosperity advocates who fearlessly seek to create even greater wealth from this crisis without so much as questioning the flawed foundations underpinning the notion of endless growth? Should we continue to belittle and censure those who simply hanker for the conspiracy theorists to be correct and the scientists wrong? Is it not human nature that we should turn our backs on a future seemingly devoid of any optimism or joy?

2. The Sinic Lens: Environment in Discord

Realizing that an existential ideal is harmonious existence, we observe that the course of industrial linearity (the extraction of resources, the industrial fabrication of consumables and the single-use throw-away mentality inherent in modern notions of consumption) is dissonant with phenomenology in the natural order.

For those systems long starved of methane and carbon dioxide, the thinning ice-sheets are breathing life back into organisms that humanity has misunderstood or ignored in terms of their role and consequence. Algae, viruses and bacteria bloom in a world filled with chemicals released by unconsidered acts. 

Our response can be dual. On the one hand, we can see the emergence of these reinvigorated terrestrial forms as symbians with whom interaction can be positive. It is conceivable that the structure and energy of these dynamic agents can align with ours in abundant cohabitation. On the other hand, we can view these energies as alien intruders and choose to oppose their emergence. While evolution cautions that the second path is unlikely to prevail in the long view, rallying around a common defense is a timeliness component of species-evident values and, as a result, may serve as an impulse to aggregate in community.

Beyond duality we can choose a more transformational pathway, embracing the role of imprudent acts which triggered this dissonance but seeking pathways to re-establish harmony. This may mean remediating our unconsidered acts, having acknowledged them as such, as well as our complicity in their invention. It may also mean uniting in acts of reconciliation that connect us more aptly in our eleventh-hour efforts to develop a considered response to our unconsidered, collective neglect. 

One can see this view in conflict in the past decade of economic and social activity in the People’s Republic of China. In the wake of the Kyoto Protocol discussions, China attempted to bridge its growing role as a world power with the post-imperialist concessions afforded in the aging paradigm under the moniker of developing nation.  In response to perceived need for power, industrial scale agriculture, and projected evidence of achievement, the Three Rivers Gorge scheme became a “coming of age” project. Sold simultaneously as ecological (non-polluting) energy as well as evidence of engineering mastery, China chose an iconic symbol of power explicitly from nature – in this case, a river.

However, discord challenged the project from the outset. Irreplaceable cultural heritage was flooded. Communities were displaced. Technology to harness power was largely supplied by foreign entities. Scant attention was paid towards the environmental cost of production (entailing vast concrete and steel consumption) or utilization (a toxification of vital waterways threatening the health of millions). 

Against the pollution of the waterways, however, has emerged a concerted effort by Chinese scientists to derive biofuel options from the various algaes that now blight the coastal waterways. Developments on algal agriculture, bacterial biodigesters and the like have emerged as centers of excellence in a country that seeks to balance Occidental metered growth with Sinic scaled engagement.

3. The Indic Lens: Environment in Dharmic Cycle

The world is as it is and we learn from our experiences. Humanity has come to the concluding stages of a process of awakening and passage through this dark stage is necessary if we are to reawaken with a new sense of being at a higher level of consciousness than before.

Prior to the industrial period we were not given the opportunity to acquire the value of reflective stewardship. Thus our understanding was compromised. Instead, our experiments with violence and with conflict (often amounting to trivial aggression over resources and territories and dominated by an imperial desire to kill, maim and impoverish for the selective opulence of a few) have come to mete lessons on those who saw themselves as beneficiaries of unconsidered systems.

These lessons must be embraced, instilled with the energy we previously released in callous and abusive behaviour, but in ways that express new models of engagement and relationship. Such is the path to enlightenment.

Those intoxicated by possessions and trapped within the current manifestation of reckless consumption will perish. But, in an awakened state, humanity will emerge more aware.

Perishing (should we embrace the process) will manifest as the eclipsing of those behaviors and memes that have dishonored matter, energy and spirit and the emergence of a refined engagement of the same in a new fashion. Perishing (should we enter into conflict with the process) will manifest as a violent retribution from matter, energy, and spirit abuse where the elements themselves will persist in destroying that which is triggering the immune response.

There is no path that does not involve destruction and there is no path that will not give rise to rebirth.

Many countries across Asia and the Global South are demonstrating collective responses that evidence the patterns emerging from the Indic mindset. In India itself, the retrofitting of compressed natural gas (CNG) in public transport vehicles in Delhi and throughout metropolitan centers has led to an immediate improvement in air quality the likes of which have occurred in few other places.

In the space of two years, pragmatism and public investment aligned to improve the air quality and living conditions of all as evidence of a notion of shared stewardship of the air. In post-Apartheid South Africa, resource management (including metals, gems, and energy) became the fulcrum for re-engagement of a national dialogue on resource stewardship and, through this context, social reconciliation was integrated into economic engagement. In Fiji rejection of colonial influences led to the provocative realignment of social order and systems.

Ironically, modern expressions of Indic philosophy include stark post-colonial reflexive social challenges in almost every incidence. However, as one examines these and other cases, what emerges is a clear prioritization on community and family accountability, in stark contrast to the abdication of such priorities for some apathetic caretaker state. This by no means suggests that bureaucracies are not flourishing and grossly ineffective in these states. But it is important to perceive the growing recognition of the role of the community unit rather than the collective apathy of displaced responsibility.

Intentional Evolution:

And so it seems there are far more inspiring alternatives to the enervating cynicism, uncertainties and increasingly shrill revelations of impending disaster that flood the Occidental mind daily. Stories that offer hope and intentions that chronicle a brighter future for all.

Human civilization is certainly in a state of transition. Indeed we may have reached a developmental crisis point, one that necessitates a redefinition of what we interpret to be progress. Yet while we can only analyze past transitions, the future paradigm still remains ours to invent. Along with technological revolutions, socio-economic crises offer exceptional opportunities to move to higher levels of evolution. We just need to be able to see the promise of societal renewal with greater clarity and conviction, which is why epistemology (the framework of understanding within which we make meaning) becomes so vital.

Contextual dynamics both establish and reflect dominant belief systems in the culture. An appreciation of context becomes particularly critical when so many of the ideas and institutions defining Western culture appear to be breaking down. This is the case today. It is the ideal time to be learning from diverse cultural traditions as an alternative to insisting upon the validity of a superior Occidental mindset, which is simply a delusion.

The Sinic and Indic traditions, as well as the various indigenous mindsets, enable an entirely different quality of reaction to the environmental crisis than that afforded through the Occidental lens.

Possibly the most profound transition in history, one that has taken hundreds of years so far and is still far from completion was the move away from pious notions of an infallible maker (or supreme being) to the concept of scientific materialism. Here it is the physical world that really counts. This shift required an across-the-board abandoning of deeply imprinted fears and fallacies. Predictably it led to the modern obsession with material goods and the acquisition of personal wealth. But evolution cannot stop there. We must move beyond even that phase of understanding.

Among the most vital of contemporary principles is the rejection of the idea of the world as a machine and the adoption of the world as a living system. The transition towards a new society instilled with such a fundamental ontological shift appears most likely to lead to a new holistic consciousness that integrates both science and spirit. Yet the practical realities of governing a global population of seven billion people still lag far behind conceptions.

In the past at least part of the problem was our inability or unwillingness to engage with really big issues (such as environmental degradation or property ownership) in any meaningful or constructive manner. Our inclination to delegate vital decisions to others (whether to dictators, monarchs, professional managers or councils of elected representatives) was deemed pragmatic. And our intransigent aversion to experience reality through an others perspective allowed us to live unconsidered lives. In reality this represented a disquieting social apathy – an ingrained passivity that is extremely difficult to overcome today. What is more it often allowed corruption, misconduct and oppression to thrive, to which we then turned a blind eye for fear of attracting still further repression. Many communities still suffer from that indifference today.

With the advent of today’s sophisticated communications systems and online social media, however, there can be no excuse. People are able to speak out and air their grievances, wielding power in ways that were previously out of the question. Dictators and governments fall at the hands of people power. Today, the voice of every citizen can be heard. Individuals can contribute to a global community of mind (a collective intelligence for change) should they wish to do so. Indeed some pundits argue the case that it is impossible to remain quarantined from such participation, given the potency and insidious nature of new social media. Furthermore, social networks help create the collective consciousness we so urgently need to reboot civilization.

In attempting to address the inevitable impacts of our hot over-crowded planet on individual lifestyles the application of such crowd-sourced intelligence, supported by all the innate wisdom and expertise we can muster, is vital. But whereas collective intelligence urges the immediate deployment of smart technologies, a shift to clean energy and the rapid phasing out of toxic products and practices, sagacity entreats us to pause, to shift the conversation, to pose uncommon questions that are missing from the current dialogue.

Some of the more important questions we should be pondering are not even on the agenda. While the greatest threats to humanity and to our environment seem to be that nothing is done, that the wrong things are done too quickly, or that too little is done too late, the greatest threat to our social well-being is that we act without wisdom.

The most urgent questions for humanity no longer focus on discrete issues and their impact but on how we can adapt and evolve to changing conditions, lessening the damage wherever we can and exploiting opportunities that are bound to emerge and delaying more serious consequences. There are two philosophical questions we need to answer: how can we tread more lightly on this planet and how can we preserve for future generations what is uniquely beautiful and inherently precious about our world?

A Critical Role:

So far our response to these questions has been depressingly inadequate. On deeper, more spiritual issues, such as how we can accelerate our capacity to adapt to the laws of physics in ways that enable more sustainable relationships, with each other and with the Earth, there has been a deafening silence. It is within this context that the role of foresight becomes critical. But the field itself will need to evolve in the following ways:  

1. Foresight practitioners must awaken to their role as curators of authentic integral experiences. Active self-reflection in the quest towards self-mastery has to be a pre-requisite for evolving foresight theory and praxis. It is only when mastery is fully understood that “higher altitude” questions around deep design can surface and be transparently explored. If an important part of our work is to facilitate the intentional evolution of society we need first to engage in that project at a deeply intimate and personal level. Viewing self as a mechanism for transition needs to be part of the process of bringing greater clarity, depth and rigor to the field and its efforts.

2. We must also ensure that foresight invites the possibility for identifying the true nature of individual and collective pathologies as well as putting forward solutions that are systemically viable and strategically resilient in a context that is morphing by the minute. The former demands integral intelligence, uncompromised by filtering and compartmentalized thinking. The latter requires a genuine blend of systemic consciousness and imagination coupled with commercial pragmatism and entrepreneurial flair.

3. Foresight must shift from its obsession with technology and uncomplicated issues to encompass a broader mix of higher altitude observations concerning the purpose of humanity, the provisioning of resources to accommodate the needs of an escalating global population, design criteria for social change, disparities between affluent and less privileged individuals and communities, and the rules and conventions that exacerbate division, competition and conflict within society.

4. Tools and methods must arise from philosophy, embracing both collective insights and expert opinion in an attempt to transcend obsolete knowledge in the co-design of new wisdom. This will take an expansive process of collaborative inquiry blended with curated transformational narratives that probe far more deeply into our inner belief systems and collective cultural traits than has hitherto been considered relevant.

5. The facilitation of foresight must move from conventional spaces into immersive environments. These decision theatres must be capable of (i) vividly visualizing dynamically complex patterns and data (ii) mapping the intended and unintended consequences of decisions (iii) simulating and modeling alternative solutions, and (iv) prototyping and stress-testing systemic designs.

6. Whole-system, collaborative inquiry and design conversations must take pre-eminence over other misused and increasingly hackneyed foresight methods. This is critical if we are to really engage a broader clientele in understanding that emergent patterns in our systems are simply the product of the way the system has been designed to function. Reframing symptoms (as frequently occurs during the crafting of scenarios) is a distraction, inadvertently shifting attention away from fundamental causes. Redesigning whole systems however (and, more importantly, the intentions informing that design) and we begin to solve the actual issues and dilemmas we are trying to grapple with on the surface – in addition, quite possibly, to resolving many other related concerns.

In a similar vein, scenarists must develop the capability for curating experiences in real time. They will need access to a range of relevant models and theories-in-play in order to guide, provoke and compose a seamless dialogue that includes and transcends prior knowledge.

It is also worth noting that when we are preoccupied with discrete technical issues and observable trends (as typically happens, for example, when scenario methods and technology roadmaps are adopted) our tendency is to converge around explicit goals we want to achieve or explicit futures we want to avoid.[vii] This is a mind-trap. Being overly attached to a particular outcome, especially one linked to a so-called focusing question, can deceive us into believing that the goal itself is of greater import than the desired end-state. As evidenced by the fact there is so much insipid and uninspired strategic thinking in corporate life today, this attachment can drag us further away from any deeper intentions we might long to embed in the system.

7. Foresight can no longer simply be about the future. It must pull information from past and future states into an expanded now of new consciousness. In this way the field of strategic foresight itself can be expanded, becoming genuinely transformative and therefore more strategically significant. This is the emerging field of epistemological foresight.

Future Pathways:

An elemental distinction between societies is whether they accentuate the spiritual or the physical realm. Within pre-literate communities these were (indeed are) identical. Throughout the late 19^th and 20^th centuries, emboldened by globalized trade and technological innovation, others eagerly embraced the Occidental mindset. Today we sense a less-fractured world, united by a common purpose, edging towards a more unified, all-encompassing mindset in which science and spirituality, as well as our internal and external worlds, strive to fuse once again.

What is evolving today, however, is not the individual but the composite organism of humanity. Even so, until we fully comprehend we are all part of a single living ecosystem, that we are all intimately connected to the Gaian biosphere that gives us life, and that cooperation and not competition is the key to our future existence, we will most likely continue to butcher each other and despoil the planet.

When a society accepts specific answers to recurrent questions from a particular body of knowledge, they commonly turn to that same source for other truths about reality. In the Middle Ages people asked the local priest or to the Church to help them resolve problems in their daily lives. Prior to that it was the village shaman or the witch doctor. When science eclipsed religion we turned to technologists for the answers. Now it is time to turn to the custodians of integral foresight and to more holistic, integrated and authentically human states of being. Epistemological foresight is the key to a deeper, more intentional design, of a unified society living in harmony with its environment.

We have been watching with increasing dismay the tragic events unfolding in Japan and Libya. As witness to these events who can doubt we are poised on the cusp of fundamental change? This moment in world history is unique. Exceptional times call for exceptional responses and not simply more of the same. Yet uniqueness of the type now warranted only emanates from higher levels of  intentionality - a collective consciousness intensely focused on integrating and transcending past paradigms and poles of thought.

Many argue that foresight methods have played a critical role in the development of modernist thinking - especially in encouraging us to imagine and rehearse what we would do should future realities turn out not to match our best-informed guesses. And they are correct. But we still remain trapped in prisons of our own invention, which is why these same foresight methods require radical philosophical and operational upgrades if they are to remain strategically relevant. The future of foresight is at stake.

Without valid foresight we put in jeopardy both the highly sophisticated nature of our society as well as its more pragmatic capacity to produce and distribute life’s necessities. One might perceive this threat as a potential collision between fate and desire. In that context, risks appear to have emerged as a direct result of the way we think - about our needs, our rights, our aspirations and our interactions, particularly relative to each other and to the planet.

Now we must think again. And differently this time. Not only through different lenses but also from a variety of altitudes. Epistemological foresight can help us move beyond the civilizational worldview by integrating and transcending current ways of thinking and doing as we re-imagine our collective state of being.

Over the past few centuries our world-system has advanced incredibly and in so many different ways. Today, those fortunate enough to be living in the developed world enjoy levels of material wellbeing that was unimaginable even a few years ago. At the same time much of what was once fresh and beautiful about humankind has ossified into a rigid shell - homogenous, pitiless, seemingly devoid of empathy, wonder or love. Bloated from excessive consumption, exhausted by pointless conflict, we await an emergency that will cause the blueprint of a new society to emerge from the imaginal cells of our deepest communion - like the metamorphosis of a chrysalis into a butterfly.

Perhaps global heating is that emergency - or will swiftly become so if government inaction persists. Yet all crises offer us a plethora of possible ways forward. Some paths lead to a better future for humanity as a whole. Others, and I fear these are the pathways we are intent on pursuing, chart a course that lock-in current divisions and convictions – especially the paradigmatic impulse linking progress to continuous economic growth and development.

We know that broadly defining a better future, one that is healthier, sustainable and more abundant than present actualities, is critical to human progress. But what do we imagine when we speak of better futures? What do we find inspiring? And how does a better future stack up with what we already have and what we believe we may be about to lose? These are critical questions to ponder as we take the first tentative steps within a new consciousness of possibilities.

In the past we have frequently quashed or undermined our capacity to substitute imprinted assumptions and beliefs for something far more viable and compelling. But we cannot wait any longer. It is time to open new windows onto new worlds.

There can be little doubt that the transcendence of the civilizational worldview, with its prejudicial constraints, exploitative traits and profound injustices, is the most vitally compelling yet audacious key towards unlocking such new windows. Impending societal collapse demands alternative options, visualizations, memes and strategies. And that is precisely the opportunity offered by epistemological foresight.

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[i] Epistemological foresight in this context is the all-encompassing domain of human consciousness, experience and knowledge. It includes the various ‘integral’ theories put forward by contemporary scholars like Ken Wilber, Rudolf Steiner, Sri Aurobindo and Ervin Laszlo as well as those in other, more ancient traditions but also goes beyond these by stepping into alternative ways of knowing that are not constrained by orthodox technological rationalism

[ii] Panarchy is the framework in which systems, including those of nature (such as forests and oceans) and of humans (such as capitalism and governance) as well as combined human-natural systems (such as institutions that govern the use of natural resources) are interlinked in continual adaptive cycles of growth, accumulation, restructuring, and renewal.

[iii] These five foundational moral impulses are best depicted as (i) it is wrong to hurt people (ii) justice and fairness are good qualities (iii) allegiance, loyalty and patriotism are virtues (iv) people should respect social hierarchy (v) purity and sanctity are good while contamination and pollution (and their associated character traits of greed and lust) are bad. Note that different cultures and groups bring different weightings to these shared five moral imperatives.

[iv] Extensive empirical research in the field of developmental psychology has shown that our ability to step into new epistemologies and to view reality through multiple lenses, perspectives and cultural mindsets, unfolds through nested stages. One of the reasons we struggle to see and appreciate alternative points of view is that we may be in an arrested state of awareness that literally prevents us from seeing and understanding more. The dance between our individual developmental stages and the evolution of a civilizational worldview with its various cultural mindsets further advances the need  for integral foresight, especially as it starts to draw attention to the interplay between intentional evolution at the level of both individual and collective levels of consciousness

[v] The four major crises facing humanity are crises of consciousness, behaviours, cultures and systems

[vi] An idea originally proposed by Richard Dawkins, author of The Selfish Gene, a meme acts as a vehicle for conveying cultural ideas, symbols or practices, which can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals or other imitable phenomena. Memes can be regarded as cultural analogues to genes in that they self-replicate mutate and respond to selective pressures.

[vii] I am using the term “outcome” as applying to a number of resulting changes we wish to experience within a system rather than that experience in its totality which I prefer to define as a “desired state”

 

Middle East Protests & Oil Addiction

Gasoline prices have been rising this winter in the US even though we are well outside the summer driving season with its traditionally highest price level. Among the reasons for today's higher gasoline and crude oil prices is the high demand for heating oil during this extra cold winter, as heating oil in some northern parts of the world is a life-and-death commodity. This can put some pressure on gasoline supplies as refineries might attempt to maximize heating oil output, although refining requires producing a constant balance of light, medium and heavy products, at fairly high utilization of capacity.

Crude oil prices have been moving toward the $100 per barrel mark. The actual price for crude and petroleum products is much higher in some nations due to subsidies (direct and hidden), keeping prices artificially low. But the official price of oil seems on the way to break the $147 / bbl record from July 2008.

Whether the emerging economic powerhouses China and India are the main reason for higher oil prices is academic, when the whole world is affected by developments in price and supply anywhere. The stability of countries such as Egypt and other Arab states has been proven illusory. When the right geopolitical event in the Persian Gulf (perhaps connected to the Tunisian, Egyptian and Yemeni trends now in play) interrupts oil supplies by as much as 10% or more of global demand, the effect on the oil market may well be as if Hubbert's peak oil bell curve became a cliff that we have already jumped off.

A revolution in Saudi Arabia has been my favorite example for years, in terms of illustrating what can spark a return to the 1970s' skyrocketing oil prices, panic buying and hoarding. As grocery shelves will be emptied in a few days when a major oil supply crunch hits, as the late Matt Simmons reminded us, what difference does it make how many billions of barrels of crude are really off Brazil's coast?

Now, when people didn't expect it but should have, we see that Arab peoples have indeed been chafing under dictatorship for decades. Arabs, as in most places, have been biding their time for liberation. Whether certain regions can soon attain it is another matter, when many have far outstripped their besieged ecosystems' carrying capacities. In Middle Eastern countries the water and soil situations are generally poor and getting worse. Food shortage and food riots can flow from ecological deterioration, especially as new weather patterns (or non-patterns) have been increasingly disruptive for agriculture.

This is one argument for activists in Arab lands to remember there is no liberation or equality on a dead planet. Although the Egyptian uprising or revolution is hundreds of miles removed from the Persian Gulf, where 18% of the world's total trade in crude its shipped through the Strait of Hormuz, a common spirit of rebellion has spread in the region. It can take a sharp anti-American or anti-corporate turn and thus affect oil exports to the U.S.

In Saudi Arabia where the monarchy is extremely repressive, demonstrators have dared come out of the woodwork after Tunisians sent their dictator packing. International emphasis on military security in the region has been on huge ships and the Persian Gulf itself, but numerous facilities on land in Arab countries and nearby nations are vulnerable to attack and closure. Also, the Suez Canal sees one million barrels of oil pass through each day from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean.

The number of separate but linked oil facilities, extent of damage, or days of closure do not have to conform to some arithmetic model for there to be a massive reaction in the world oil market. The perception of supply shortage, with real instances affecting deliveries, is what drives oil prices on the world market, much as the stock market sometimes has a herd mentality. So far we are talking about what most observers would consider a temporary oil supply disruption resulting in a price spike. However, if the disruption and spike are strong enough, severe effects can shut down much of the global economy and simultaneously stop much local activity.

Petrocollapse - the exacerbated and lasting failure of the world oil market to meet demand, and the paralysis and collapse of most of the economy's infrastructure relying on petroleum - does not need to follow a formula or specific pattern of oil industry breakdown or a certain depletion schedule of oil reserves. We will only be sure when petrocollapse hits. Because peak oil has been attained, we can say that the petrocollapse process has begun and just needs a catalyst to tip the whole economy and trigger famine on a scale as large as some future climate disaster.

I don't believe the "Transition Town" or less-known "Stair-case slow collapse/catabolic" viewpoints take into account adequately the extreme vulnerability of and to the oil market. The Transition Town and Stair-case adherents' views, hopes, dreams and assumptions may actually refer to social change from civilization collapse, when they may think they are referring to the post-peak oil downslope, or vice versa. But this may make no difference as events may accelerate, and collapse and die-off throw theory and wishes out the window.

In my oil analysis career at Lundberg Survey, we accurately predicted the Second Oil Shock based on our finding that in March 1979 there would be a 9% shortfall of gasoline for U.S. demand. It was a time of billions fewer humans and rising oil production (extraction). The world also seemed poised to follow through with stringent conservation and development of alternative fuels. After Jimmy Carter's failure to catch fire with those strategies, energy efficiency actually reversed direction with the SUV phenomenon. But any slight per capita gains, had they been consistently in the right direction for conservation, are offset anyway by growth, while efficiencies paradoxically end up adding to more consumption.

Since 1979, aggregate energy demand has not been tamed in the least, and growth of the global oil infrastructure has dangerously proliferated. Peak oil extraction happened worldwide around 2006, according to the International Energy Agency, although "peak" is not a single year due to the advent of nonconventional crudes and biofuels over time. Peak oil is the main reason we are living in very different "oil times" since 1979: growth of crude supply has turned a corner, starting downward. Compared to past years, even conventional crude (light, sweet, easily extracted) - besides unconventional and expensive, extra-polluting oil replacements - is far more expensive to exploit, with lower net energy obtained for newer fields.

Petrocollapse will not be limited to the U.S., as we shall see when dominoes fall. The bigger they are, the harder they fall. The popular faith in renewable and other alternative fuels to "save us" from dwindling oil reserves or from a loss of Middle Eastern or OPEC oil ought to be shattered prior to the rude and crude awakening from a significant supply crunch. The alternatives are not ready on a large scale, and generally only provide electricity rather than liquid fuels or petrochemicals or other materials. We will only wake up en masse when chaos starts to rapidly unfold - as if it hasn't already.

One is constantly cautioned to never conclude on a sour note. So I will point to the silver lining of collapse as a liberator far more fundamental than regime change. This is because basic relationships in society will be radically altered by extreme lifestyle change brought about by the loss of petroleum and by having to painfully face the recent separation from natural cycles that modern technological societies have achieved.

The U.S. is still thought to be the richest country in the world, but increasingly this fact requires the caveat of a greater and greater gap between the rich and poor. According to the CIA World Fact Book, the US is ranked as the 42nd most unequal country in the world. In contrast, Tunisia is far better off, ranked the 62nd most unequal country. Yemen is ranked 76th most unequal. And Egypt is ranked as the 90th most unequal country! And inequality in the U.S. has soared in the last couple of years.

The New York Times published on 31 January that in Egypt "long-simmering resentments have burst into open class warfare." As poor as the Arab peoples are who are rioting and replacing regimes, and as important as this is for Arabs and all people under oppression, it is even more urgent for US citizens to focus on questioning their own circumstances vis-a-vis petroleum dependence.

Fossil fuels do not make us safer or healthier. Besides getting soft from sitting in our cars, before the TV and under the influence of many pharmaceutical drugs made from fossil fuels, US citizens seem to still want to believe all is more or less well. As to energy, many still believe "they will think of something." But some of us would rather "Imagine" and create now a radically more liberating and equitable world and way of living, as John Lennon did with his song of that name.

This article was written by Jan Lundberg and was first published in Alternet on 1st January 2011. It is reprinted here with Jan's permission. Jan is founder of Culture Change and was an oil industry analyst at Lundberg Survey before joining the grassroots environmental movement in 1988.

Climate Cranks: Time to Fight Back

I didn't realize it at the time, but my daughter was born at a momentous turning point in history. She arrived on a sunny San Francisco afternoon in April 2005. All the nurses kept remarking on how alert this baby was, so her mother and I decided to name her Chiara, which means "clear and bright" in Italian.

I had been covering the climate story for fifteen years by then, and when Chiara was almost six months old, I went to London to interview Sir David King, then the British government's chief science adviser. The interview changed my life. King, who had done as much as anyone except Al Gore to awaken the world to the dangers of climate change, helped me understand that the climate problem had undergone a profound, largely unexpected paradigm shift that carried the gravest of implications for little Chiara and all the world's children. No longer was climate change a preventable future threat; it was now a punishing current reality, one that was guaranteed to get worse, perhaps a lot worse, before it got better.

My interview with King led me to write HOT: Living Through the Next Fifty Years on Earth  which has just been published. My hope was to find a way for my daughter and her peers around the world to cope with all that lies in store for them. After four years of investigation that took me across the United States and around the world, I'm heartened to report that there are many practical steps we all can take—as individuals, as communities, as countries—to protect our societies and our young people from the changes in our climate that are unavoidable over the coming decades.

Still, I am saddened and angry that we find ourselves in this position in the first place. After all, humanity's failure to take action in time against global warming was a conscious decision, a result of countless official debates where the case for reducing greenhouse gas emissions was exhaustively considered and deliberately rejected. Much of the blame for this unfortunate outcome belongs to people I have come to refer to as climate cranks—the corporate lobbyists and right-wing ideologues who for twenty years have done all in their power to keep this country, especially the government, from seriously addressing the problem.

In my journalism I have frequently pointed out the nefarious role the climate cranks have played in our national politics, but I confess I have often wondered how much good this did. I revere the profession of journalism and have long believed that it is best kept separate from activism; each of these callings has its own role to play in the endless struggle to make a better world. But I am not only a journalist. I am also a father. And as a father who during all of my now 5-year-old daughter's life has been watching governments, especially my own, do next to nothing about the climate catastrophe hurtling toward us, I have come to feel obligated to reach beyond the tools of journalism, vital as they are. Like my colleagues Bill McKibben and Mike Tidwell, two journalists and fathers who have also come to embrace climate activism, I now feel compelled to take more direct action. If Chiara and her peers around the world are to have a decent chance of inheriting a livable planet, the status quo cannot stand. We need transformative change, above all in Washington, and we need it quickly.

Which is why I will go to Washington the week of February 15 to confront the climate cranks—in Congress, in the media and in the corporate sector—and try to stop them from further sabotaging our response to the climate crisis. My partners in this effort will include the group Kids vs Global Warming, whose iMatter march aims to put a million kids in the streets on Mother's Day to demand that our leaders address climate change as if our children's future matters; Grist, America's leading environmental news website; The Nation; and other organizations still to be determined.

On the ground in Washington I will be joined by local young people—activist members of Generation Hot. Our plan is to confront the climate cranks face to face, on camera, and call them to account for the dangers they have set in motion. We will highlight the ludicrousness of their antiscientific views, which alone should discredit them from further influence over US climate policies. And we will show how our nation could still change course—for example, if the federal government were to use its vast purchasing power to kick-start a green energy revolution that would create jobs and prosperity across the land. We welcome your help and constructive suggestions for how to achieve these goals and invite you to join us.

But now let me turn to the question of why such direct action has become necessary. From the time global warming emerged on the public agenda in the late 1980s, it was regarded as a grave but distant future threat and, crucially, one that could be neutralized if humanity acted quickly enough to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. I shared these assumptions until my October 2005 interview with David King shattered them. The science adviser told me that in fact global warming had already triggered outright climate change, and had done so a hundred years sooner than even the most concerned scientists had expected. One early manifestation, according to three British scientists writing in Nature, was the record heat wave that brutalized Europe in the summer of 2003. King cited government statistics indicating that the heat had killed 31,000 people, making it "the deadliest disaster in modern European history." Yet this turned out to be an underestimate. An epidemiological study conducted in 2008 for the European Union—reported here for the first time—concluded that the 2003 heat wave had caused at least 71,449 excess deaths, a toll considerably higher than the United States suffered during the Vietnam War.

As a new father, most alarming to me was King's next point: this newly triggered climate change is bound to intensify for the rest of my daughter's life. The inertia of the climate system—that is, the laws of physics and chemistry—guarantee that average global temperatures will keep rising for decades to come, no matter how fervently humanity might embrace solar energy, electric vehicles and other options for reducing emissions. And as temperatures rise, this global warming will unleash still more climate change: deeper droughts, stronger storms, wilder wildfires and so on, as well as faster sea level rise.

"No, no, it's not too late," King hurried to reply when I asked if this paradigm shift means all is lost. But the early arrival of climate change does transform the nature of the problem, as paradigm shifts tend to do. To wit, humanity now faces a double imperative. The traditional goal of climate policy—to reduce global warming—has now become more urgent than ever, for if global temperature rise isn't halted soon, it could gain too much momentum ever to reverse. Yet at the same time, humanity has no choice but "to adapt to the impacts that are in the pipeline" over the coming decades, said King. In short, we have to live through global warming even as we try to reverse it.

All of this makes my daughter an involuntary member of what I call Generation Hot. In fact, every child on earth born after June 23, 1988, belongs to Generation Hot, roughly 2 billion young people in total. I choose that date because it was the day humanity was put on notice that human activities were unwittingly raising temperatures on this planet. The warning was in NASA scientist James Hansen's testimony to the Senate, boosted by the decision of the New York Times to publish the story on the front page, thus making "global warming" a common phrase in newsrooms, government offices and households the world over. But Hansen's and countless subsequent warnings have gone unheeded, largely because of stiff resistance from the carbon lobby, to borrow author Jeremy Leggett's term—the energy and auto companies that profit from carbon dioxide emissions, the politicians and propagandists these companies sponsor and the right-wing ideologues who share their antigovernment sympathies.

My daughter and the rest of Generation Hot are fated to pay the price for this foot-dragging. One of the most unpleasant facts about climate change is that, once triggered, it cannot be turned off anytime soon. Even if humanity somehow stopped emitting carbon dioxide overnight, King told me, "temperatures will keep rising and all the impacts will keep changing for about twenty-five years." Since it is likely to take us at least a quarter-century to leave fossil fuels behind, the reality is that we're locked in to at least fifty more years of rising temperatures and the harsher climate impacts they bring. Thus the young people of Generation Hot are condemned to spend the rest of their lives coping with a climate that will be hotter and more volatile than ever before in our civilization's history.

You want specifics? By the time she is my age, Chiara may well not have enough water to drink here in California, because much of the Sierra Nevada snowpack will have melted. Children in today's Washington, DC, are likely to witness in the course of their lifetimes sea level rise combine with stronger storm surges to regularly ring the Jefferson and Lincoln memorials with moats and submerge half of the National Mall. By 2050 the record heat that made the summer of 2010 so wicked will become the new normal in New York City and much of the East Coast. Overseas, the impacts will be punishing as well, especially for the poor. In Bangladesh, sea level rise is already making the soil and water in southern coastal regions too salty to produce decent yields of rice, the staple crop for hundreds of years. Meanwhile, the inexorability of sea level rise ensures that many such low-lying areas worldwide will have to be evacuated, unleashing vast streams of climate change refugees. Military experts warn that this will pose not only humanitarian challenges but recurring threats to peace if the refugees attempt to cross national borders.

Precisely how much blame the carbon lobby and climate cranks deserve for the fate of Generation Hot cannot yet be scientifically determined. In theory, it's possible that global warming would have prematurely given rise to outright climate change even if the United States and other countries had scaled back their emissions beginning in the late 1980s. After all, it is the historic accumulation of greenhouse gases, not the annual emissions, that drives global warming. Scientists are still debating exactly when global warming sparked climate change, as well as the related question of how much responsibility global warming bears for any particular climate impact. (In their Nature study of the 2003 heat wave, for example, the three British scientists estimated that global warming was responsible for about 75 percent of the excessive heat Europe experienced that summer.)

But these are scientific nuances. As a practical matter, there is no denying that the large amount of greenhouse gases emitted since June 23, 1988—about 40 percent of humanity's total emissions since the Industrial Revolution—made global warming worse. That, in turn, increased the likelihood of unleashing climate change. Viewed in this context, the obstructionism of the carbon lobby and climate cranks played a decisive role.

Throughout the 1990s and the first decade of the twenty-first century, the climate cranks blocked our government from taking serious action against emissions. By doing so, they also stalled international action (since other countries were understandably reluctant to reduce their emissions when the world's biggest polluter was unwilling to do so). Thus limits on global warming were avoided at the very time they would have mattered most. "Had some individual countries, especially the US, begun to act in the early to mid-1990s, we might have [avoided dangerous climate change]," Michael Oppenheimer, a professor of geosciences at Princeton who ranks among the world's most eminent climate scientists, told me. "But we didn't, and now the impacts are here."

"This was a crime," Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, Germany's former chief government adviser on climate told me. But the wrong people are being punished. My daughter and the rest of Generation Hot have been given a life sentence for a crime they didn't commit. Meanwhile, the perpetrators are reaping record profits, enjoying prominent media coverage (and not only on Fox) and even gaining control of the House of Representatives, where they plan to launch an inquisition against climate scientists who don't share their loony ideas.

It is outrageous that these climate cranks have the upper hand in Washington. The plain truth is that they have no more scientific credibility than the Flat Earth Society, and that should discredit them from exercising any influence over our climate policy, much less holding it hostage to their ideological and economic agendas. But someone has to stand up and point out that the emperor has no clothes.

Don't rely on our media to rise to the occasion. The protocol of mainstream news coverage leads Washington journalists to refer to these people as climate skeptics. They're not skeptics. They're cranks. True skepticism is invaluable to the scientific method, but an honest skeptic can be persuaded by facts, if they are sound. The cranks are impervious to facts, at least facts that contradict their wacky worldview. When virtually every national science academy in the developed world, including our own, and every major scientific organization (e.g., the American Geophysical Union, the American Physics Society) has affirmed that climate change is real and extremely dangerous, only a crank continues to insist that it's all a left-wing plot.

One crank recently took me to task for supposedly having no respect for science. In my reply, I assured him I respected science as much as anyone who lives in the modern world, where we take for granted air travel, Wi-Fi Internet, modern medicine and a host of other blessings. Then I asked, "If you respect science so much, how do you explain the fact that virtually every major scientific body on earth disagrees with you about climate science? Are they all in on the conspiracy?" He never replied, but of course that is the logical implication of his camp's insistence that they do too have science on their side. The scientists who say otherwise are all part of a conspiracy to—well, take your pick: to keep the research dollars flowing, to expand government control of the economy, to dismantle modern society and return us to hunter-gatherer primitivism. As I said, these are the ravings of cranks.

You can hear much the same from Congressional Republicans, starting with Jim Sensenbrenner of Wisconsin, the vice chair of the House Science Committee, who will be leading the charge to debunk mainstream climate science. "I personally believe that the solar flares are more responsible for climatic cycles than anything human beings do," Sensenbrenner has opined, repeating a talking point favored by many climate cranks but definitively refuted by many peer-reviewed scientific studies. For his part, the new Speaker of the House, John Boehner, is so scientifically illiterate that he apparently thinks the environmental complaint about carbon dioxide is that it's a carcinogen. Uh, no, Mr. Speaker, that's actually the rap against those cigarettes you like smoking (and whose manufacturers you've defended all these years).

Newly emboldened by the midterm elections, the Republicans are gearing up to put environmentalists and climate scientists on the defensive and block progress against global warming for the rest of Obama's presidency. It's time to turn the tables on them. The first step is to connect the cranks to the terrible consequences they have set in motion, and thereby discredit them from further influence over the nation's climate policies.

How? Our initiative, Confront the Climate Cranks, will do just that: confront the cranks on camera and accompanied by some of the children they have put in danger. We will video all of our confrontations and then quickly make them available to the public—by posting them on YouTube and sharing them with mainstream and alternative media and the social networks of our partner organizations. (In the run-up to these confrontations, we will invite the participation of the members or readers of The Nation, Grist, Kids vs Global Warming and the other partnering organizations, polling them on which cranks to target, what questions to ask and so on. Thus we hope to build momentum before arriving in Washington, as well as generate continuing attention and activism after the confrontations.)

By no means is our initiative alone sufficient to turn the tide in the climate fight, but we believe it can make a valuable contribution, especially if others lend a hand. By naming and shaming the climate cranks, we hope to shift the political terrain of the climate fight. By highlighting the specific climate impacts that have already begun and will intensify in the coming years, we aim to shift the debate away from abstract ideology toward the actual consequences the cranks have wrought for Generation Hot. And by conveying our message through children and parents, we can reach the ordinary Americans whose support is essential to overcoming the power of money and insider status in Washington. We hope you'll join us.

This blog was written by Mark Hertsgaard, the environment correspondent for The Nation. Mark is the author of six books, including "Earth Odyssey: Around the World In Search of Our Environmental Future." This article is adapted from Mark's latest book HOT: Living Through the Next Fifty Years on Earth, published in January by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. You can get involved in Mark's work by visiting the Generation Hot Facebook page)

 

Congress of the New Middle Ages

The last year or two have witnessed no shortage of silver-bullet rhetoric to deal with the world’s most pressing challenges. A global economic “G-2” of the U.S. and China was proposed to sort out the imbalances between savings and deficit countries; the United Nations General Assembly devoted several days in September to the “Millennium Development Goals” that address hunger, poverty, and other socio-economic ills; grand summits were held in Copenhagen and Cancun to craft a global climate treaty; and experts spoke of a “Grand Bargain” to freeze Iran’s nuclear program.

It should come as no surprise that all of these attempts to solve global problems with the stroke of a pen have proven stillborn. A new “Concert of Powers” à la 19^th-century Europe, another “San Francisco moment” recreating the 1945 founding of the United Nations, or even a “new Bretton Woods” financial summit is not going to deliver geopolitical stability and worldwide prosperity.

Such antiquated thinking is a complacent vestige of a Western-led world. Even more fundamentally, it is a legacy of a Westphalian, state-centric world. That too has ended. We have entered a new Middle Ages: an era that most resembles the pre-Westphalian era of nearly 1,000 years ago. That was the period of history when the East was as powerful (if not more so) than the West, cities mattered more than nations, powerful dynasties and trading companies were engines of growth and innovation, private mercenaries fought in all wars, religious crusades shaped inter-cultural relations, and new trade routes over land and sea forged the world’s first (nearly) global economy.

What did diplomacy look like in the Middle Ages? First, it was characterized by complex multi-level relations: the Pope and his emissaries, Germanic duchies and vassal territories, Italian city-states like Milan and Venice, and great universities from Oxford to Bologna. Second, it was informal. For most of history, the chief criteria for diplomatic inclusion have been status and prestige, not legal sovereignty- which only came into being in the 17^th century. The formalized, bureaucratized foreign ministry as we know it today is a legacy of French nobleman Cardinal de Richelieu, who as an adviser in the court of King Louis XIII established a Ministry of External Affairs in 1626 and dispatched the most extensive professional diplomatic corps in Europe. As patriotism ascended, freelance diplomacy was curtailed.

But diplomacy, as the professional joke goes, is the second oldest profession. It long pre-dates the state, and will continue to thrive even as new ways of organizing people, territory, resources and ideologies emerge. Because diplomacy takes place amongst anyone who is someone, it is our best window into the changing structure and patterns of relations among the world’s leading authorities.

The best place to view what model of diplomacy lies before us in the New Middle Ages is the Swiss enclave of Davos, where each January the planet’s most influential heads of state, CEOs, mayors, religious leaders, NGO heads, university presidents, celebrities and artists flock for the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF), an event that over the past four decades has established itself as what “60 Minutes” last year dubbed “the most important meeting on Earth.” What CBS’s flagship program discovered was that this gathering of “capitalists, globalists, and futurists” seems to work precisely because it is neither formal nor official.

Davos has nothing to do with sovereignty and everything to do with authority: it’s peer-to-peer among anybody who’s somebody. Where else do hundreds of Fortune 500 CEOs, American cabinet secretaries, the mayor of London, prime minister of Catalonia, chairman of China’s Export-Import Bank, investor-statesmen like George Soros, rock-star activists like Bono, and billionaire hybrid executive philanthropists like Bill Gates speak directly and honestly, and form new ventures on the spot?

Compared to the modern inter-state diplomatic system, Davos represents anti-diplomacy—and yet it actually reflects the true parameters of global diplomacy today better than the United Nations. The reason is that in our ever more complex diplomatic eco-system, relations among governments represent only one slice of the total picture. Beyond the traditional “public-public” relations of embassies and multilateraism, there are also the “public-private” partnerships sprouting across sectors and issues. Qatar’s natural gas fortunes hinge on its arrangement with Exxon, India’s ability to attract foreign investment is contingent on support from the business magnates who make up the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), and the alliance of the Gates Foundation, pharmaceutical company Merck, and the government of Botswana saved the country’s population from being wiped out by AIDS, to name just a few of the now literally countless such arrangements flourishing today. The third and often neglected dimension of the new diplomacy is “private-private” interactions which circumvent the state altogether. Think of the Environmental Defense Fund dealing directly with Wal-Mart to cut the company’s overall emissions by 20 million metric tons and install solar panels at 30 new locations. The diplomats at Cancun could only dream of such concrete measures.

All three of these combinations of negotiating partners thrive at Davos and in all WEF activities, which range from mini-Davos-style regional conferences to year-round multi-stakeholder initiatives in public health, climate change, anti-corruption and other areas. The WEF does what no U.N. agency would ever do: allow “coalitions of the willing” to organically “grow and go” - incubating them but also quickly spinning them off into self-sustaining entities; but importantly also letting projects die that fail to attain sufficient support from participants. In this sense the WEF is both a space for convening but also a driver of new agendas.

The WEF has long been a practitioner of today’s newest behavioral economic fad: “nudging”. The WEF’s founder, Swiss-German academic turned businessman Klaus Schwab, first declared a “Spirit of Davos” in 1983, claiming that the WEF annual meeting had become “one of those increasingly rare international events where formality can be dispensed with, where personal contacts can be made, where new ideas can be tried out in complete freedom, where people are aware of the responsibilities involved in belonging to an international community, where we have time to look at really important issues rather than everyday pressures.” It is, of course, an explicit homage to the mid-1920s “spirit of Locarno,” which urged the normalization of relations with Germany and its admission to the League of Nations. Like Locarno, Davos is not an institution but a place where agreements can be made in the hope of influencing subsequent decisions and events. The WEF has been ahead of the curve in promoting some of the signature issues of our time—from broadening the understanding of the ingredients of economic competitiveness through its signature reports than began in the 1970s to promoting good corporate citizenship years before anti-globalization protesters stormed Montreal and Seattle - yet rarely does it get any credit.

The credit always goes to the growing ranks of “Davos Man,” and often-misquoted term coined by Samuel Huntington in 1996 to denote an increasingly rootless global elite caste. But not everyone viewed the emergence of “Davos Man” as a bad thing. Contrary to the WEF’s reputation as a host for secret, if glamorous, deal-making, the Economist praised “Davos Man” as the necessary antidote to traditional diplomats who seal themselves behind veils of protocol, instead immersing themselves in the latest innovations, technologies and trends, speaking English as their lingua franca, and reinforcing thinking and debate through engaging with the media. Today the WEF has more followers on Twitter than any international organization, and uses Davos to convene “Global Town Halls” with live online participation to debate global priorities.

Surely Davos does not correct the “democracy deficit” afflicting the world’s power structures, but what it does better than any other is correct the “diplomacy deficit,” giving anyone it invites the right to represent themselves without interference or manipulation. NGOs speaking for the world’s oppressed, social entrepreneurs, and all manner of others seeking attention and funding get unobstructed access to the world’s richest companies, governments and philanthropists. Davos is where money and megaphones come together.

The WEF is an interesting proxy for America’s standing in the world as well. At Davos, American leadership isn’t embodied in feeble cabinet members mouthing pre-fab remarks, but through its modern-day Medicis. The Medici family of medieval Florence led the West into the Renaissance by commissioning artists like Michaelangelo, inventors like Leonardo da Vinci, and backing secular rationalists like Machiavelli. Far from being ignorant, aloof, and depraved, America is home to most of the postmodern Medicis, from Bill Gates to Warren Buffett to George Soros. Mr. Gates tackles global scourges through science, Mr. Buffett backs public works through investment, and Mr. Soros attacks autocrats with technology. What the old and new Medicis have in common is a disregard for antiquated notions of public versus private power and a focus on a new hybrid model that unites the best of both spheres. America’s global footprint is far greater than its declining share of global GDP and its increasingly unpopular president. Davos is where it needs to go in greater numbers to regain global respectability.

Davos is reflexively dismissed as “waste of time” by those either not invited or not interested in making contributions to the world beyond their own bottom line. But with the G-20 far less than the sum of its parts and the U.S.-China “G-2” more a nightmare scenario than solution, Davos represents a fluid yet far more resilient division of labor for the world. Nobody can stop the entropy that is diffusing power in the world. Instead, we need more Davos-like congresses to harness all the new power centers, from presidents to entrepreneurs to activists. Indeed, what matters most of all is not what happens at Davos but who copies it. Its demonstration effect is visible already in events ranging from the Clinton Global Initiative to the Saudi Arabia General Investment Authority “Davos in the Desert” conveniently set for the week prior to Davos.

Global governance is not a thing, not a collection of formal institutions, not even a set of treaties. It is a process involving a far wider range of actors than have ever been party to global negotiations before. The sooner we look for new meta-scripts for regulating transnational activities and harnessing global resources to tackle local problems the better. Davos continues to be a good place to start.

This article was written by Parag Khanna. Parag is a senior research fellow at the New America Foundation and author of “How to Run the World: Charting a Course to the Next Renaissance" published this month by Random House.

 

 

Clueless: The Future of Stupidity

Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe

                                                Albert Einstein

We humans, by our very nature, are easily misinformed, misled by gossip, taken in by grand lies, seduced by rumours and conspiracy theories, and often downright stupid.

A cursory glance at the average story headlining the daily newspapers reveals the degree to which stupidity and gullibility are routine. Indeed I suspect we constantly underestimate the number of stupid individuals in circulation. Its very difficult to avoid them. They are to be found everywhere – in academia, industry, government, politics and big business. 

Lets be clear. I am not talking about ignorance or a lack of education. On the contrary, many uneducated people are incredibly intelligent while countless stupid people have had a particularly decent education. I am using the term stupid quite explicitly to identify those among us who consistently display their capacity to ignore reason, who habitually disregard the obvious, who doggedly believe they are right and who remain convinced of their own infallibility, come what may.

Most of us believe we are smart. The problem is stupid people think they are smart but are not. They are deluded. In other words they are unaware they are stupid. However this is potentially hazardous for the rest of us, especially given the strong likelihood of stupid people being in positions of influence or power. Complicating the matter is the fact that even intelligent individuals can be stupid on occasions.

To deride stupid people, to single them out in order to laugh at their naivety would, in itself, be foolish. For stupidity seems to be a conditional norm. As a species we are clueless a lot of the time. If that were not so serious it would be amusing. But stupidity is a reality we need to face up to, particularly in an age characterised by the collapse of certainty and by the failure of systems we rarely challenge yet whose genesis arose from flawed assumptions and questionable intentions. Many of these are grand lies; misfortunate social memes that have ingrained themselves across generations and cultures to shape a shared civilizational weltenschaung.

In purely technological terms we are a remarkable species – or so we constantly flatter ourselves. In a more general cognitive context our capacity to solve complicated issues probably justifies the conclusion that we are a highly developed sentient intelligence but that is only a half-truth.

Over the past few centuries fundamental design issues and associated down-stream problems have recurred generation after generation and in every culture. Wisdom has been in short supply. Our undoubted technical and engineering capabilities have leapt ahead of any comparable expertise in social design. Furthermore our much-vaunted technological brilliance is set on destructive purposes rather than being used as a tool for good. All things considered we look pretty stupid.

I doubt very much that we can continue for too long in our conventional clumsy ways. But what should we do in a political and cultural landscape in which alarmist rumours, lies and superstitions are peddled as sacrosanct beliefs and where such fictions have more currency than fact-based truths?

Blaming individuals is not the point. Nor will condemning certain groups or communities for being ignorant, greedy or malevolent get us very far. Criticising an education system that still focuses on subject disciplines while failing to teach social interaction, altruism, learnable intelligence, critical thinking, eco-literacy and systems dynamics, is simply too easy. On the other hand we do need to tackle our collective stupidity. And if messaging has such a significant impact on how we interpret facts then there are few alternatives other than countering the more preposterous lies with a narrative that simply tells the truth.

Lets start with the biggest lie of all. The truth is there is no God. At least not in the sense of an omnipotent, omniscient man in the sky – compassionate or unforgiving depending upon one’s source of indoctrination. During the Enlightenment it became obvious that the God-myth was an elaborate hoax. It has endured, and flourished for a while, nurtured by those whose best interests were served by defending such infantile propaganda.

But it is now time to grow up and to acknowledge the myth for what it is. Like Zeus or Thor or Quetzalcoatl the God of monotheistic traditions is pure fiction; fabricated at a time of relative scientific ignorance to account for phenomena that could not be explained any other way.

On one level the God-myth reflects imagination, inventiveness and beauty. Reactions to the myth from the faithful can be pure and sincere. Nevertheless, pause for a moment to reflect on how bizarre our situation has become at the behest of this myth. As the potency of the lie became clear to rulers and those in authority it was used calculatingly and comprehensively to wield social control over the rest of us until, today, its impact has become insidious and irrational. For example, nobody in the US can seek public office unless they are prepared to pretend such a God exists. Much of what passes for good public policy in any number of cultures is forced to conform to religious taboos more suited to a medieval theocracy. Meanwhile crimes against humanity, whether it be the stoning to death of Iranian women or the atrocities committed by US-led forces in Iraq, are condoned on the basis of some kind of religious-inspired logic within a forlorn illusion that “God is on our side”.

In this day and age, when scientific and spiritual knowledge combined has reached a stage of sophistication that enables us to design, create and sustain life, but where much of the suffering we inflict upon each other can still be attributed to religious hatred, war and delusion, the God-myth has become indefensible. It is stupidity and self-deceit at its most scary. To refute this lie is a moral necessity.

Other lies, almost as grand, flow from this. Serfdom is a case in point. The ancient claim of monarchs and popes to be God’s representatives on Earth intrinsically entrenched their power in an era where the God-myth was intense and could not be defied without the risk of eternal damnation.

Yet it amazes me that millions of people around the world are still in thrall to rulers and autocrats who blatantly and in full view of the media accrue wealth at the expense of those who pay allegiance to them. The mystery, pomp and ceremony surrounding “majesty” is simply incomprehensible when set against the fact that each day over 4 billion people have insufficient access to clean drinking water. Inequities and injustices would diminish considerably if we were able to institute more egalitarian, less corrupt, regimes.

Another grand lie that distracts us from the invention of better futures is the assumed role of business in today’s society. It is often asserted that the role of business is simply to make profits for shareholders and that no other role should be countenanced. That is the kernel of stupidity. For profits depend upon continuous economic growth which, we have now discovered, is impossible. It flies in the face of physics. We have reached the limits imposed by nature – and nature is reacting in ways that are alarming.

In pre-industrial cultures production and consumption were mostly localised. Value was self-evident in that the quality of life was to be maintained. Meanwhile mastery of one’s craft was nurtured by a system of guilds. This system, based on trust and equity, was to generate value of one kind or another for the entire community.

The advent of the modern, limited liability company, changed these dynamics, creating a legal behemoth that enjoys freedoms and benefits denied us mere mortals. Initially the invention of the corporation spawned a level of growth and development previously considered impossible. It opened up new markets and expanded the range of goods and services that could be purchased. But over time the corporation’s obsession with money and profits eroded trust, amplified greed, and set humanity on a course from which we are now finding it is almost impossible to recover.

This lie needs to be overturned. Contemporary business can no longer merely serve the financial interests of a minority especially if, in order to do that, it has to ride roughshod over the environment or the rights or ordinary citizens. Business has to become an amplifier of value, but in ways that are more equitable than in the past, that recognise the inherent value of non-commoditised resources, and that accept responsibility for future generations.

I should point out that this is not some kind of utopian dream but a practical solution to some of the problems facing us today; problems that will not fade into memory without a conscious effort to destroy the lies underpinning them.

There are myriad interrelated myths to which we adhere in spite of all evidence pointing to their fantastical and deceitful nature. Contemporary stupidity covers the full range of policy issues - from the absurd to the irrational. Whether it is the bullying use of warfare that changes nothing in the long run, the denial from large corporations that small-scale local farming is the key to solving world hunger, the proliferation of guns in a country where deaths from the use of legal arms is on the increase, farcical arguments around whether or not global warming is caused by humans, or the unsustainable nature of a global monetary system based upon debt, it is the tissue of underlying lies and erroneous assumptions that are of most concern and that play into the hands of stupid people.

While dogma and inconsistencies abound, stupidity will flourish. But we can rise above it by accepting culpability for our stupidity, letting go of our ego-driven need to be right all the time, and coming to terms with the underlying flaws in our life-critical systems.

Human intentions, together with our knowledge base for leading, governing, making, contributing, managing, consuming, exchanging and relating (to each other and to the environment) all need a drastic overhaul and brought into a situation where the truth, rather than fiction, is the primary design tool for societal evolution.

Whether we opt to approach that from a scientific viewpoint or a spiritual ethos the issue is the same. We must find ways to transcend our collective stupidity, especially by rejecting obsolete fears and superstitions that may otherwise continue to trap us in a quicksand of escalating crises from which we will find no way out.

The alternative is to remain clueless – and perish.

 

Eradicating Ecocide

Until we have a law to prosecute those who destroy the planet, corporations will never be called to account for their crimes

Sophie Scholl, a Munich University student, was executed for revealing the truth about the activities of the Nazi authorities. This week 20 brave Ratcliffe whistleblowers have been sentenced at Nottingham crown court for plotting to draw attention to the truth of the activities of another German entity. This time, replace the tyranny of the Nazis with the tyranny of the energy giant E.ON.

Scholl and 20 others stood up and took direct non-violent action. Their crime was the dissemination of leaflets highlighting and decrying the tyranny of the Nazi dictatorship. It was a decision to undertake something unlawful – an act that they believed was a necessity – to halt a greater but unnamed crime, a crime that cost many lives. That crime did not, at the time, have a name. But it soon did: genocide.

The Ratcliffe 20 did the same in April 2009. They too were prepared to stand up and take action. Their crime was planning to shut down Ratcliffe-on-Sour, a coal-powered station that is one of Britain's largest greenhouse gas emitters. The state was failing to prevent a greater injury from taking place; the loss of life. This time it is not only human life, but all life.

Like Scholl and her fellow activists, the Ratcliffe 20 were motivated to take non-violent direct action. They, along with 124 others, decided to undertake something unlawful: conspiring to close down the offending emitter. It was an act that they believed was a necessity; to halt a greater but unnamed crime, a crime that is already costing many lives.

Their defence was that they were acting to prevent a greater crime, of death and serious injury caused by climate change. We do not currently have a legal crime in place that fits this description but there is one fast looming on the horizon and that crime is ecocide.

Currently there is no law to prosecute those who are destroying the planet. Instead, climate campaigners do not have the support of the judiciary in preventing the corporate ecocide that is daily occurring under our very noses. Ecocide is permitted (as genocide was in Nazi Germany) by the government and, by dint of the global reach of modern-day transnational business, every government in the world. Corporate ecocide has now reached a point where we stand on the brink of collapse of our ecosystems, triggering the death of many millions in the face of human-aggravated cataclysmic tragedies.

Over the passage of time, tyranny revisits. Tyranny is the cruel, unacceptable, or arbitrary use of power that is oblivious to consequence. While the use of coal stations may not be deemed an intentional cruelty, it is certainly an unacceptable use of corporate power. Our governments collude by encouraging excess emissions, contrary to their UN commitment to stabilise "greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system".

Sixty years ago the tyranny was Nazism. Today it is pursuit of profit without moral compass or responsibility. Despite the planned Ratcliffe protests, it is one that the majority of humanity accepts regardless of the known consequences. We look the other way from the daily reports of destruction of our world by those who are in a position of superior responsibility; the master controllers of our fates are those who determine how we live our lives. It is the heads of the top corporations who gamble with the fate of our planet; those who produce and supply our energy are the most culpable of all.

The failure rests with our governments who are unwilling to intervene to make the destruction of our world a crime. Our police are disempowered and our justice system is unable to protect our greater interests when faced with the superior silent right of corporations to cause injury to persons and planet. Those who stand up and speak out are thereby treated as criminals.

Prior to the Ratcliffe trial, the judge ruled: "the defendants must have the opportunity of putting that contention (that the emissions from the power station do pose an immediate threat) before the jury, no doubt backed by expert evidence." Expert evidence was heard, from James Hansen, the former head of Nasa’s Goddard Institute, on the immediacy of the threat to life caused by escalation of emissions, to MPs who confirmed government inertia. All of which the jury failed to accept. What will it take for that dense sea fog to dissipate and for the truth to be revealed?

Unlike the Ratcliffe 20, Scholl and her co-conspirators were denied the right to defend themselves in their trial. They too were convicted for resorting to unlawful acts, which they believed to be necessary to expose the truth. At the very end of her trial, she spoke out. It is just matter of time, she said, before the true destroyers are put in the dock. The very same can be said today.

This article was written by Polly Higgins and published in The Guardian on Monday 5^th January 2011. Polly Higgins is a barrister, international environmental lawyer and the author of Eradicating Ecocide: Laws and Governance to Prevent the Destruction of our Planet, published by Shepherd-Walwyn. Further information on Polly’s work is available from Polly’s websites: http://www.facebook.com/ecocide and http://www.thisisecocide.com

 

Terrifying Revelations

"Try as I may I can not escape the sound of suffering. Perhaps as an old man I will accept suffering with insouciance. But not now; men in their prime, if they have convictions are tasked to act on them."
                                                                        Julian Assange, 2007

Do you believe that it is in Americans' interest to allow a small group of US leaders to unilaterally murder, maim, imprison and/or torture anyone they choose anywhere in the world, without the knowledge let alone oversight of their citizens or the international community? And, despite their proven record of failure to protect America (from Indochina to Iran to Iraq) do you believe they should be permitted to clandestinely expand their war-making without informed public debate? If so, you are betraying the principles upon which America was founded, endangering your nation, and displaying a distinctly "un-American" subservience to unaccountable authority. But if you oppose autocratic power, you are called to support Wikileaks and others trying to limit US Executive Branch mass murder abroad and failure to protect Americans at home.

These two issues became officially linked for the first time when former US Afghan commander General Stanley McChrystal explicitly stated that the murder of civilians increases rather than decreases the numbers of those committed to killing Americans, and actually implemented policies, since reversed by General Petraeus, to reduce US murder of civilians. McChrystal said that “for every innocent person you kill, you create 10 new enemies." By so doing he made it clear that killing civilians is not only a moral and war crimes issue but, in today's interdependent world, also threatens US national security.

As important as is the issue of free speech, it is the question of whether the US Executive is in fact protecting the American people through its mass murder abroad that really lies at the heart of the Wikileaks controversy. Executive Branch officials justify persecuting and threatening to murder Assange on the grounds that he has damaged US "national security." If McChrystal is right, however, it is the past decade of US Executive mass murder in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, now revealed beyond any doubt by Wikileaks, that is the real threat to US national security.

The chilling fact is this: whether you believe that September 11th 2001 was due to incomprehensible fanaticism or genuine grievances, it seems likely that US leaders’ murder of countless Muslims since 2001 will cause the next 9/11 should, God forbid, it occur. The recent suicide-bomber in Sweden who came perilously close to succeeding taped a message saying "so will your children, daughters, brothers, and sisters die, like our brothers, sisters, and children die." Similar sentiments were voiced by the Times Square bomber and it is likely that those responsible for future American deaths will also be motivated by revenge for the hundreds of thousands of Muslims for whose deaths US leaders are responsible since 2001.

This is not, of course, to justify such attacks. Any attacks on civilians, whether by the Taliban or General Petraeus, are totally unjustified and crimes of war. But if the issue is how best to enhance US national security, it is critical to rationally discuss the most prudent and sensible means of preventing further attacks, which in this case is to stop creating huge numbers of people who want to kill Americans. If General McChrystal is correct, every American should tremble at the long-term danger to America caused by the last decade of US war-making in the Muslim world. If only 1/100th of 1 per cent of the world's 1.6 billion Muslims are moved to want to attack America because of America's post-9/11 killing of Muslim civilians, for example, the US Executive will have created a pool of 160,000 Muslims devoted to murdering Americans.

Nothing is more emblematic of the service Assange is doing Americans than the July 25the New York Times headline announcing its publication of the Wikileaks Afghan War Logs: "View Is Bleaker Than Official Portrayal Of War In Afghanistan."

The New York Times thus not only acknowledged that Wikileaks had supplied Americans with vital information about the war that its own government was denying them, but that this information had not been provided by the US mass media. If it had been doing its job, after all, America’s “newspaper of record” not Wikileaks would have long ago revealed that the Afghan war was "bleaker than official portrayal of the war." The Guardian newspaper's headline on the same day drove the point home: "Massive Leak Of Secret Files Exposes Truth Of Occupation," – i.e. the truth as opposed to US Executive lies.

These Afghan War Logs, like the Iraqi war logs after them, and much material in Wikileaks' recent release of diplomatic cables, reveal above all that US Executive war-making is marked by massive deception of the American people - particularly lying about (i) the enormous civilian casualties the US is causing and (ii) its claim to be pursuing a "counter-insurgency strategy" designed to install a democratic Afghan government. The Times and Guardian stories describe how these official US documents reveal constant US Executive Branch lying to the American people.

US MURDER OF CIVILIANS: "A huge cache of secret US military files today provides a devastating portrait of the failing war in Afghanistan, revealing how coalition forces have killed hundreds of civilians in unreported incidents," (The Guardian) "Incident by incident, the reports resemble a police blotter of the myriad ways Afghan civilians were killed - not just in airstrikes but in ones and twos - in shootings on the roads or in the villages, in misunderstandings or in a cross-fire, or in chaotic moments when Afghan drivers ventured too close to convoys and checkpoints". (New York Times) "The NATO coalition in Afghanistan has been using an undisclosed "black" unit of special forces, Task Force 373, to hunt down targets for death or detention without trial… The logs reveal that TF 373 has also killed civilian men, women and children and even Afghan police officers who have strayed into its path." (The Guardian)

REGULAR COVERUPS OF US CIVILIAN MURDER: "The dead, the reports repeatedly indicate, were not suicide bombers or insurgents, and many of the cases were not reported to the public at the time." (New York Times) "War logs show how marines gave cleaned up accounts of an incident in which they killed 19 civilians… There would be no punishment." (The Guardian) "The logs detail how US special forces dropped six 2,000 lb bombs on a compound where they believed a `high-value individual' was hiding, after `ensuring there were no innocent Afghans in the surrounding area'. A senior US commander reported that 150 Taliban had been killed. Locals, however, reported that up to 300 civilians had died." (The Guardian)

US AND A CORRUPT AFGHAN GOVERNMENT ARE ALIENATING AFGHAN CIVILIANS AND LOSING THE WAR: "The documents illustrate in mosaic detail why, after the United States has spent almost $300 billion on the war in Afghanistan, the Taliban are stronger than at any time since 2001... The reports paint a disheartening picture of the Afghan police (who) are often described as distrusted, even loathed, by Afghan civilians. The reports recount episodes of police brutality, corruption petty and large, extortion and kidnapping... The toll of the war, reflected in mounting civilian casualties, left the Americans seeking cooperation and support from an Afghan population that grew steadily more exhausted, resentful, fearful and alienated... The expanding (US) special operations have stoked particular resentment among Afghans - for their lack of coordination with local forces, the civilian casualties they frequently inflicted and the lack of the accountability." (New York Times)

When the Iraqi war logs were published 3 months later, they revealed even more shocking information, particularly that US soldiers had handed over Iraqi civilians to Iraqi police, knowing they would be hideously tortured employing electric drills, acid and other devices before being savagely murdered. Ellen Knickmeyer, the Washington Post Bureau chief in Baghdad in 2006, wrote that these revelations meant that US officials had been lying daily to the US media, and American people, by saying they were not aware of this mass murder. U. S. leaders also lied constantly in claiming they were not tracking civilian casualties, when in fact they were. Since international law made US leaders responsible for providing law and order in occupied Iraq, these Wiklileaks cables thus also revealed that US leaders bear a major responsibility for these war crimes, among the worst since the end of WWII.

Both the Wikileaks Iraqi and Afghan War Logs, in short, have revealed that the entire US Executive is a "vast lying machine", as journalist David Halberstam described the US military in his affidavit for the CBS vs. Westmoreland trial. It must be understood that “truth” vs. “lies” is not even an operational category within the Executive Branch or military. The purpose of communicating with the public is not to provide them with truthful information but rather to advance “the mission”. People who communicate with the public obtain their jobs and are promoted on the basis of their ability to mislead, deceive, “spin” and lie. There is no recorded case where Executive Branch officials have been rewarded for telling the truth to the American people, and many where they have been punished or lost their jobs for doing so. And nothing so epitomizes the degradation of democracy in America that the fact the public expects Executive Branch officials to lie to them, and that mass media journalists even betray their profession by defending Executive secrecy and excoriating those who reveal their lies like Julian Assange.

It is thus impossible to overstate the importance of the Wikileaks documentation of these lies to the American people. When a journalist reports a US government misdeed, government officials automatically deny it and many Americans are unsure whom to believe. But Wikileaks has revealed official government documents that prove US leaders’ lying and commission of crimes of war. The fact that the US has covered up its mass murder of civilians, and that this is contributing to its losing the war, is thus no longer open to serious question. The callous and careerist politicians and journalists who daily ignore US mass murder, while calling for Assange's arrest or execution, shame themselves, their children, and their profession by their indifference to non-American human suffering and obsequious toadying to illegitimate Executive power.

And the Wikileaks documents reveal something even more important: the entirely bogus nature of US claims that Assange has damaged US "national security", e.g. by revealing information that could help the “enemy.” It is obvious that the "enemy" knows whether those murdered by the US are civilians. The US Executive clearly claims it is only killing “insurgents” to keep its murder of civilians a secret from the American people, fearing it would face protests that could tie its hands if it became known. The Wikileaks documents, though they date from 2009 and before, also shed important light on what is occurring today under General David Petraeus.

It is important to remember, after all, that the Wikileaks controversy is not primarily about the past or abstract legal issues, but what is happening to actual human beings today. As you read these words countless Afghan and Pakistani villagers are huddling in their homes, terrorized by US war-making, as General Petraeus's brutal offensive into southern Afghanistan, met by an increase in the Taliban's resort to roadside bombs and assassination, has caused the Red Cross to issue an unusual alarm saying that conditions are at their worst for Afghan civilians in 30 years, i.e. as bad as during the Russian invasion. A Canadian press report indicates that Kandahar's main hospital is overflowing with civilian casualties, and that "on some days, the floor is red with blood".

Petraeus has tripled air strikes, brought in 9,000 US assassins who are conducting round-the-clock murder, and introduced an unprecedented number of night-time raids recalling Nazi movies from the 1940s - as screaming US soldiers break into people's homes, terrorize women and children, and kill, wound, torture or imprison men indefinitely without a trial or any chance to prove their innocence. Even the US-installed Afghan President Hamid Karzai is so appalled that he has begged the US to curtail its airstrikes and night raids, saying, “the raiding homes at night. Terrible. Terrible. A serious cause of the Afghan people's disenchantment with NATO and with the Afghan government… How can you measure the consequences of it in terms of the loss of life of children and women because you have captured Talib A. And who is this Talib A? Is he so important to have 10 more people killed, civilians? Who determines that?”

Petraeus has firmly refused to end what this Afghan leader describes as the General’s responsibility for civilian murder, making a further mockery of his claim to be bringing “democracy” to Afghanistan. Particularly significant are the many first-person reports in the Wikileaks Afghan War Logs of US murder of innocent civilians at US checkpoints - which flesh out McChrystal's March 2010 admission that "we have shot an amazing number of people, but to my knowledge, none has ever proven to be a threat."

For this raises a basic question about Petraeus's vast escalation of US airstrikes. If US forces have murdered countless innocent civilians at checkpoints, where they can at least see those they are killing face-to-face, how many more innocent civilians is Petraeus killing from the air, in bombing raids where those below can barely be seen?

And these Wikileaks documents also shed important light on how Petraeus's massive escalation into both southern Afghanistan and Pakistan, where he has dramatically escalated both US drone and ground assassination, is weakening rather than strengthening long-term US national security. Just as the Taliban is far stronger today after the US has wasted $300 billion and thousands of American lives over the last 10 years, Petraeus's tactics are strengthening not weakening America's enemies over the long run. If he murders enough people in southern Afghanistan, the General may be able to claim some short-term successes there. But there is no serious question that his tactics are sowing a long-term whirlwind which not only threatens the stability of the Afghan and Pakistani governments, but pose a long-term threat to Americans at home.

A UN map just published by the Wall Street Journal has revealed that the Taliban, using classic guerrilla tactics, has moved into northern and western Afghanistan as Petraeus has moved south, giving them control of more territory than ever. “Internal United Nations maps show a marked deterioration of the security situation in Afghanistan during this year's fighting season, countering the Obama administration's optimistic assessments of military progress since the surge of additional American forces began a year ago”, the Journal reported.

The New York Times has reported how various insurgent groups in Pakistan have responded to Petraeus's tactics by coordinating and cooperating for the first time, vastly increasing the threat they pose to the Pakistani state. It is also obvious that Petraeus cannot possible]y kill more "insurgents" than he is creating if he continues to provoke the 41 million Pashtuns on both sides of the Afghanistan Pakistan border to want to fight America. The population of North and South Vietnam combined during the Vietnam war was only 31 million, after all, and provided a manpower pool large enough to outlast 500,000 Americans.

In the end, however, the most profound questions for Americans raised by the Wikileaks documents go far beyond the Muslim world. If we can free our minds of a lifetime of official propaganda identifying the US Executive with the American people, the evidence is overwhelming that in foreign and military policy the US Executive Branch is an undemocratic institution that does not represent its own citizens. It operates largely independent of Congress, the Judiciary or a mass media which has largely become an arm of Executive power, broadcasting its lies far more often than it exposes them.

A few months before President Obama's December 2009 decision to send 30,000 more US troops to Afghanistan, for example, only 24 per cent of Americans wanted to send more and 43 per cent wanted to decrease the number. Their wishes were ignored, as are the opinions of Americans today who, by a margin of 63 to 32, oppose US war-making in Afghanistan. And, Bob Woodward’s “Obama’s Wars” revealed, even the President is largely a figurehead when it comes to Executive war-making.

Woodward documents how the military thwarted Obama’s clear desire to begin a major pullout from Afghanistan in the summer of 2011. Last month, Obama was humiliated by being forced to endorse a hypothetical 2014 pullout date.

Most Americans would agree with the statement in the Declaration of Independence that governments derive "their just powers from the consent of the governed." But the governed can only give their consent if they are informed as to what they are agreeing to. This is obvious in our daily life. I cannot be said to have "consented" to buy your laptop if you deceived me by not telling me it was broken. One of our most basic legal principles is that a contract is null and void if it was obtained under false pretences. By revealing massive US Executive deceit Wikileaks has thus revealed that it does not legitimately represent the American people.

These Wikileaks documents thus raise the most fundamental question citizens can ask themselves: to what extent to citizens of a democracy owe their allegiance to autocratic leaders who obtain the consent of their citizens through massive duplicity? And to what extent can they trust either their judgement or their decency?

Americans may find themselves increasingly pondering such questions in coming years, as economic decline and future terrorist attacks cause US elites to bring home the authoritarian mindset that has caused so much damage abroad. It seems certain that American democracy will face greater challenges than at any time since the country's founding.

But that is a long-term question. The key question now is whether Americans can hear the sound of suffering their leaders are causing abroad, as at this very moment innocent men, women and children are being murdered and maimed in what the Red Cross describes as the greatest civilian carnage since the Russians invaded 30 years ago. Julian Assange should be applauded not persecuted for hearing the sound of their suffering. Do we?

This post first appeared in Alternet. It was written by Fred Branfman and is reprinted here with the author’s kind permission. Fred exposed the US Executive's Secret Air War in Laos, which illegally and savagely murdered tens of thousands of innocent Laotian peasants. He has written frequently on Executive war-making for Alternet in recent years. See www.trulyalive.org for more information on Fred’s activities.

How Leadership Development Fails

Initial thoughts

Each year hundreds of millions of dollars are spent on the development of leaders - by companies wanting a competitive edge, government departments concerned to improve their professional competence, institutions looking for greater public impact or a more congenial work environment and individuals seeking self-improvement.

Most of these investments are channeled into workshops, training courses and programs of differing kinds. And most of it goes to waste. Although there are often short-term gains reported by a few individuals these are exceptions. Leadership development programs are rarely effective in the long-term. Much goes on as before. Transformational change remains in hiding.

Of course it can be unwise to make such sweeping statements. There are any number of innovative off-the-grid experiences available to executives, in particular, that have been shown to yield extraordinary and continuing benefits. The intensive strategic learning journeys offered by The Constellation are but one such example. Generally speaking, however, we do not discover more sophisticated leaders or higher levels of consciousness emerging from conventional leadership programs. Unfortunately the facade of success appears to be easily sustained in today’s marketplace, in spite of the fact that programs intended to develop and nurture leaders most often serve only to underline the dearth of leadership that currently exists.

There are good reasons for this which I only began to explore during the writing of The Five Literacies of Global Leadership.

Current approaches to leadership development remind me of the health and well-being industry, its veracity as well as its marketing hype. I am sure you know the way this industry works.

If you are wealthy the first step is to choose the most superbly equipped, state of the art health resort, if possible in some exotic location. Many of these facilities offer comprehensive packages comprising nutritional therapy and customised diets, spa and sauna rooms, colonic irrigation, therapeutic massages and detoxification treatments, physical exercise regimes, yoga and meditation classes. Often exuding an air of exclusiveness, these facilities offer tranquillity and a rare chance to reflect on one’s life journey in harmony with nature. Think squawking parakeets, sunny skies, the sigh of a gentle breeze through palm trees, the distant sound of surf...

For many others who long to participate in these health resort experiences but are less affluent it is simply the equivalent of a holiday. A few frequent flyer points away from life's hectic treadmill. A pause. Do they provoke long term change? No, not usually. But they still have benefit. The problem is the misconception of what is on offer. The marketing message seduces, exactly like the messages surrounding corporate change, into taking the easy path - the pill for weight loss or, for that matter, the pill for anything, versus doing the inner and outer work that is actually required for real change to embed.

Health resorts are luxurious and also very expensive but then so are most corporate change and leadership development programs. Of course you can expect highly personalised attention from expert staff as well as your own private villa for seclusion should you so choose. Sports stars and movie celebrities check-in to these places. You are bound to emerge a fitter, healthier, happier, more effective human being. Or so you reason...

As it turns out this is an illusion. Statistics show that over 86 per cent of people who routinely attend a health resort, wellness centre or spa, fail to maintain their new fitness and dietary regimen even when the immediate impact such life changes produce have been noticeably beneficial. This is why people constantly return. In fact the health and well-being market actually depends on their return customers.

Although I cannot quote precise statistics the same happens to be the case with almost all leadership development schemes – even the best and most internationally lauded of brands. Just think about it. These intensive courses and high-level retreats are typically designed “for” a clientele, rather than “with” them, by human resource specialists (and occasionally instructional designers) who then turn over custody of the participants development to a cadre of facilitators, academics and consultants, particularly those who have acquired something of a guru status in their special field.

There can be no doubt that training and development professionals are too often engaged to drip-feed superfluous or questionable information, minimising any potential discomfort and creating an impression for participants they are in some kind of positive and sustainable transition. Focused primarily on upgrading technical knowledge and often urging behavioural or attitudinal readjustments, these external service providers are not in the least bit concerned with volition or conflicting “states of being” within the group. Nor do they concern themselves with trying to secure any kind of enduring collegiality. Why? Because they are not paid to do that. If they were rewarded on such results, the programs they designed would most likely take on an entirely different form and ethos, more appropriate to a transformational paradigm than the prevailing instructional mode, which merely gives them licence to perform in front of an admiring audience.

The cynic in me is also suspicious that one of the most important selection criterion for any successful external trainer or facilitator is the ability to inject novelty without causing unnecessary offence or too much distress – unless, of course, that has been overtly orchestrated. Some of the most highly paid facilitators, including a number of associates with whom I regularly work, state emphatically that, for the most part, they are paid to smooth conversational processes and make participants feel good about the outcome, even if this bubble bursts the morning after. In other words facilitators are often the insurance policy that guarantees a good time is had by all. Tick the box. Job well done.

Is it any real surprise then that participants come away frustrated by the suite of new-fangled theories and incoherent models they are expected to deploy but that remain functionally and symbolically disconnected from their day-to-day problems?

The expression of freshness, of discovery and exhilaration, of modified behaviours and new personal commitments that seemed so novel and engaging at the time, eventually fade into vague memories. Unless further invitations transpire offering additional, more “advanced” courses. Which then serve to recycle the whole experience once again. Ah well, plus ca change, plus c'est la meme!

It is true to say that most programs of this nature are simply unsustainable away from the conditions of their genesis. In other words they are designed to fail. The promise of sustainable change is one that simply cannot be kept. Yet pills continued to be swallowed by the bucket load and unwise investments, amounting to millions of dollars in training, materials, travel and accommodation, not to mention opportunity costs, roll on mainly because those responsible for resource allocation have been brainwashed into believing that leadership development is critical to the business.

It is critical. We know that. But not in any shape or form. And certainly not in the form of a pill or vaccination promising immediate and sustainable change. The results are in and the implications are absolutely clear. If effective transformational leadership is the goal (and far more consideration must be given as to whether this really is the superordinate aim) a number of critical design factors must be taken into account.

After all is said and done, the need for development (whether individually or collectively motivated) arises for a reason. There has to be an underlying imperative, a logic, implying something is currently missing and/or something can be gained, from undertaking a program focused on development. We have to believe in the potential for surfacing something better, brighter, grander or more effective that will evolve from investing in the development of leaders and the nurturing of new forms of leadership.

Well there is. Actually there are three overarching logics (or longings) that commonly drive the urge to grow successive generations of leaders and to articulate a new knowledge base for leadership:

1. The judgement to perceive reality from a higher altitude or the perspectives offered by a new stages of consciousness. Higher states of enlightenment unveil hidden dimensions and possibilities for becoming a force for good in our world
2. The wisdom to appreciate the complexity inherent in human systems, relationships and beliefs. This capability can be used to comprehend complex dynamics and to provide a more sophisticated resolution of the dilemmas facing us
3. The willingness to step into different epistemologies, and cultural mindsets, and to do so with grace. Such volition opens up compassion and empathy for diversity and inclusion, without which any leadership flounders or descends into baseness.

To enable these three logics to manifest within the context of leadership development, five additional factors must be taken into account:

1. Learning Mode

Leadership development needs to be prised out of the instructional mode (of telling) into the sphere of personal and collective transformation (of enquiry and questioning).

That simple shift requires development initiatives to be co-designed by the community of participants or stakeholders, including those for whom development or behavioural change is intended, so that relevance is assured at all times and everyone has a say in how their “evolving selves” can best be used in every moment.

A word of caution is in order. The term “co-design” is very much in vogue today. It has become common currency even within the instructional mode of development. Only in that context it refers to specific knowledge to be imparted (as in theories, models, exemplars and tools) as well as the manner of such instruction (that is presentations, round tables, facilitated dialogues or working groups). This usually implies that a "design" is agreed by the commissioning agency (most commonly members of an organisation's human resource community) in conjunction with designated service suppliers. This is not what I mean by the term co-design.

Within the transformational paradigm authentic co-design is an engaging and continuing process, it requires a contribution from, and the presence of, all stakeholders in the initiative - especially those being targeted for development. As a consequence design input focuses on the symbolism, composition and staging of experiences that have the direct effect of excavating ancient wisdom or of eliciting yet-to-be-embodied knowledge, as opposed to conveying explicit data which is, after all, the objective of design input within the instructional paradigm.

2. Attention density

Typically the potential value arising from development workshops and programs remains unrealised, mostly because of routine pressures or a cultural DNA that protects the status quo, but also because of conflicting philosophies. By means of development programs leaders connect with new possibilities (for themselves and for the organisation) but may find it difficult integrating these into beneficial enterprise-wide changes because of existing conditions that actively discourage the migration of new knowledge into new praxis.

This can also be deeply troubling at a personal level. When this happens people either stay, suppressing what they have learnt in compliance with tradition, are marginalised as they struggle to resolve the tensions, or give up trying and leave.

True leadership development aims to change these outcomes by finding ways for new knowledge to integrate and transcend into new work. This is a cyclical, iterative and recursive dance between transformative thinking and communicative action. I often refer to this transitional or migratory state as an “awakening” process rather than a “developmental” process per se. Leaders are given opportunities (or are jolted into epiphanies) that awaken within them an electric, palpable authenticity and potency, both individually and collectively.

This can usually only be achieved by (i) continually recreating, sharing, integrating and transcending the conditions, conversations and experiences evident when a sense of anticipation, renewed purpose, or excitement for change originally surfaced and (ii) by having leaders nurture and value intimate working relationships with mentors who can constantly remind them of the transformational experience and intended higher purpose.

3. Framing

There are enormous social and psychological impediments to deployment of the kinds of consciousness expansion we seek from leaders today. Most leadership programs ambushed by the instructional mode of development are seriously impacted and distorted by the nature of the inquiry itself. In short, the question or impulse (or sometimes just the nominated expert at the front of the room offering their pet view) shapes the response, rather than allowing the data to frame relevance. It is for this reason that on-the-job learning in a transformational mode is preferable to almost any other form of developmental experience.

True learning coupled with the evolution of new forms of consciousness invariably arises from an inner sense of knowing and translating that into action. It occurs when experts, gurus, facilitators and trainers are taken out of the equation and people are left to wallow in a messy and confronting space defined only by intentionality and imagination and guided by questions and provocations from those who are “tuned in” to group dynamics and are not constrained by adherence to a single model, truth or impulse.

4. Setting

Pertinent theory and the analysis of case studies can be immensely useful - if there is an opportunity for immediate translation, application and practice. Nowadays however it is quite easy for anyone to surf the net and download as many case studies and theories as one could stuff in a wine cellar. Generally speaking classroom teaching in the conventional sense adds almost no value to leadership development in ways that are unequivocal.

Furthermore, where such theories and lectures take people off-the-job into an artificial learning environment for an experience that might be memorable but is not replicable when it matters, they invariably fail. Naturally this will be fiercely contested by the business schools who trade in such models.

If programs and courses are delivered in this manner one needs to ask what is retained when participants return to work? How much of the learning endures? To what extent will that knowledge continue to add value when the daily routine exerts its gravitational pull? How much of it will still be relevant in five years time? Or ten years time?

Above all how can the unique experiences conveyed within instructional development programs be amplified in ways that add value for the thousands of other people who were not privileged to attend the program? Generally speaking they can not. In order to generate sufficient returns on investments in leadership, higher-order benefits need to spread across the enterprise - in terms of a more innovative culture, cross-business cooperation and the collective comprehension of environmental patterns and trends. This can only manifest in “on-the-job” praxis which is the pragmatic element within the transformational mode of change.

5. Language

The vocabulary of leadership is critical. Within the transformational paradigm development must include terms such as being, empathy, diversity, beliefs, choice, wisdom, responsibility, an expanded sense of self, freedom, intent, purpose, integral, limits and volition. For this is the language of intentional transformation.

As a lexicon in its own right, this language evokes altogether different responses and emotions than the technical terminology so beloved of management consultants and behavioural psychologists, the result of which, so often, is to keep leaders firmly anchored in current disciplines and beliefs.

Final thoughts

The development of leaders and leadership is especially pertinent in today’s global environment as huge shifts in our most life-critical systems edge us towards an age of ethical capitalism, an era of far-reaching change and fundamental political, economic and social upheaval leading, one might hope, to societal renewal. In order to benefit commercially and continue creating value through such volatile times, it will be necessary for companies and governments to pursue innovative business and operating models as well as adopting mindsets open to entirely new ways of being, thinking and doing.

I have been blessed with the extraordinary good fortune to be involved with some of the most progressive leadership programs of their kind available anywhere: inspiring, challenging and knowledge expanding. Until very recently leadership development was premised on a model that depended on acquiring knowledge from external experts or consultants, usually in an artificial environment far removed from the day-to-day bustle of organisational routines, and where case studies and lines of reasoning assume a continuation of the prevailing business paradigm. This is an instructional mode of conditioning. It is repressive and manufactures consent but is increasingly useless in a leadership context.

If we are to challenge that hypothesis, opening our thinking to more exploratory ways of understanding, the development paradigm needs to shift. We will need to take the very best of what has been achieved, integrate and transcend new knowledge and ways of knowing, and embed this within a continually evolving expansion of leadership praxis. That will entail leaving theory behind and treating leadership as a process of continual learning rather than as a punctuation of events residing outside of our control.

 I am grateful to my colleague in The Constellation, Dr Christine McDougall, for her valuable assistance in developing some of the ideas contained within this piece.

 

A Convenient Lie (with apologies to Al Gore)

"The ideal tyranny is that which is ignorantly self-administered by its victims. The most perfect slaves are, therefore, those which blissfully and unawaredly enslave themselves." Dresden James

Over the passage of time I have come to anticipate the end of each year with a serenity born of familiarity as much as for the solitude and change of pace it invariably brings.

As people all over the world return home for the holidays, hibernate or simply seek sanctuary in simple joys arising from reconnection and renewal, the frenzied clockwork of contemporary existence seems to slow down to such an extent that it allows scrutiny in some considerable detail - like counting the seconds. In that briefest of moments all exterior realities are suspended, albeit temporarily, and transcendent qualities perceived or possibly felt.

Perhaps this illusion of slow motion, of stillness, is the only real gift at this time of the year – a rare chance to pause, review in awe the debris we have left in our wake, reflect on the path we are intent on tracing and ponder our most probable destination should the path remain true.

Since a very early age it has been my practice to mark the end of each calendrical chapter by writing a short account of the past twelve months, attempting to make sense of events while mulling over key twists and turns in a journey I share with others as well as consider some ways I may be changing as a result of others' interactions with me.

Normally I sense only evolution. This year has been different. It has invited palpable psychological change. I am increasingly perturbed by foolishness. Stupidity goads me into anger far more easily these days. Greed and laziness too. And I am suitably offended when encountering self-righteousness in any guise. Perhaps all of this is partly a consequence of age. At 65 there is less time for subtlety or toleration of political correctness. Every word must cut through pretension; every deed must be meaningful. It was always in my genes but this year I have matured into a trouble maker par excellence!

Long ago I acquiesced to the label of futurist – an ironically short-sighted consent, for as successive years pass I feel less confident about what tomorrow holds and far less able to voice my apprehension without resorting either to vehement provocation or brooding silence – a state many find even more disconcerting given my innate penchant for debate and my delight in vocabulary.

It is also true that on some days I feel like an impudent adolescent, accused and imprisoned with prejudice in a padded cell from which there is little likelihood of escape, other than by appealing to those who chose to incarcerate me in this manner. On such occasions my blood boils and I am moved to scorn, delivered with an icy precision, capable of inflicting deep wounds. Yet each month I meet and fall in with hordes of like-minded souls who agree with my analysis of the global milieu and who feel a similar torment and stress. Yet few speak out - possibly for fear of being classified as an hysterical malcontent. No matter. I cannot help myself.

Even so the curse of knowledge is deleting positive memories of the future as fast as the water evaporates from puddles in summer. With each moment that passes I feel less able to comprehend the impulse of a species tacitly, tragically, intent on pursuing its own destruction, knowing that most people just get on with their lives, much as before, having little or no consciousness that would lead them to such a desolate conclusion. Each day it becomes harder to tolerate a situation where the most destructive of “inconvenient truths” are ignored, relegated to trivial pursuits, or ridiculed by an increasingly terrified gang of wealthy monarchs, politicians, autocrats, media barons, industrialists and senior executives who have, quite simply, lost the plot of what it means to lead.

Of course it is all too easy (and utterly wrong) to view everything through a lens clouded by despair and scarcity. On those rare occasions when pessimism crowds me in I am fortunate enough to be stirred by those around me who see only abundance, generosity of spirit and cooperation. They are my inspiration and my salvation.

This year has been crammed with significance on so many levels. The local impacts of global heating continued to gather pace. Meanwhile the previous failure of the United Nations’ climate negotiations in Copenhagen, which led to an even more spectacular collapse in Cancun, were air-brushed into “success” by armies of spin doctors. China’s yuan has become the most trusted global currency, helping to reinforce the continuing shift of moral and economic authority to Asia and the global South.

Web 2.0 journalist Julian Assange blew the whistle on an entire library of government chronicles, copping the petulant wrath of politicians and generals who dislike their sordid little secrets being aired in public. In Burma, comparable enemies of democracy graciously released Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest while in Thailand the year ended peacefully after the stirrings of a class revolution failed to muster the required momentum – at least for the time being…

As usual my personal life flaunted variegated shades throughout the year. Isaan New Life took off. The Constellation was born in a state of grace and love. A host of new ventures started at a pace that promises to be both exhilarating and exhausting. In 2010 I traversed the world several times, created a furor in the Thai Royal household by publishing a letter highlighting racism and injustice, resigned from Dhurakij Pundit University but accepted the Chair of Australia21, started work on my next book, Dancing with the Future, encountered enriching new friendships on all five continents and accompanied Suna to Japan and Europe where we witnessed the cherry blossom season in Kyoto, tried our hand at salmon fishing in Scotland, foraged for mushrooms in Stroud and enjoyed crusing the canals in Amsterdam. However the most incredible news was that I am to become a father once again. Our baby is due in June.

Inevitably I am drawn to speculating on what kind of a world our child will inhabit. Those who know me well understand that the more recent compulsion for my work springs from the dread of knowing I helped create a world that, in some respects, is hardly worth inheriting. In my quietest moments this is a huge burden. At least I want my children and grandchildren to know that I strived to instigate renewal; to help create a world that is intentionally different to the one manifesting today.

What might that effort look like and to what end? To many observers even the proposition of massive societal change might look, feel and smell like unwarranted insurgence and seditious in the extreme. But only, I suspect, because we have been conditioned to interpret radical ideas through the win-lose lens of scarcity and competition. Thus we instinctively respond to any inherent novelty in this regard as a threat to our quality of life or our standard of living - especially in the West. Or even as an unwarranted imposition on our hard-won freedoms and acquisitive tendencies.

Actually the imperative for whole societal change is more accurately described as intentional evolution, where such intentionality arises from a more sophisticated collective awareness of reality to that which currently prevails. Let me be clear: the imperative for whole-system change is not some kind of left-wing conspiracy aimed at shifting power from one group to another. Such a goal would be entirely inconsistent with our actual needs. On the contrary, intentional evolution transcends more primitive instincts by shifting attention to our mutual predicament, our shared humanity, rather than on individual fears of deficiency, deprivation or difference. In effect it builds on an integral knowledge base, harnessing the impetus to collaborate in the design of a society we would all gladly bestow on our children, and their children.

The most salient, indeed sacred, aim of evolutionary leadership in this context must be to seek paths that reach into the future by going beyond limits imposed by the “civilizational worldview” that pervades our existence and within which the human species is most certainly trapped.

It may help to define what I mean by the civilizational paradigm: that is the framework of unchallenged principles, beliefs and values that has given rise to our world-system – its institutions, structures and protocols. This belief system is not new. On the contrary it stretches back hundreds of years to a time in history when tribes and communities were just beginning to form.

In fact the civilizational worldview is not only enduring but immensely resilient. Over centuries it has been modified and shaped by differing cultural streams (most obviously Occidental, Indic and Sinic mindsets as well as more finely-grained hybrids of these) without seriously testing its underlying philosophy. Intriguingly the only cultural mindsets I have yet discovered that appear not to subscribe to the civilizational worldview are the various Aboriginal and pre-literate belief systems that honour a different social order and intent.

Outside of these pre-literate mindsets then, the civilizational ethos encompasses all political ideologies and class structures and is consequently one to which we all learned to submit, whether consciously or not. Its core is embodied in the following attributes:

1. A hierarchical social order controlled by a privileged minority (an elite leadership for want of a better term) that remains largely unaccountable for its decisions and where serfdom (and even slavery) is used extensively to exercise power
2. The pursuit of wealth through unlimited economic growth and expansion and the protection of this wealth (as well as the determination of how it is used) through a strictly measured allocation of resources sustained by an interwoven apparatus of political, legal and military elements
3. An economic system, driven by notions of scarcity and competition, that vests title to the wealth produced by society in the elite
4. The concentration of power and wealth in urban centres as well as widespread despoliation and plundering of the rural environment and wilderness
5. A grand mythology and mythic narrative portraying society as originating from and continuing to be influenced by suprahuman powers with sectors of the elite as the official conduit of that influence
6. A written language and accompanying symbolism that is absorbed and monopolised by the elite and its functionaries particularly in the reification of the civilizational illusion
7. Education, labour and corrective systems designed to serve the aims of the elite while manufacturing and maintaining compliance with the designated social order
8. A military establishment and industrial war machine utilised not only for external defence and aggression but also for internal control and repression.

I apologise for listing these attributes in a language evocative of repression, power and class struggle, but it really is the most apposite way to explain the essence of the civilizational ethos. And although as individuals we might find such an association confronting in the extreme, our collective memory and impulse resonates quite spontaneously with this paradigm precisely because most of us have known no other. Whether Chinese, European, Aztec, Zulu or Sikh, it has been the original, solitary, overarching worldview with which we have all complied. So far...

However we have made two fundamental errors in our abiding allegiance to it. Firstly, we have come to view progress within this single worldview as the zenith of human potential, one to which all people and societies should aspire. It is not. Secondly, we have assumed that the civilizational paradigm can solve all of the problems facing us today. Clearly it can not.

Now comes the appalling catch. Those readers who are paying attention will have realised that in order to transcend the civilizational worldview - to move beyond civilization to a world-system that is genuinely sustainable, less manipulative yet deeply liberating - we need to persuade the wealthy (that is you and me) in addition to our nominated elite (including monarchs, high wealth individuals, heads of state, corporate leaders, public intellectuals, and senior bureaucrats) to give up that which has brought such unprecedented affluence and power. As far as I can see the only way to pierce the bubble is by shedding our desire to accumulate more and more material wealth at any cost. But in order to achieve that our overwhelming narrative about who we are and what is important must morph from one that exalts competition and scarcity in every crack and crevice of public life to one that venerates cooperation and abundance without boundaries. Indeed abundance is the space in which evolutionary leadership must now manifest if our species is to advance beyond base materiality, futile conflict and rampant consumerism.

If you think such a situation is sheer fantasy, then take a look at what I am predicting will happen within the next quarter of a century; simply because it has to. As I look back on my life with such gratitude, and forward into the future with such hope, my deepest conviction is that we will witness a substantial shift in five conditions that serve to hold the civilizational worldview in place:

1. Official diplomacy will be set aside so that the truth can be told openly, sincerely and without fear
2. The wealthiest among us will cooperate to eliminate poverty and injustice
3. Militarism and the industrial war machine that spawns terror and sustains conflict will start to unravel or be dismantled
4. Communities will migrate to a steady-state (low growth) economy that jettisons reckless development and consumption in favour of replenishing the Earth’s natural resources
5. The power currently vested in nation states will decline as human ingenuity opens up less exploitative and engaging forms of governance.

This is not an altogether idealistic wish list. Nor is it quite so mad as it looks. Indeed, as I have indicated consistently over the past decade or so, there are already signs that such a genesis is in train. Small, apparently insignificant tremors and recallibrations are evidence that more massive shifts are on the way. The commons movement is gaining an inexorable momentum, calling into question established notions of ownership and granting rights to the underprivileged. Open source and peer-to-peer mechanisms are unshackling ordinary men and women from under the yoke of large corporations. Networked communities are beginning to challenge allegiance to the nation state. Meanwhile people everywhere are beginning to tire of a dominant narrative and systems that isolate and alienate, that create fear and suspicion, and that propagate injustice and inequality.

Digital communications tools and social media are enabling alternative voices to be heard, free from the censorship and half-truths beloved of the establishment and state-controlled media. The recent hullabaloo surrounding Wikileaks, for example, is an indication that a majority of citizens are increasingly disdainful of officialdom, believing truth and integrity to be far more indispensable than complicit agreement with the elite's belief in their right to preserve clandestine reports and activities. In fact the leaked documents are shocking not because they reveal profound state secrets (lets face it there is more tittle-tattle than profundity here) but because they illustrate (a) that the government-military alliance is in effect a vast terrorist machine perpetrating mass murder in our name; (b) an alarming dearth of true leadership in the propaganda many elected representatives are prepared to invent simply to bolster their illusion of power; and (c) the fact that democracy itself has gone feral given that we now owe our allegiance to autocratic leaders who obtain our consent through massive duplicity.

Another case in point derives from the Cancun climate accord which seems to me to be indefensible in the way it fails to deal with climate justice. The text of the accord replaces binding mechanisms for reducing greenhouse gas emissions with voluntary assurances that are utterly inadequate, at least if we are not to exceed a rise in global temperature of 2 degrees Celsius. Filled with bureaucratic ambiguities the accord allows numerous loopholes for polluters, opportunities for expanding traditional carbon markets and other mechanisms that reduce the obligation of developed countries to lead.

Ultimately international negotiations will need to bite the bullet or risk irrelevancy. Sadly, a convenient lie has become all that powerful nations are willing to offer, while they ignore scientists' exhortations to act radically now. Unbelievably Bolivia was the only nation in Cancun to refuse to sign the accord. Bolivia’s logic is clear: they are perturbed that yet another US-European managed, neo-colonial process, will result in the justification and continuation of a failed “development” model and the emergence of additional market-based mechanisms that aim not to solve the problem of global heating but rather to profit from it.

Who knows, perhaps they also grasp the fact that we are facing not just a serious environmental crisis but a global ecological collapse in the broadest sense. Whatever the motivation, this act of principle by one of the poorest nations on the planet appears to be reigniting the determination of others in a similar position not to comply with the traditional power elite.

Indeed support for Bolivia’s stand is forthcoming from diverse networks across Asia and the global South. Comprising men and women, rural communities and farmers, fisher folk, indigenous peoples, formal and informal workers, climate migrants, youth and urban poor (communities who are among the marginalized and most vulnerable due to climate change) the members of these networks comprehend that their lives and their futures are at stake.

All of which indicate a tentative breakdown in the key elements required to preserve the current worldview and a positive sign that we can evolve to a fresh worldview (beyond civilization) more just and benign than that some of us have enjoyed and are now chossing to reject. Ironically I view a breakdown in the established order as an essential pre-requisite for the future survival of our species. Call that revolution if you like, although I am no revolutionary. I am confident, however, that we can evolve in ways that are wise, socially liberating, and do not require us to go back to the dark ages.

But there is a tension within me for I, too, have been indoctrinated within the bubble of the civilizational paradigm. So although I believe the excessive habits of the rich (especially our astonishing levels of production and consumption) are totally unsustainable, I cannot bring myself to accept the oft-heard conspiracy theory suggesting deliberate, organised, attempts by the world’s elite to cling to power through any means. I need to believe in the good intentions of people, whether serfs or leaders, and in our capacity as a species for adaptation and, yes, transcendance.

On the other hand one huge question lingers in my mind. It relates to the speed at which we are prepared to change. Whether we like it or not, whether we "get" it or not, those factors defining the civilizational worldview which I articulated above are obsolete, utterly out of kilter with our needs and the limits imposed by physics. We have reached a point in the human story where, in order to survive and thrive, leaders must create the conditions for their own decline - in terms of wealth and power. This is metamorphosis and to suggest this will require a degree of altruism, audacity and wisdom that is unbearably rare is a huge understatement.

Whether the members of a system we have deliberately installed over many centuries are sufficiently enlightened to even comprehend this, or possess the collective capability to design what is in effect a new society, remains to be seen. It requires letting go of old knowledge and ways of knowing, unprecedented application of imagination and innovation, and an unwavering commitment to collaboration.

The clock is ticking. Uncertainties are plentiful. And, of course, many people see no need to change the habits of a lifetime. “Let future generations deal with the problem” is their catch-cry. I cannot live with that thought. Success will most likely depend on the patience of the world’s poor, the ability of young people everywhere to invest in the creation of a world-system far beyond today’s materialistic models, and a willingness from people of all creeds and persuasions to set aside pettiness, fear and superstition in order to combat economic, energy and environmental issues in ways that will provide us with the breathing space needed to design the next great worldview.

I am grateful to Keith Chandler and his study into mindsets and value systems for helping me to articulate the set of eight attributes depicting the civilizational worldview in this blog.

 

Time to Call Our Bluff

An invitation to withdraw our consent from current economic leadership and do what needs to be done

The news is filled with stories of nations on the edge of economic collapse, going with a begging bowl to the financial markets, European Union and International Monetary Foundation for billions of dollars of “rescue package”. Should the markets or institutions be gracious enough to lend them the money (which must be repaid with significant interest), the countries must introduce a package of “austerity measures” to get their economy “back on track”. To please the High Lords of the global economy, funding is cut to public services, people are made unemployed, subsidies for the environment and international development are slashed – all in the name of “getting our economy back on track”.

But what are we actually talking about here? Do we need to go along lemming-like with the commands of the current economic priesthood? Or could we start questioning the consensus reality, testing its integrity and authenticity, seeing if the emperor really has any clothes?

Although it may seem and feel like an unthinkable course, it is my belief that if we did choose to withdraw our consent and asked ourselves what we really needed, the world would not fall apart around us, our lifestyles would not plummet to the depths of a depression. The good people of Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Spain and others “in need” would know exactly what they needed to do to ensure that their societies functioned well, people who needed care were cared for, the natural environment on which we depend was looked after properly, and that what we really needed to provide in terms of goods and services was provided in a way that nurtured people and planet. We have abdicated our responsibility for the running of our household (economy from the Greek oikos, a house and nomos, a law) to people educated in abstract mathematical models that have become increasingly detached from the realities of people’s lives. It is time to reclaim that responsibility and break the consensus trance.

Imagine…

Imagine what would happen if instead of going along blindly with the demands of our outdated agreements and concepts of how we should run our households, communities and countries, our leaders were simply to refuse. The people and governments of Ireland, Portugal, Spain and others simply said “No. We don’t want your money and we don’t want your conditions.” Before we go any further, just feel for yourself what that would feel like... When I imagine that, I feel tension first, but then an enormous relaxation and sense of groundedness in my body.

So here we are. We stand in our own power. We have a current situation that by the old paradigm looks like our economy and country are going down the plughole. But what if we were to refuse to judge the beauty of our society, culture and people any more by those criteria? What if we were to look at the real value of the contributions people make in their daily activities, the value that our creativity, dedication and innovation adds to people’s well-being and our planet’s vitality? What if we were to decide to stop doing stuff that clearly is not aligned with the best of who we are and to start doing things that are truly meaningful and gainful for the demands of our times?

Would this mean the end of our civilisation? Would this mean world war? Would this mean armageddon? Of course not! It would simply mean that we simply do what needs to be done, regardless of the economic rules that most of our current leadership say we should follow (simply because they see no other option). In fact, it is my belief that it is precisely the continued enforcement of our outdated beliefs about economics and society that will plunge us into greater darkness and despair.  We just need to accept that times have changed, the solutions and models we created to solve problems of the past don’t work any more, we need to let them go, look again at who we are, and start to re-organise.

One step at a time...

So, I hear voices crying, where is the big plan? If we don’t have a big plan of how to organise everything differently, how can we let go of the old? Well, maybe we don’t need a big plan. Maybe we just need to continually connect to reality as it is in the present moment, take decisions that seem workable for the current reality, address new tensions one at a time as they arise, and dynamically steer our way into the future.

In fact, if you study the science of non-linear transitions (and we happen to be in one right now), there is no other way to do it. From the old paradigm that we are still immersed in, even as we sense its demise in every cell of our being, we simply cannot see the future that will emerge out of this transition. The best we can do is stay as close to present reality as possible, keep sensing into the general direction we want to go, listen deeply to what resonates and what creates tension, act to the best of our ability, prototype and learn, while letting go of any attachment to pre-conceived outcomes.

These unstable yet hugely fertile times require a very different approach to organisation and leadership. Do we know how to do this? Yes, small organisations and civil society initiatives have been experimenting with this for years. As is the nature of these kind of transitions, we now need to look to the fringes, where people have broken free of the old consensus reality, find the things that are working, experiment with them ourselves and keep learning – step by small step.

It is much simpler that we think. Our highly intellectual civilisation has created complex models around the basic realities of exchanging value, rooted in ways of seeing the world that believe in a reality of strident individualism, a world made up of lots of separate parts and an over-glorification of the mind and the measurable, at the expense of the heart and the immeasureable. Yet biologists and physicists increasingly describe a reality of interconnectedness, collaboration and mutual care.

Let us let go of all the models and theories that we hold of how people should be organised, look closely at ourselves and those around us, ask ourselves what really needs to be done, and start, one step at a time, to re-organise ourselves in a way that honours the best of what it is to be human, that assumes a fundamental interconnectedness with the rest of life around us and that releases that mysterious spirit inside us we call Life. Can we do it? Of course, it is simply who we are.

This blog was written by Peter Merry who is founder and Chair of the Center for Human Emergence in the Netherlands (www.humanemergence.nl) and Director of the new Hague Center for Global Governance, Innovation and Emergence. He is a founding partner of Engage!, a fellow of the Centre for Human Ecology and a member of the faculty of Wisdom University Europe.

Science Friction

Today we welcome to the program, Dr Nick Mitchell, founding director of the Integral Science Academy, Nobel Prize winner and Australia’s Chief Scientist to hear about his life, ideas and concerns. Welcome to the program Nick. Your team has just made a breakthrough in solving one of our major environmental problems. You’ve been partying I hear?

You bet. Even scientists let their hair down occasionally you know. I mean, in a six-way race against Europe’s affluent Monsanto empire, a Chinese conglomerate funded by that zany billionaire guy who recently acquired Glaxo Smith-Kline, and three boutique global alliances, it was our team that cracked the jackpot! Yes, of course we celebrated.

It’s meant a lot of hard work and plenty of travel for you and your associates.

Yes indeed. Professor Lin Lynn, one of our most eminent hydrologists and the former chair of the Cooperative Research Centre in Water Futures at Tehran University, and I have spent most of our time during the past three years coordinating the work of our various team leaders - Hiromi in Tokyo, Bob here in Canberra, Vivek in Mumbai, June and Tammy in Boston. I still hate travelling, as Lin would have told you, so I work from Canberra whenever possible, using the resources of the Decision Theater at ANU where I also have a Chair. The air hammocks on Singapore Airworld are quite comfortable I suppose but, unlike Lin, I’ve never been able to sleep in an upright position. I also avoid taking any melatonin you see, so when the lid closes I get this awful sense of claustrophobia. Anyway it’s been a race against time. Our funds were fast drying up. But now we’re on the verge of announcing a solution to one of the world’s most formidable ecological problems.

Nick, before you tell us about that perhaps I should explain to our listeners that we’re talking about salinity. Your desalination process has been successfully tested on some of the world’s most hypersaline areas with unprecedented success.

Yes. Actually the desalination process is only part of the solution. The real breakthrough arose when we married our nano-membrane desalinator (the technology) with “keyline” design principles (the philosophy) and applied this to specific tracts of land identified with the help of detailed intelligence from NRI in Canberra. It was the combination of these things that allowed us to achieve quite extraordinary results.

The success will mean massive profits for your sponsors, Nippon Chemicals & Chemnet and incalculable kudos for you and your team. 

That’s correct. Also Vivek’s Research Institute in India and CSIRO here in Australia are likely to reap a bonanza in funding through their strategic partnership with Hoechst. In fact it’s probably the difference between surviving or not for Vivek. So he is over the moon, as you can imagine. Our sponsors are looking at a return on their original investment of something approaching 800% over the next decade.

For a while there it looked as though salinity was the one environmental problem we would not be able to solve. By 2025, dry land salinity had claimed almost 18 per cent of our cultivated land. Salt in Adelaide’s drinking water, where my parents still live, had reached the World Health Organization’s maximum safety levels. It was shocking.  

There have been many costly attempts to remedy salinity of course. Possibly the biggest disappointment was the massive and costly Wonthaggi plant that started up in 2012 which was supposed to have had an initial capacity of 410 megalitres a day. Successive governments, as you know, have ploughed more and more money into promising initiatives. I guess they’ve all helped to some extent. Who knows what proportion of our land would be lost without these efforts? But you are correct in that none of them have really cracked the problem in the long-term - until now.

Why do you think that was Nick? What is it in our thinking that focuses on short-term expediency rather than the long-term future?  

Oh, hold on. You’re putting words into my mouth. And I can’t accept the proposition that we ignore the long view. Today’s science is a fast moving body of knowledge and we are always finding new ways of combining different aspects of science to create more viable solutions to problems. You’ve only to look at history. It doesn’t matter how tough the problem, science always finds a way of dealing with it. It is this scientific capability that is so beneficial to society.

Can you give our listeners some concrete examples?

Sure. Remember 2008 when we decided to de-stock much of the interior of sheep and cattle on advice from CSIRO researchers? That worked very well in the region and it certainly allowed the recovery of some arid-zone ecosystems and increased organic matter in soils.  

As I recall Nick, the social impact on the families who had farmed these lands for generations was calamitous.

Well it’s true we really hadn’t given that side of things much thought. But we’re scientists, not sociologists. We can’t be held accountable for non-scientific problems. And solve scientific problems we do. Take the “daughterless” project for example. In 2010, the introduction of the latest research from leading gene technologists in the UK enabled Aussie farmers to use various anti-fertility techniques, including an immunosterilisation technique known as “daughterless”, to control pests ranging from mice to cane toads.  You must remember that? It created quite a hullabaloo in the press. It was very successful.

I do remember that Nick.  But I also seem to recall that, although the situation improved for a while, there were some problems associated with these techniques spreading to domestic animals.

Well, yes that was a surprise for us. All of the experimental research indicated that the cross-species transference would be within tolerable limits and would not have a widespread impact on total populations. We are learning that the application of controlled research on a wide scale can have unforeseen impacts. But we always find a solution – just as we did through the development and application of hormone implants in the females of reproductive age. This also helped overcome normal sterility. So I think you’ll agree that the benefits in this case have far outweighed the costs, and produced a valuable new industry for Australia. The sale of implants and implant expertise has reinvigorated several country towns and created a budding new Australian export industry. And there are many other new experiments continuing to show similar promise for the sustainability of the Australian rural sector.

Why don’t we hear much about these experiments? Surely the community has a right to engage in serious debate about such issues, just as scientists have an obligation to explain to us the options we have as a society – especially when it comes to new technologies? How can we the public trust the experts if we aren’t included in the conversation?

It is a challenge for science – to hold back research and implementation when we know there are benefits because we need to engage the community first. I guess scientists are more interested in the science and solving problems than in trying to market our work to the community. There is so much to be done.  Spending precious time persuading government and commercial sponsors to put money up for research is bad enough. They certainly won’t entertain the funding of pure research nowadays. There always has to be a commercial outcome to raise any interest at all. So I guess we’ve learned to keep our business out of the public eye until we’re certain it works. 

Surely you run a great risk in not including non-scientists in the process?

There are calculated risks in everything we do. I don’t see how including non-scientists can really achieve much other than slowing the process down. Science is difficult for some people to understand. Scientific research is complex work. That is why we have experts. What good does it do to try to explain this to ordinary people? Aren’t we better to find the solutions and then present them to people? Overall I believe the community is interested in our results and the benefits from scientific research. All of our technological developments, scientific breakthroughs, health and aging...  All of these are due to the work of our scientists. I’ll agree that we need to communicate better. But it is a perennial dilemma I’m afraid, and one that our commercial backers are not really prepared to fund. Its solutions they demand - not public relations. Look, scientists have tried hundreds of things that you won’t necessarily have heard about. Take feral pests for instance. Wild cats, rabbits, cane toads…  Now there’s a problem. We’ve trying everything we know to combat that one. Your airwaves would be clogged if we talked about every approach that we’ve ever tried!

But in spite of all these efforts, the cane toad problem today is far worse than it’s ever been!  

Indeed. It is proving to be a diabolical problem. But there are promising research indications that the borscevits strain of blood sucking insects imported from Antigua might combat the growing plague.  There are a number of other promising approaches each looking at specific aspects such as diet, predators and habitat. It is a difficult issue but I’m optimistic that we will find an answer sooner or later. You must remember that we’ve achieved an enormous amount during the past 25 years. I’m thinking of organic fertilisers, satellite resource intelligence, sustainable agriculture, renewable energy... The public recognises the value of robust science, and when provided with good evidence will support it. They will even change their minds about some things.  Remember the public outcry in the first decade of the new millennium over genetically modified foods! Most fresh produce and processed foods are genetically modified now. The initial public outcry was just because people were misinformed – they didn’t have all the facts. Greenies on a mission, I always said! We have to be realistic. People can rely on science to provide huge benefits for society. For example, we’ve enriched oilseed with omega-3 fatty acids to ward off cardiovascular disease and created drought-resistant cereals. It’s all environmentally benign agriculture naturally. What’s more Australia is now recognised as one of the most efficient producers of GM foods in the world. Where would we be without those exports!  

I’ve always understood that the shift away from intensive farming techniques in 2005, coupled with the complete ban on the use of antibiotics as growth promoters in livestock, was really just following the lead set by the EU in 2004?

That is partly true. This policy actually came about as a result of pressure from the EU. They asked the WTO to examine the legality of Australia’s strict quarantine regulations, claiming the process was nothing more than disguised protectionism. That was a difficult one for the Minister as she had to squeeze free trade and Australia’s “clean and green” image into the same quarantine bottle!  Then there was the BSE outbreak in the EU, you’ll recall.  All was well for a time, although it was a bit of a balancing act. But there were good scientific reasons for the use of antibiotics, as was proven by the particularly nasty outbreak of Salmonella poisoning that led to the collapse of the Australian pork industry. Now everyone is eating GM soybean that looks and tastes like pork. So it has found public acceptance now – thanks to another scientific discovery that created another Australian industry and saved a whole community.

Now that everything in our lives is so commercial (even scientific research and technology is motivated by short-term profit) how does your Institute find funding to work on those projects that may be less commercial, but socially desirable? How do you fund the work you are doing in Africa, for example.

As I said before, there is no such thing as pure scientific research these days.  There are simply no resources available for things like that, unless you can find a private benefactor of course. The people who get the grants are those that large corporations will back. So we are forced to focus on the more commercial outcomes of our work. This becomes a barrier when commercial profit is finite. Our African project is a good example. We’ve been using a combination of gene cloning and biomimicry techniques to try and find solutions to some of Africa’s most scary health problems. This is leading-edge stuff. Historically there has been no money available for this kind of thing because those people most in need, African peasants, can’t afford to pay for the solution. When profit is the only motive it is inevitable that society as a whole suffers.  And they demand profits – they don’t sense a responsibility to provide health care for Africans. These days the only way to work on these problems is when political will bows to the pragmatic entrepreneur – in this case the Gates-Buffet Foundation, which has a record of assisting the world’s poor.

And yet, isn’t it ironic that if account were taken of our rampant use of polluting fossil fuels, industrialized countries would have totted up an environmental debt of around one thousand billion dollars to the highly indebted poor nations, such as those in Africa.

Yes indeed, it doesn’t make sense does it? But on a more positive note, those countries have also benefited from the science. Increasingly, globalization has brought new industry, new crops and new water technologies to poorer countries. So they are benefiting too. And the salinity project will eventually have spin-offs for the drought stricken countries of the third world. Now that we have a commercial solution and are in production, the technology will become more widely available. I understand negotiations are currently underway to begin production of the nanomembrane in several developing countries.

Nick, now that the salinity project is coming to a conclusion, at least from a research point of view, can you tell us what is next in the pipeline?

I feel an obligation to help reverse the decision that was made way back in 2015 when a meeting of some of the world’s leading scientists in Luxembourg voted to abandon the so-called “precautionary principle” that has guided scientific endeavor for the past couple of centuries. 

Why did they take this risk?  

At the time most scientists, and politicians for that matter, felt a need to focus all available resources and energy on a massive effort to overcome the planet’s worst environmental and health problems. We needed solutions and we needed them fast. Remember global warming and pollution had become a real threat by then. In Australia we’d already lost the battle to save the Great Barrier Reef and salinity was considered a lost cause. So there was nothing to lose and everything to gain.  

Was there any single factor informing that decision?

It depends upon your point of view. It’s true that from around 2030 the various forms of human cloning and stem cell farming being practiced precipitated a few problems we hadn’t foreseen. One of these was a new family of mutant viruses. As usual, the alarmist media hype backed the scientific community into a corner and I think it was the reaction of some prominent scientists to that issue which resulted in the Luxembourg decision. A few skeptics warned of dire consequences. But scientists have always had immense confidence in robust science. We know that science can solve most of the world’s problems - sooner or later. And at the time I think we genuinely thought that these few instances arose from a small number of research projects that turned out not to be as sound as we had thought. If the science is sound, then the risk is small. Unfortunately though, it seems that many of the solutions adopted, especially by some small commercially minded labs in the Eastern European Union and the US, weren’t adequately tested before being brought into use. The commercial pressure to get to market, together with the releasing of controls…  Well, as you can see I think it was a bad decision. As a result a few chronic ailments have emerged that we don’t fully understand. And there are some outbreaks of old diseases, like hepatitis C, for example, that have come back to haunt us in new guises. But there are numerous research projects focusing on these issues and I am confident that we will crack them very shortly.

Doesn’t that mean that abandoning the “precautionary principle” was rather reckless?

I don’t know that it was reckless. I think at the time that we thought it was an acceptable risk. The need for the solutions was so great - remember we were faced with very big environmental and health problems. And initial research findings were so promising. You’re right that there were instances where we were proven wrong. But you can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs.  

I’m not sure that Janine Field, the Fox News journalist who contracted a new form of hepatitis, despite being inoculated before an assignment in Afghanistan, would agree with you – or the thousands of people who took the same Merck vaccine in good faith.

Yes this was an unfortunate instance, but I don’t think you can blame science for this one. I understand that Ms Field has sued Merck & Co, who made the vaccine and that they recalled batches of ineffective hepatitis in pre-filled syringes in March. You’ll recall that the suit, filed in New York State Supreme Court, claims Merck "negligently manufactured, distributed and sold the recalled vaccine which provided absolutely no protection against the disease"..  So let’s be quite clear, this is obviously the result of poor manufacturing and quality control, not poor science.  That said, I do believe that the commercial pressure on science now to get to market quickly, and the removal of controls over production and distribution of scientific products, allows for less than desirable practices. I would like to see some control over those things, to put the brakes on just a little so that situations like this don’t happen.

And on the environmental front we are still left with impending ecological disaster if we don’t act quickly?

Yes. Things do go in cycles don’t they? 

So what’s the answer?

The attack on scientific expertise is insidious as it is an attack on excellence and rational thinking per se. We must remember that science is impartial and objective. It is the only logical basis we have for decision-making. So attacking science gets us nowhere. I guess I would advocate a more rational approach and a return to the past in terms of the “precautionary principle”. Now is the time to be providing the time and the frameworks for sound scientific research, reinforcing the need for robust thinking, and sufficient testing. We need to ensure good science, not undermine all science.

But do we have the luxury of time to be so cautious?

Possibly not. But I really know of no better way.

Dr Nick Mitchell, thanks so much for your time today. And as for your exotic viruses project, I’m sure our listeners empathize with your efforts to help the world’s poor in ways that contribute to their quality of life. Good luck.  

Next week on this program we will be talking to NASA scientist James Goode about his work on the self-repairing chemical lasers currently deployed in the Earth’s atmosphere to protect us from the terrorist activities of rogue states. This is Harry Drummond signing off for today. Take care and stay happy…

 

 

Garden Under Glass

Do you remember how it felt?

How could I ever forget? I felt such sheer disbelief that it was actually happening. I breathed in the deepest breath and watched intently as the skin covering the first sector of my Earth Dome peeled away, exposing real air and natural sky. I recall wondering if things would now return to how they used to be – the way my grandmother used to describe her life “outside”.

You must remember that most of my thirty-seven years have been spent in the Lithgow Earth Dome just west of Sydney’s Blue Mountains. So, like you, I’ve been isolated from the real world by a thin film of plastic for most of my adult life. I do vaguely recall playing with my friends on Coogee beach and how good the sand felt between my toes. That was before the Domes spread like wild mushrooms in the decade from 2020 and the environment became increasingly more hostile to life as temperatures soared and sea levels rose by up to 85 centimeters. 

In the years following the Johannesburg Convention on Sustainability, which my grandma had attended in her capacity as a senior manager with the Australian Conservation Foundation, scientists’ inability to make significant inroads into the unrelenting environmental damage meant that a new approach was badly needed.  Faced with such evidence, the global scientific community persuaded an alliance of 100 multinational corporations and 128 countries to sign the landmark Beijing Earth Monitor Convention in 2015. This Convention established a program to map the socio-ecological systems at work on the planet and to convene joint action in using that knowledge to intervene appropriately in the global environmental system. 

As with earlier multilateral accords and treaties, signing it was one thing, getting underway another. Turning international agreement into international action was not a speedy process. There was no real infrastructure, no common understanding of systemic methodologies and they were pitted against the inevitable interference from individual vested interests. Companies still had to make a profit; nations still needed the support of their citizens…  What’s that saying about nothing changing the more change there is?

Creating a giant computerized earth model to enable this understanding and provide a certain degree of predictability didn’t come cheap, even then. For a long time it didn’t look like it would get off the ground, especially after the scandals surrounding the collapse of the Japanese-based Earth Simulator 1.2 in 2008. I mean, where is the profit in that kind of scientific endeavor? Who would be likely to fund the future of the Earth? 

As a kid growing up in Australia I felt lucky in many respects. I know it sounds crazy but we were far better placed than most as we were among the first to experience total environmental collapse. Being located directly under the massive breach in the ozone layer meant that our environment was one of the first to feel the pain of climatic volatility and therefore one of the first to take action. I can still feel the scorching heat of the sun on my back to this day. That’s something I can never forget.

How did you get involved in the Pandora Project?

That’s a long story. Let’s go back a few steps. In spite of the optimism surrounding the 1987 Montreal Protocol, which had focused on reducing the consumption of chlorofluorocarbons, the actual impact on the atmosphere was too slow. Most people were distracted by the global warming debate. But while that was certainly serious most people hadn’t spotted the other danger. Combined with a build-up of sulphuric acid droplets emanating from a succession of unexpected volcanic eruptions from Japan in the north to Antarctica in the south in the early years of the century the ozone layer all but disappeared over vast tracts of the southern hemisphere when I was growing up. That, combined with surging melanoma cases arising from greatly increased levels of ultraviolet radiation, the longest drought in Australian history, 25 per cent of our most valuable agricultural land lost to salinity and the devastating bush fires, floods, hurricanes and violent storms that characterized the first two decades of the new millennium, meant there was more pain, more urgency for a solution on this part of the planet.

Traumatized, federal and state governments refused to change deeply flawed policy settings. Funding for scientific agencies continued to decline as a proportion of national spending. Desperate to get their message across, scientists forged an alliance across agencies and took the issue to the corporate sector. Surprisingly, the response was positive. At last scientists realized they were not alone. 

My own involvement was more personal. It arose out of my mum’s death from melanoma, from my apprenticeship as a cinematographer working with James Cameron in Santa Monica after I graduated from the Australian Film, Television & Radio School, and from a chance meeting with members of The Constellation. I’d better explain. 

At the turn of the century just across the Tasman a burgeoning new industry was catalzsing public action like nothing before it. Filmmaker Peter Jackson had chosen New Zealand’s magnificent scenery as the backdrop for his Lord of the Rings trilogy. This inadvertently spawned a “back to nature” movement as filmmakers and audiences alike escaped into the grandeur of these ancient landscapes.

Then came along Avatar in 2010. James Cameron’s use of three-dimensional digital imaging combined with his mythic story-telling capacity and concern for nature and humanity, created a new sensitivity focused on our mutual responsibilities to each other and to all living beings. As more and more people started taking the precarious future and timeless beauty of our planet personally, scientists and artists joined ranks, determined to guide the rest of us into a future characterized by abundance and well-being. Meanwhile Jim Cameron had already started working with The Constellation, a global community of thought leaders, systems practitioners and institutions committed to evolving the art, science and craft of leadership. Using his expertise in visualizing complex information, Cameron joined forces with The Constellation to build the initial web of highly networked immersive “decision theaters” in Tempe, Chennai, Johannesburg, Tokyo, Canberra, Beijing and the Hague. These early locations were deliberately chosen so as to capture different cultural inflections and attitudes within the shared knowledge base. From this unlikely genesis blossomed the Pandora Project, the first authentically global quest aimed at environmental and social renewal.

As you will recall the arts industry worldwide swung into action. Musicians, DJs, filmmakers, performance artists, multimedia production, PR and merchandising departments now had dual imperatives: to make money and to conserve nature. What had been altruistic before now achieved a legitimacy that altered everything.

Inexplicably, the environment became the cause célèbre once again for a groundswell of international passion. Back home, national interest was clear. Not only were these ancient landscapes beautiful, they were vital to our future economic and social development. As an idealistic 18 year old I was certainly intent on doing what I could to change people’s notions of what was possible. That is when I was invited to become a systems modeller with the Australian decision theater at the ANU in Canberra. I leaped at the chance naturally.

With burgeoning public and corporate support for environmental action and money forthcoming from the arts and entertainment industry, the way was clear for some creative thinking about the future of our planet. In Australia and New Zealand the Social and Environmental Systems Trust [ANZSEST] was formed and I was invited into their youth network. We worked together in the decision theater, always sharing our thinking and progress with colleagues in the other centres. Armed with AI-enhanced systems thinking tools, sophisticated virtual reality depictions of a range of alternative futures, and a great deal of focused energy, ANZEST worked with The Constellation to commission action-research projects that would lead to alternative environmental knowledge. Some of these paid off handsomely. And of course it all made for great cinema as both the landscapes and the human and scientific processes of understanding and conserving them for future generations now grabbed the public’s attention. It was the new form of “reality TV” – not quite documentary, not quite fiction. Voyeurism with a lesson…

Our first program, which was also our first success, exemplified new thinking on a small scale. Taking a radically different “integral” approach to salinity (by mapping the interconnected social, aesthetic, spiritual, economic and environmental factors that had given rise to both predictable and emergent consequences) our eco-engineers were able to design alternative strategies to address what was previously thought to be beyond human capability to solve. From this extraordinary initiative, the notion of integral sustainability was born, complete with patented products and processes. At last there was real money to be made by conserving natural resources. 

Having confirmed the validity of the whole-of-system approach in agriculture, ANZEST turned its attention to industrial and urban development. Using design criteria derived from industrial ecology, EcoPark (Australia’s first eco-industrial park) was established in the new bush lands around Canberra. This first no-waste industrial and community development provided the focus, capital and a working model for other projects. Another new industry, Whole Systems Eco-Design, had been invented which went on, as you know, to work hand-in-glove with the Carbon War Room in Washington.

By that stage you had become a member of ANZEST’s Youth Board?

Yes. I was eighteen years old and the youngest member by far! ANZEST realized it was still only tinkering at the edges of what was possible. Decision theater processes and technologies gave us insights into altogether different realities. It was an amazing adventure. These early programs in the Pandora Project were powerful examples of strategic invention but they still didn’t address the deepening problems associated with climatic volatility and global warming. Sea levels continued to rise and by 2030 scientists were battling it on two fronts – one dealing with the present (through the Earth Domes) the second working at a global level as part of the Whole Earth Model Consortium, aimed at mapping, understanding and modelling the planet as a single living system.

Of these two initiatives the Earth Domes was straightforward enough, at least from a scientific viewpoint. Learning from the Eden Project, a dome large enough for a whole city of around two million people was designed and constructed outside Hamilton. The still larger Lithgow Dome followed soon after and the stage was set for the ANZSEST Dome Construction Consortium’s international expansion. Managing the microclimate within each of the Domes was simple. Lessons from Earth Simulator 3.5 enabled reliable cybernetic modelling at this small scale.

It didn’t take long for the gloss to wear off did it? 

I guess managing the social interactions of people is beyond current scientific understanding. More so than, say, technology. People just aren’t as predictable. So sometimes it worked. But mostly it didn’t. Even so for most Domies it became a whole lot better than living rough outside on the planet’s unprotected surface. Much of the earth had become far too parched to sustain human life in those days.

And that created another set of issues. 

Yes. Those unable to afford a Domicile weren’t particularly happy. They thought it aggressively elitist in an otherwise egalitarian society. Security for the Domies became a huge issue. At first it was only a minor inconvenience, but as life on the “outside” became more uncomfortable, antagonism toward the Domies grew. At Lithgow we needed constant surveillance to ensure the integrity of the Dome. Inside, too, where the melting pot of different cultures and values all existing under the same roof caused one hassle after another!

Life in other parts of the planet was even worse of course, especially in Africa and South America where people still had no choice but to cope with the lack of drinking water and plummeting oxygen levels in the large cities. Sadly the social volatility in these regions rivals environmental issues in their complexity. The swine-flu pandemic of 2025, followed closely by widespread famine from the dumping of inert GM seed stock, greatly exacerbated already fragile political and social systems across Africa. The push to connect Africa into the global telenet in the 2030’s as a way of improving education and keeping teenagers in their home countries also had unintended consequences. 

People were now able to see even more clearly the inequality that existed between different communities. It’s difficult to live with such obvious social injustices. Yet nobody could hope to deliver on the demands for greater material wealth increasingly heard from those poor people. Not even today, using the most sophisticated systemic modelling mechanisms are we able to solve such ingrained problems. What we really need is a whole-of-system solution for Africa. Sadly, we have wiped our hands and walked away. Our only answer has been to quarantine the whole continent. In so doing, the developed world has knowingly condemned its inhabitants to isolation and ultimate ruin. But we cannot seem to find the reverse gear!

The gap between the rich and the poor gave rise to the age of terror ecology?

Yes. As if all of this wasn’t chaotic enough, a new brand of horror surfaced. Frustrated by years of ineffective pro-environmental activism and armed with a new systemic awareness, Greenwar, a breakaway group from within Greenpeace, began to employ a new form of activism - terror ecology. Devotees of Stuart Kauffman’s philosophy, that networks near the edge of chaos have the flexibility to adjust at an accelerated rate and trigger cascades of change, they took radical action to shift the environment into a state of chaos.

Their mantra “chaos for the planet” became a powerful attractor. 

It certainly did. The movement grew quickly, attracting not only other true believers, including many of my closest friends, but also systemic misfits looking for a home.  Here was a purpose that appeared to resonate strongly with the depressive death cults so common amongst disaffected young people at the time. For others I suppose it was just another opportunity to indulge in the latest “extreme sport” and live their life on the edge.

Greenwar’s opening gambit had been to nuke a number of oil fields in the Gulf of Thailand. Following that early success, more ambitious targets were identified.  Within days a number of major oil refineries across the globe had been bombed. The devastation wreaked was terrible. But the real shock was how slowly political systems responded. After half a century of non-violent activism, it was difficult for politicians to come to terms with the fact that this new wave of terrorism emanated from within the environmental movement itself.

Market reaction was much faster of course, as it always has been. Although solar had become the main source of powering the cities, oil, coal and gas was still in plentiful supply for those who could afford it. Suddenly the use of fossil fuels dropped by 80 per cent almost overnight as supplies dried up and people rapidly moved to adopt the substitute alternatives that had been waiting in the wings for over half a century.  Thankfully most manufacturers were still profit driven and were able to gear up production relatively quickly. 

Overall, the impact was to create further instability in the system. This provided yet another powerful reason to “go under glass” into an environment that was safer and more secure. Construction of Earth Domes accelerated apace. Within ten years, thirty domes had been completed on high ground in Australia and New Zealand alone, offering a safe alternative to chaotic environments and a new social life as the promotional material so compellingly claimed.

Social disruption didn’t disappear though.

No, in fact it was probably aggravated further if the truth were known. For a start, the Domes couldn’t house everyone so security became a continuing issue. Life inside the Domes wasn’t so easy either. Many became a hotbed of frustration and elitism rather than the safe cocoon we had originally envisaged. Soon strict regulations governed who could live in the Dome, and what happened inside them.  Even then it was still much better than living “outside”.

What was the biggest challenge for you?

Undoubtedly tackling the Whole Earth Model. For all of us in the Pandora Project this was the really big issue and it was an altogether different ball game. It was too big, too complex and too chaotic for humans to fully understand. Many of our envoys genuinely believed we would need to postpone work until super humans could address the challenge. Seriously!

The creation of a hybrid species of superhuman was becoming a force to be reckoned with. In laboratories all over China competing environmental programs were well underway...

Absolutely. One such program entailed the harnessing of Artificial Intelligence and materials science to create super-intelligent beings. In this way, or so it was thought, we would come to understand the universe differently and develop a new appreciation of the world that might transcend our current, limited beliefs. 

Another program in competition with ours entailed the establishment of a Living Earth Model by a Chinese-Indian-Pakistani consortium. A designated regional system was marked out in economically depressed north western China, including Tibet and stretching down into the Punjab region that had been inundated by the floods of 2010, using its people and ecosystems as a giant real-time systems laboratory. While viewed sceptically by many of my more rationally minded colleagues, the aim was to monitor and test large system events, trends and interventions within a designated area and map the resulting causal loops to gain a greater understanding of cause and consequence.

My close friend Zhou Huiching was a Causal Mapper for the project. She claimed it was more accurate than the computer modelling of our Whole Earth Model and I tend to agree with her. What she began to notice was that serendipitous and watershed events weren’t coincidence. They appeared to have a mappable pattern and sequence to them, based on the levels of connectivity and behaviors in the region.

What Huiching still couldn’t get her head around, though, were the outcomes of behavior or action past about the fourth order of consequence. Her analytical tools just couldn’t hold that level of complexity and variability. This is where our machine models had it over her team. By that stage, though, we were all really just guessing what was going to happen, without much basis in fact.

You’ve been quite sceptical about American science.

Since the US started its decline at the beginning of the century, the vibrancy of innovation in science and technology has diminished considerably. The US still spends far too much on military protectionism and “selfish” science and very little on the environment. It’s so macho, such a wank! It’s all been funded by the conservative baby boomers, after all. They’ve put significant scientific effort into extending life, maintaining youth, cheating death...  Many aging baby boomers were even making deposits to Genetic Savings & Clone and spending their money on re-creating their pets. It’s all quite bizarre. Only in America, as they say!

So ANZSEST persevered against these odds? 

We couldn’t just give up. In the race to find workable solutions, the consortium deployed millions of nanosensors across Australia and New Zealand designed to measure every aspect of the biosphere. This provided the indispensable data needed to run simulations through the Whole Earth Model. The Grid – a third generation Internet system designed specifically to handle large amounts of data at phenomenal speeds – was requisitioned to connect interested non-aligned agencies all over the world. Gradually, clues as to a sustainable working model began to surface. It was an exciting time.

Yet, even at this stage, the project was plagued by uncertainties. 

Unfortunately that’s right. Competing views on what systems methodology to use, problems with Google’s Earth Monitor software, and escalating pressure on the consortium due to increasingly frequent environmental disasters, conspired to undermine effective decision-making. We also had scalability and interoperability problems with the data we were using. Our monitors were placed over a relatively small test area and it was impossible to create boundaries sufficient to remove systemic interference from the rest of the planet.

Progress slowed as we became bogged down in bureaucratic trivia. At times it seemed as though we were getting even further away from creating a really systemic appreciation of interacting human systems. Each time the Consortium’s lead scientists thought they had a viable solution within their grasp, something else (like Greenwar atrocities, for example) popped up to hinder our work and perturb the system further.  Was it chaos at work, or just too complex for us to understand just yet?  None of us could really say.

But we persisted. By 2040 a working model was up and running. Incomplete, but robust enough... Or so we thought. What we had not envisaged was the impact on our project from jettisoning other forms of knowledge. Remember we had started in an integral space. But by 2045 a global model was developed in which rationality and science prevailed. We had come to know how the world’s environmental system actually worked. We had the proof we needed. It was now clear what needed to be done in order to manage the system. The evidence was irrefutable and our scientists were euphoric. I remember the Board meeting…

But that’s when things started to go badly wrong?

Yes, at the height of our elation. Ironically, no sooner had the new policies been deployed than glitches started appearing in the system. The temperature started to fall.  The ice caps began to re-form. Huge numbers of the nanosensors began to “drop out” of the satellite navigation grid for no rational reason. Others showed up in the strangest of places.

What was happening? Had Greenwar finally inspired a systemic snapback? Had we reached a new equilibrium? Or was this the lull before the storm, the beginning of the end for the Whole Earth Model? The conversations in our network went haywire! Decision theaters all around the world were being used 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Nothing in the model could explain the wild fluctuations that were now occurring at an increasingly inexplicable rate. Even with the sophistication of the model, the ubiquitous nature of the biosensors, and the vast amounts of technological and logistics support, we still couldn’t quite manage it all.

Who first realized what was happening?

Actually it was a few activists, members of the arts community, like myself, who first grasped the unintended consequences - a few ordinary citizens saw what was actually happening. I well remember Amanda Lucas, George Lucas’s daughter, pointing out that there were so many nanosensors that they were like dust clouds forming a UV shield reflecting the sun’s rays back into space. And she was right! Originally, you see, the scientists assumed they’d only need the sensors for around ten years, so they programmed and powered them for this lifespan. But as the nanobots aged they decommissioned, and without adequate propelling and locating sensors they swarmed, gluing together forming vapor clouds in the atmosphere that blocked out the sunlight.

Once the scientists understood what was happening, they just packed up and prepared for Armageddon. They could manage global warming. But this? The planet, many believed, would just “cook”. Fortunately the decline in fossil fuel consumption was actually reducing the total amount of heat generated on the planet. The Earth Domes and EcoParks were containing a significant amount of the heat generated. Far from creating an insulating blanket, the “nanoclouds” were acting as a heat regulator, transferring heat away from the atmosphere and acting as a kind of planetary thermostat. It was uncanny – something nobody could have predicted.

We’ve now come full circle almost.  The Domes are being dismantled even as we speak.

Yes. As the environment began to stabilize, pressure mounted on councils to remove the Domes. For many Domies, the need for the Earth Domes became not so great.  They had served their purpose after all. For some, the sanitized environments are simply too safe a haven to leave. They still cannot bring themselves to trust living in the open air again.  For still others, it is all they have ever known especially now that there is such social control within some Domes. There is safety in the scientifically controlled environments and they do not want to envisage anything else.

Any regrets?

No, not as far as I’m concerned. Oh, I would love to have seen my grandma’s face as we removed the skins at Lithgow. But for me, for my partner and for our children, the adventure is just beginning.  We can breathe fresh air again. And I can’t wait to feel the sand between my toes.

Free Fall

Our civilization feels like its in free fall. Much of what we have previously taken for granted now appears to be broken as old operating strategies refuse to work any more. Just as humanity is confronting limits imposed by nature on what it can and can not do, so an impasse has been reached in our ability to deal with critical issues in a collective manner - that is as a species.

During the coming decade we are likely to face a cascade of massively disruptive crises that will feed on each other both economically and ecologically. Many of these will disable institutional power players, potentially opening up space for new socioeconomic, governance and technological innovations to embed. As that happens, collaboration on an unprecedented scale will be needed to transition the human community into one that is at once more viable, resilient and benign to life.

In that regard it is useful to distinguish between two scenarios articulated by my friend Michel Bauwens. The first presupposes enlightened leadership from at least a fraction of the political and business elite. This is difficult because it requires a level of consciousness and individual altruism able to rise above perceived self-interests. The second focuses attention on local resilience but accomplished in ways where the resulting innovation flows are accessible universally – for example through open source design and peer-to-peer communities. Elements of both scenarios are critical to success. Both must be framed within different logics of possibility and desirability.

There appear to be five factors currently hampering civilizational renewal. They have nothing to do with technology, infrastructure and investment capital, and very little to do with politics. In fact all five of these factors are relatively intangible. What they do have in common is an affiliation to the cultural or psychological space within which we typically respond to shifting and uncertain conditions.

Very simply stated these factors are (i) the detachment of ideas and social relations; (ii) fears and apprehension, engendered through an apparent lack of control as well as a distrust of others motives; (iii) outdated and invalid mindsets; (iv) competitive conduct; and (v) the fragmentation of endeavours. Let us examine each of these in turn.

1. DETACHMENT

As the umbilical bond human beings have with each other expands we become more highly attuned to a global “community of mind” as an experiential phenomenon. Increasingly we feel an integral part of a cohesive human family. At the same time it is almost unbearable to digest the pain arising from such knowledge. How is it that we can wreak so much misery and suffering on our fellow beings?

When it comes to tangible events and issues the opposite condition seems to prevail. Here, critical issues facing humankind are becoming uncoupled from each other in our cognitive analysis of them. We no longer discern the interrelatedness. They are separate in our minds. In first seeking that which separates one idea from another we fail to discern and appreciate the crucial pattern that connects. When it comes to issues like climate change or terrorism, for example, we continue to apply linear thinking (usually with greater enthusiasm than before and even in the knowledge that our solutions are not working and cannot possibly work) yet stop striving to design a different world where such symptoms (of a system in stress) would simply disappear. There are perhaps five fundamental reasons for this:

Myopia - We have become blind to the obvious – those things that really matter. The warning signs of a system in distress are there to be seen – but only by those possessing sufficient bandwidth to perceive them as such. We are more commonly deceived and distracted by many thousands of iterations of just a few seminal messages, smudging clarity and transforming meaning into inconsequential pap. This “consensus illusion” as David Martin put it has deceived us into believing we are operating with more information when, in fact, we are becoming indoctrinated with less information.

If that were not alarming enough many signs are not appearing on our radar screens because they are either imperceptible to us culturally or are showing up only at the intersections of our knowledge. With few exceptions we are no longer in the habit of looking for the truth at the edge. Even if we were looking in the right places we lack the tools to bring into sharp focus what we might see there. In other words the territory has changed but our maps and reasoning have not kept pace. We have all become so busy interpreting what is going on from our own, deeply embedded, meaning structures that we have become myopic to viable alternatives.

Despair - Most people find it almost impossible to grasp the complex nature of change. Consequently modern society is out of its depth - deficient in the capacity to make sense of what is going on at anything more than a superficial level. Worse still, as hype around our most critical issues escalates, our ability to confront matters is overwhelmed by a belief that such a thing cannot possibly be happening to us. It is simply too much to bear. The result is that collective cognition shuts down - or diverts to less existential matters, like sporting events, celebrity gossip and other diversions.

This is known as apocalypse fatigue. People suffering from this condition feel helpless to do anything about the issues confronting them. They would much rather ignore any threat to their own existence by acting as if it isn’t true, shrug their shoulders in despair, or turn away from reality simply because it is too dreadful to contemplate. Ultimately there is only one question that really matters. Whatever happens over the next few decades the wealthy will survive. The three billion or so people who are not so fortunate will be wiped out. Do we really care? If so, what should we be doing about it.

Exclusion - The occidental mind (unlike Sinic, Indic or even Islamic mindsets for example) is rational, responding best to deductive logic which it values over alternative methods of knowing. Accordingly those of us in the West have been conditioned into building and dissecting structures one piece at a time. We have been taught to analyse and measure critical dimensions before applying problem-solving techniques to re-engineer these parts. Using this logic results in solutions ranging from the brilliant to the commonplace.

Method, on the other hand, remains consistent - dependent upon ranking and available resources. So one or more parts of a structure (those perceived to be the weakest links) are improved while other parts are ignored. When we see deterioration in different parts of the structure we switch our attention to those elements and ignore the parts we were working on. While we in the West have become very adept at this kind of structural reductionism we have neglected to develop similar expertise in the design of viable and enduring systems.

Our greatest weakness, however, is in applying deductive logic to every challenge facing humanity. By excluding alternative ways of knowing, including indigenous wisdom, we are requiring all other cultures to engage through the ideology of the occidental mind should they wish to participate in their own survival.

Overload - We are assailed by all kinds of information every hour of our waking lives. It has been known for some time that too much information causes a condition known as sensory overload. This produces disorientation and a lack of responsiveness as well as lowering our ability to make accurate predictions. Not only does sensory overload make it more difficult for us to express and comprehend complex systems, constructing effective long-term solutions becomes even more problematic when we are exhausted by the very information that might have the solution embedded within it.

Displacement - We have developed a highly refined sense of shifting the blame. It is not my problem is a conditioned reflex acquired through our instruction-based, rather than inquiry-based, educational methods. As we are routed into careers, social memes, and classes, we develop a highly refined sense of what is in our purview. We seek public sector solutions to our wantonly excessive consumption. We rely upon government intervention when our sick and aging need care. We look to the police for community relations. We look to the clergy for morality.

Regardless of evidence showing a lack of cognitive alignment within our collective transmuted accountability, the notion of someone else should remains our dominant modus operandi. Then, when these systems fail, we animate them with our projections of an accountability that they never accepted in our opening premise. By focusing on the role of leaders and obsessing on artefacts of hierarchical structure we have lost our moorings on citizenship and personal responsibility within community. In reality we are the problems we project on others. But then we, too, are the capacity to solve the same.

2. FEAR

In spite of the highly controlled machinery of denial, misinformation and propaganda a growing minority vaguely comprehend the seriousness of our predicament. A few are even trying to do something about it. But having a partial sense of circumstances beyond our control has also encouraged society’s communicators to go to town in ways that exploit our growing sense of angst and that are detrimental to longer-term planetary solutions.

Some journalists have leaped on discrete issues to push their own frenzied (often negative, cynical and commercial) self-interest. As a consequence most memes dealing with the contemporary human condition are conveyed via a strange mix of edgy fear coupled to competitive dogma rather than from a sense of hope, inspiration and abundance. It must be said that some recent strategies by celebrity politicians and well-meaning activists have also unintentionally contributed to an overwhelming feeling of helplessness that has humanity in a vice-like grip.

3. HUBRIS

Most of the seeds responsible for today’s rampant damage across so many sectors of society were sown during the industrial revolution. Those seeds exhibited a way of thinking that was uniquely occidental in its approach to economic growth, innovation and development and was ultimately responsible for the success of Western economies. 

Of late it culminated in blatantly exploitative mechanisms of production – variants of the capitalist ethos that have become driven by greed and are designed to promote the acquisition of wealth above any other goal. Developing states, including China, have started to emulate this model, or a hybrid of it.

Today, because of the exponential demand for food, water, energy and goods from the seven billion people who inhabit this planet, a perfect storm of economic and social flaws inherent in the original design is about to break. In spite of this all relevant societal memes are predicated on the notion that occidental worldviews, values and beliefs hold the key to societal renewal. This is hubris and narcissism. Western views of progress already border on the irrelevant in most non-Western traditions.

Future solutions to the civilizational problem must of necessity integrate and transcend current worldviews if they are to be effective. That means giving an appropriate voice to those cultures, along with giving credence to alternative economic and social modes of development.

4. COMPETITION

The political inertia we see does not spring from apathy or any lack of a desire to change. Again the problem can be found in our thinking. In this case the notion of competition (the prevalence of competitive behaviour) traps us in circumstances where it is expected that we fight others in order to safeguard our own parochial interests. Thus the lack of any real political leadership is first and foremost the result of us succumbing to an obsolete economic paradigm with its associated suite of constraints concerned with preserving the national interest.

The fact is we are beholden to mechanisms, from the nation state to the G20 and even the United Nations, that effectively hinder collaboration on a planetary scale. Conventional wisdom maintains that we are fundamentally competitive social beings. Most biological evidence points to the contrary. But this is part of the paradigm we must shatter in order for the communal needs and interests we all share to shine through.

5. FRAGMENTATION

If the lack of a unified vision or platform for change is a serious issue then the splintering of any strategic focus and alignment are huge contributing factors to a demoralizing diffusion and dilution of energy. Currently there are myriad discrete and well-meaning initiatives, strategies, campaigns, movements and media all vying for our attention and funding across a range of theatres. Such diversity is overwhelming and a distraction in its own right. There is also far too much talk and not nearly enough inspired leadership for action attached to these ventures.

The key will be to find strategic acupuncture points that liberate new energy flows that concentrate and embed entrepreneurial passion and innovations within the world-system. A critical element in this regard will be investment capital for renewal. The injection of capital and resources from business and high net worth individuals is still channeled overwhelmingly into old ‘sunset’ industries and interests – including the servicing of war and conflict which is a highly profitable business.

Two things must change. Firstly new business models must be invented to challenge prevalent assumptions governing investment, value and profitable exchange, ultimately making it more attractive to invest in things like renewable energy, sustainable agriculture, charitable agencies and alternative governance systems. Secondly, however inconceivable or idealistic it might seem, we must wean ourselves off military combat. Peace is a prerequisite for societal renewal. We cannot create peace by practising warfare.

So there is our dilemma. For the first time in history we are faced not with a simple problem requiring a simple solution, but with a fiercely diabolical human condition – a world-system so immensely and dynamically complex that even the most sophisticated reductionist thought, coupled to rational evidence and the most incredible breakthroughs in technology are totally insufficient to correct the unintended consequences of our defective design. Yet we insist on using old tools and thinking to combat this enemy. It is not the planet that is at risk but our civilization.

I am deeply indebted to critical ideas and inputs from my colleagues at The Constellation, especially Christine McDougall, Laurent Labourmene, Lindley Edwards, Robb Smith and Dave Martin.

 

Interlude Between Crises

Over the past few months I have received numerous requests that I devote some considered commentary to recent events in my adopted country. Until now I have refrained from making any public statements. Like anyone living here it is almost impossible not to take sides. Yet the situation is incredibly complicated and bewildering. Each issue has its own set of nuances and although I have lived here for five years there is still much that I do not understand about Thai conventions and mindsets.

Now, on the eve of my first public address to a Thai audience on some future options available to this nation, and as co-convenor of a small group of non-aligned public intellectuals who have set about the task of crafting a suite of scenarios for a “third way” I feel it appropriate to break my self-imposed silence and speak out regarding the need for reconciliation and reform.

We had been on the road for almost three weeks. During that time we caught only intermittent snippets of news about the deteriorating situation at home. Official reports coming out of Thailand amounted to government propaganda and could not be trusted. Even so-called neutral English-language newspapers were noticeably biased towards officialdom. Eventually we just relied on reports from foreign journalists supplemented by phone calls with local friends and family who were at least credible first-hand witnesses to what was going on.

Returning home was even more distressing, although I am not sure what my wife and I had actually expected. We arrived at Suvarnabhumi airport off an Emirates flight from Sydney in the early hours of Sunday morning - barely a day after the military put a precise yet bloody end to protests by UDD “red shirt” activists. Streets that normally would be bustling with energy were deserted. Not a soul could be seen. The curfew was in full swing. We spotted a few smoke trails and the stench of burning tyres still hung in the air. We were home.

When I ventured out the following morning to view the carnage I was shocked even though I had been told what to expect. The heart of Bangkok was transformed into a scene out of a painting by Hieronymous Bosch. Amazing Thailand, the brand presenting Thailand to the world, was smashed, perhaps permanently.

Two weeks have past but nothing of substance has changed. If anything the provocative, politically-motivated behaviour of the government (particularly in charging former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra with terrorism) is making matters far worse than they need to be and is sending strong signals that genuine community reconciliation is a bridge too far. Besides such ill-advised strategies nearly always backfire and in this case the international community has already passed judgement on the ineffectiveness and self-serving nature of Thailand’s political elite.

I get a strong sense, too, that the smouldering anger and resentment of an entire community has just gone to ground. People are waiting - patiently biding their time for the next opportunity to redress issues of inequality that run deep in Thai society.

Meanwhile Prime Minister Abhisit and his government continue to insist that normality has returned to Thailand. The truth is that life in this nation is anything but normal – at least if by the term normality we mean the way things should be in a civilized country during these early years of the 21^st century. The facade of daily life appears normal enough. Glancing at the images of young celebrities staring out from the pages of local magazines or buying sticky rice and grilled chicken from the street food vendors, one might be forgiven for thinking that life had indeed returned to normal.

But looks can be so deceptive. Although the curfew has been lifted, a state of emergency continues to apply in some provinces. At best an uneasy calm prevails. The famed Thai smile has vanished, only to be replaced by furtive glances and whispers in cafes about who shot Sae Daeng and what really took place in Wat Pathuwanaram on that fateful night in May. Sadly I no longer feel so welcome here as I walk down Soi Thonglor to do some shopping. I notice the suspicion lurking deeply in the eyes of those who scuttle past me, resolutely avoiding my gaze.

There are also cold statistics to be considered and explained. Tourism has collapsed to the extent that occupancy rates for many hotels is 25 percent less than this time last year. Small business owners are more anxious about the future than ever before. University student numbers have decreased. Unemployment is going through the roof.

In spite of the various commercial trappings that give this nation a semblance of sophistication, Thailand remains fundamentally feudal in its social and power structures as well as its belief systems. But the veneer of urbane erudition is beginning to wear thin. Propped up by a propaganda machine and an elite that assumes a compliant public will continue to remain loyal to the state’s most venerable institutions, tolerance and trust in legitimate authority are nevertheless crumbling. The wealthy are beginning to fear for their future. Cultural traditions which, until now, have been the bedrock of Thai society, are losing their mystique and gloss. Most significantly the social and political divide, once secreted away from public view, has burst open like a cancerous sore. This time there can be no escape from reality and the healing, if at possible, will take decades rather than months.

At the same time possibilities for greater political inclusion and economic equality have been held up to the rural poor. They have seen what is on offer in the global marketplace and, like their compatriots in the cities, want a piece of the action. That is only fair after all. Even as the activists camped amidst the downtown shopping malls, stuffed full of international brand names they would never be able to afford, a new truth began to dawn on those present. This was a revelation to many in the crowd and immediately transcended any allegiance they might have had to Thaksin. For this revelation was symbolic of a better future for all Thais. Its essence is easily summarised as it conforms to the basic principles of democracy: Life has treated us unequally. But it does not need to be like this. Injustice and poverty can be eliminated from our country. Democracy is the force that can liberate us. We will not endure serfdom any longer. All it will take to create a more equitable society is unity and political will.

As it turned out, the protest leaders grossly underestimated the degree to which this symbolism would be acceptable to the most powerful groups and factions in Thailand. It created a brutal wedge between those that empathised with these principles and those who had a vested interest in maintaining the status quo. After that the ensuing conflict was inevitable.

Yet upon reflection there is considerable merit in what the protestors were advocating. Had they sought less disruptive means to voice their protest perhaps the results would have been more positive. For although Thai citizens are wealthier now than at any other time in the past five decades, the relative gap between the wealthy urban elite and the rural poor has become a chasm. Unfortunately the means chosen by the UDD to voice their complaints has simply generated more distrust. Meanwhile the elite, the security forces and powerful business interests continue to feather their own nests, doing little to re-establish trust or deal with the corruption that is at the root of the problem.

Embedded corruption and an extreme polarisation of views, potentially leading to further insurrection, have become the greatest insidious dangers for Thailand. They threaten to derail any tentative first steps towards reconciliation and the re-building of trust. Recent history is not much help. The turbulent years that commenced with a bloodless coup, toppling populist former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, has seen two constitutions, four different governments, four party dissolutions and six different prime ministers. Meanwhile social conflict along traditional class lines has increased and the violence in the far south, much of it probably the result of internal competition between rogue paramilitary factions, continues unabated.

So what can be done to ensure that the current lull in hostilities is not merely an interlude between crises?

As can be learned from the establishment of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the path to genuine reconciliation requires the compassion to forgive, the willingness to include and transcend past practices, an authentic nurturing of trust, and a sincere desire to bring about national unity and pride. At this early stage in Thailand’s reconciliation process none of these factors are present. In that respect at least one has to point the finger of blame at the current government.

Over and above these principles, the policy path to reconciliation and future progress is quite transparent. A majority of Thai citizens want political and social inclusion. They also want their government to continue subsidizing the rural economy (a trend that has been in train for at least the past two decades) in order to eradicate inequalities and unfair discrimination. They want to eliminate double standards. And they want to change those laws that manipulate circumstances in order to prohibit freedom of expression.

Naturally there are more intractable issues that will take far longer to address:

1. Reform of the police force is essential, particularly in terms of eliminating embedded corruption and focusing their attention on internal security matters.
2. The bloated military, too, needs urgent attention if it is to command the respect its leaders deserve. Conscription is an outdated mechanism and, along with the various paramilitary units, should be scrapped in favor of a more professional service. Here the emphasis should be on maintaining external and border security rather than an instrument for internal political maneuvering.
3. In order to ensure that the police and the military remain in service to the monarchy and to the people a stronger degree of coherence and cohesion will be required within the political arena. This is best bought about through the exercise of democratic principles.
   
4. Finally there needs to be a massive investment in overhauling what has become an archaic educational system that still emphasizes basic literacy and rote memorization instead of curiosity, inquiry, creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship.

Without this level and scale of democratic principles and policies applied to societal design as well as the domestic economy, the outlook for the nation is dismal indeed. But if the struggle for reconciliation is undertaken with purity of intent and a “third way” forged to include all parties and interests, Thailand’s social and economic future in Asia will be assured.

Let us hope that they can pull it off. The alternatives are simply too depressing to entertain.

Celebrating Our Success

A speech given to an invited audience of the world’s wealthiest citizens held in the Maldives on 1^st January 2015

Your Holiness. Your Royal Highnesses. My Lords. Excellencies. Distinguished Members. Ladies and Gentlemen. It is a pleasure to welcome you, the wealthiest and most powerful people on the planet, to our celebrations at the Rania Experience tonight.

Guests arriving by seaplane would have noticed the tight security surrounding the island. Those who came in the Sheik’s yacht may have missed the full extent of these safety measures. Needless to say no expense has been spared on your behalf. While you are here you can be assured of total peace and protection. It is impossible for uninvited guests to intrude so please relax and enjoy the fabulous amenities this sensational island paradise has to offer – at least until it sinks below the rising tides (wait for laughter to subside).

As Chairman of the Affluence Global Alliance [AGA] it is indeed an honour to report on the runaway success of our continuing strategy guaranteeing that the world’s wealth stays in the hands of those most capable of using it. Us. We are the most prosperous and powerful people on this planet and the AGA intends keeping it that way (wait for applause).

Naturally we cannot celebrate our success without a word of appreciation for the founders - those farsighted individuals who set us on our present path. For that we must travel back at least 250 years.

Tonight we honour those early industrialists who intuitively grasped the idea that consumers could be convinced to buy almost anything, including stuff they don’t actually need. We also pay tribute to the US judges who invented the legal fiction of a corporation limited by guarantee. In truth, this device gave our whole enterprise the boost it required in order to generate current levels of spending and, as a consequence, our wealth.

A special mention must go to the bankers. These stalwarts of capitalism took responsibility for ensuring that almost every citizen had access to easy credit. Not an easy task. Yet they triumphed against the odds. They are good friends of the AGA. Incidentally the idea of giving credit cards to teenagers was, I am sure you will agree, a stroke of genius (Wait for applause). Without the bankers our aims would have been so much more difficult to achieve. They have been unyielding in their support of our endeavours. More recently their can-do attitude, coupled with an entrepreneurial flare we all admire, astonished even the cynics among us. Let’s face it, their schemes, most of which I do not pretend to understand, allowed us in the AGA to make astonishing amounts of money at the expense of those less able to manage their own finances. (Applause)

Naturally, without the establishment turning a blind eye to what was actually going on in society (a constituency over which they had supposed jurisdiction) our success would have been limited. Some of our political and distinguished friends are gracing us with their presence tonight. Thank you for your part in our little conspiracy. Only joking! (Wait for laughter)

Nor could we have done without a few corrupt politicians and the (often naïve) support of multinational corporations, especially CEO's in the oil, steel, coal, tobacco, chemicals and pharmaceutical industries, who were persuaded to hoodwink a gullible public into trusting them. Without you we would not be sitting here tonight drinking champagne. To all of you our heartfelt thanks.

A thought too, should be given to those less fortunate than ourselves, particularly the fecund poor of all nations who continue to procreate like rabbits, thus ensuring an ongoing exponential demand for manufactured goods, food and luxury items. Long may it continue.

Clearly without such an embedded infrastructure in place our strategy would founder. That is why Africa, India and South America are of continuing importance to us in the AGA. Long gone are the days of overt colonialism. Frankly I am saddened by that fact. I felt, as most of you do, that we did a great job in our respective colonies. Yet there are almost unlimited resources that we can still mine from the these countries if we have a mind to. There can be no doubt we need smart, shrewd minds to lock down our strategies in that regard, especially if we are to benefit from those reserves as we did in the past. The game has changed of course. Plundering resources and blaming the Chinese or Islamic terrorists were good ploys until recently. But, as you can see if you look around you, many of our members now herald from China and the Emirates. Our intentions need to adapt to new realities.

As you know, the extraordinary success of the AGA has been founded on two capitalist tenets (unlimited growth and rampant competition); propelled by an insatiable desire for “more” in developed nations and “envy” in other parts of the world); and focused on three systems (energy, environment and economy) all underpinned by profoundly unsustainable governance practices.

Let us look at those three systems. We are repeatedly told that peak oil has peaked – or is about to peak. But can we seriously believe that? Of course not. The story there is still the same: “Drill baby drill”. Most of what we produce and consume comes from petrochemicals. We need the stuff. Besides there are many out-of-the-way places in the world still to be explored in that regard. I doubt we will run out of oil or coal any time soon. Do you? (wait for applause).

I do acknowledge that the environment seems to be feeling the effect of human activities. But then we always knew we might have to do sacrifice a few species and learn to live with concrete, rather than wilderness, grass and glaciers, when we chose the path of consumerism. Personally I don’t think we should worry too much about nature. It will take care of itself irrespective of what we do to it. And it has come to be something of a luxury after all.

Finally there is the economy – and in that regard I fail to see a problem. What should be changed if the system is already functioning well? Do not fix what isn’t broken. That’s what I say. Debt is here to stay. Easy credit has allowed everyone to upgrade the quality of their lives - including the poor. Who are we to deny the new middle classes in emerging economies the benefits we ourselves enjoy. It is surely hypocritical and morally indefensible to suggest that the average citizen in China or India should not experience the same quality of life as the average US citizen. No. Ignore the naysayers. The AGA needs to take a stand. Our economy is doing just fine. We can see that from the profits we are continuing to generate. That is the real measure of success. (Applause)

In truth if any of the aforementioned systems were to drastically change our strategy of wealth creation would be put in peril. Fortunately that is unlikely to occur. A number of people here tonight are using their wealth to fund all manner of initiatives that will result in a continuation of the status quo. Charles and David over there are using their Institute to whip up confusion and cast doubts on the science of climate change. (Applause) They are also working to ensure that our lobbyists are equipped with all the information and money they need to persuade governments to resist the green activists and numerous do-gooders. So please give them a hand (wait for applause). Nor must we forget our friends from the American Enterprise Institute (applause) and of course the various media shock-jocks who are all assisting our cause. Well done Rush. (Applause).

Actually there are very few threats to our continued accrual of riches and power, so strongly ingrained is the current system of political influence, corruption and monetary gain. For that we are truly blessed.

I suppose the most critical of these threats would be if people were to stop killing each other and the entire military machine were to grind to a halt. Now that would indeed be a catastrophe. (Laughter) Just imagine if competition were to be replaced by unprecedented levels of collaboration at every level of society. Now that would be tough. Hardly likely, one might conclude, given the ingenious ways we have to fuel conflict. Besides we should not forget the rampaging competition between nation states still scrambling to protect their own interests at any cost. Just look at Copenhagen. What a joke! (Wait for laughter to subside)

Another danger could be ordinary citizens taking matters into their own hands, or governments, under pressure from communities around the world, needing to be seen to legislate our industries out of existence. (Wait for audience reaction) I can see the indignation written all over your faces. But it is feasible – you must give me that. Some politicians (present company excepted) are yellow to the core. (Applause) 

Naturally if these or any other threats were to eventuate we would still persist (Applause). The AGA is not going away! (Applause) In fact if the unthinkable were to happen it would be quite easy for us to assume greener credentials, for example, thus benefitting from the many flawed low-carbon strategies being mooted in international forums at the moment. Many of you are probably making these early plays anyway – just to cover all bases. That just seems pragmatic. I know Goldman Sachs are positioning themselves for a different business environment. It is just plain common sense. Good camouflage too. Just ask Warren over there (Laughter). Only joking my friend!

But seriously. I believe we are well placed to endure any small shock to the system. After all we have lasted for several generations and we have been getting stronger and wealthier all the time. Our strategy has endured for well over two centuries. We have succeeded beyond our wildest dreams. The future is assured.

And so to all those sceptics like Herve Kempf, whose most recent book claimed that we, the rich, are intent on destroying the Earth, I would say hogwash. Our wealth generates jobs. It inspires innovation. It creates growth and development for all people and gives us the world we luxuriate in today. (Applause) I say if that is destruction then bring it on. (Applause) 

Thank you. (Standing ovation)

Paradigm in Progress

Danses:

The past year was not just one of economic turmoil. Across our increasingly hot and crowded planet people are reacting in sundry, yet mostly conventional ways, to the effects of global heating.

Politicians, too, are feeling the heat. And with good reason. Ensnared in past dogma, beliefs and practices, politicians of every persuasion, along with legions of their advisers, have failed to comprehend what is actually going on. Plagued by hesitation, denial, attention-seeking, propaganda, bickering and blame, this has to be the greatest break down of politics yet witnessed.

The reluctance and inability of governments to act decisively or in unity sets humanity on a catastrophic course. Such spectacular abdication of leadership, so transparent during the recent climate change negotiations in Copenhagen, not only puts civilization at risk. It threatens the very survival of our species on this planet. It is a veritable danse macabre.

Consider this…

Eleven of the past fourteen years have been the hottest on record. The Nepalese leadership recently held a cabinet meeting on Mount Everest in order to draw attention to rising temperatures that have dramatically reduced snowfall over the roof of the world. The government of the Maldives held a cabinet meeting underwater to highlight the threat of global warming to the low-lying Indian Ocean nation. In Bolivia, glaciers that hold the nation’s water supplies are rapidly dwindling. The Arctic is melting so fast the ice cap is likely to have disappeared by the end of the century. Even East Antarctica, long stable, is now losing ice.

Elsewhere drought, floods, earthquakes and fires wreak havoc. Deforested peat lands in Indonesia are drying out and burning. The future of the Amazonian rainforest is similarly endangered. In parts of Australia drought, once cyclical, is now a permanent condition. Rivers everywhere, including the mighty Ganges, an inextricable part of India’s physical and cultural landscape, are drying up, leaving only desiccated earth and dust bowls.

The marshlands between the rivers Tigris and Euphrates, fabled site of the Garden of Eden, a land so rich in soil and water that it would quench the needs of its dwellers throughout eternity, emits the unmistakably pungent stench of a dying ecosystem.

Meanwhile the massive floods that killed hundreds of people in the Philippines this past summer and the recent earthquake in Haiti, which is thought to have killed over 170,000 people, are becoming the norm. Nor are such extreme weather events confined to the tropics or the polar regions. Agriculture in the United States has been ravaged this year by droughts in Texas and California, heat waves in Louisiana and Nebraska, floods in Minnesota and torrential rains in Illinois.

In Venice, a major trade hub and maritime power in the middle ages and still one of the most idyllic cities in the world, the number of permanent residents is hovering at around 60,000, having halved during the past fifty years. Why? Because Venice is sinking into its own foundations. Bangkok too, once romantically known as the Venice of the East and my home for the past five years, is sinking into coastal mud at the alarming rate of up to three centimeters each year. Marine life, too, is being killed indiscriminately. Only 10 per cent of all large fish (both open ocean species including tuna, swordfish, marlin and large ground fish such as cod, halibut, skate and flounder) remain in the sea. Toxins and pollutants combined with current rates of ocean acidification could potentially deprive future generations of all wild sea food.

On every continent desperate nomads are migrating further and further from traditional homelands, many of them inhabiting the vast urban metropolises which are now home to over 50 per cent of the world’s population. As many as 200 million people are destined to become climate migrants by 2050, destabilizing the global economy in a process that will inevitably result in escalating poverty, inequality and conflict.

Excuses and rationalizations for delay, along with assertions there are more pressing problems, are simply no longer credible. Climate change will ravage the planet and destroy our prosperity, security and any hope for a safe future, unless we come together to take rapid, effective action.

On the other hand perhaps we are already past the point of no return. The speed at which the arctic permafrost is melting is alarming. If warming caused by increased methane emissions locks the region into a destructive cycle that forces temperatures to rise even faster, this factor alone could overwhelm all efforts to tackle climate change.

Alarms:

As far as I can tell the former statement is no exaggeration but, on the contrary, a fairly measured assessment of our current predicament. Furthermore its content and tone reflect the dominant media ‘meme’ vis-à-vis climate change - a meme that is increasingly typical of the perspective projected onto such subject matter through articles, books, websites,  television news, cinematic fiction, plans, activism and conferences. Containing a range of disquieting facts, statistics and opinion, it seems to provide indisputable evidence that climate change is serious and unavoidable.

It is also representative of the scenarios saturating our perceptions; choking confidence, playing to our fears, doubts and superstitions in ways that abandon any sense of a better future. In this specious state almost everything about the past (including, of course, the socio-economic platform required for fabricating modern lifestyles) takes on a utopian perspective. Regrettably this nostalgia for the past, though seductive, merely engenders apathy: instead of aspiring to fresh goals we do everything in our power not to lose that which we had. Energy dissipates right there!

As a consequence zero-sum games remain the actuality. Entangled in a transition we never intended and never thought possible, one that threatens to depose some of our most fundamental tenets and over which we have seemingly less control by the day, we are traumatized by an ominous sense of foreboding and the ennui of uncertainty.

Instead of embracing an energizing potential for renewal, especially the possibility of attending to inequities generated by increasingly predatory forms of capitalism, we descend prematurely into melancholy, grieving for the sacrifices to come and striving to avoid the pain of disassociation.

In most cases that just means carrying on with life – turning a blind eye to worsening forecasts and devastating events, doing what we can to protect our own parochial interests, and all the while putting our trust in promises of further economic expansion and growth when that is clearly the root cause of our current mess. How absurd!

In these circumstance is it really any wonder vast numbers of citizens just switch off, get angry, or try to deny the laws of nature staring us in the face? Why should it surprise us when individuals search for ways to evade discomfort and to conserve, or even improve, their present life-style? Should we continue to belittle and censure those who simply hanker for the conspiracy theorists to be correct and the scientists wrong? Is it not human nature that we should turn our backs on a future seemingly devoid of any optimism or joy?

There are far more inspiring alternatives to the enervating cynicism, uncertainties and increasingly shrill revelations of impending disaster that flood our daily lives. Stories that offer hope and intentions that chronicle a brighter future for all. Human civilization is certainly in a state of transition. Indeed I believe we have reached a developmental crisis point - one that necessitates a redefinition of what we interpret to be progress.

Yet while we can only analyze past transitions, the future paradigm still remains ours to invent. Along with technological revolutions, socio-economic crises offer exceptional opportunities to move to higher levels of evolution. We just need to be able to “see” the promise of societal renewal with greater clarity and conviction, which is why context (the framework within which we make meaning) becomes so vital.

Contextual conditions both establish and reflect dominant belief systems in the culture. An appreciation of context becomes particularly critical when so many of the ideas and institutions defining our culture appear to be breaking down. This is the case today.

Possibly the most profound transition in history, one that has taken literally hundreds of years so far and is still far from completion, was the move away from pious notions of an infallible ‘maker’ or supreme being, to the concept of scientific materialism. Here it is the physical world that really matters. This shift required discarding deeply imprinted fears and fallacies. Unsurprisingly it led to the modern obsession with material goods and the acquisition of personal wealth. But evolution cannot stop there.

We must now move beyond even that phase of understanding. Among the most vital of contemporary principles is the rejection of the idea of the world as a physical machine. The transition towards a new society instilled with such a fundamental ontological shift appears most likely to lead to a new holistic consciousness that integrates both science and spirit. Yet the practical realities of governing a global population of seven billion people still lag behind conceptions.

In the past at least part of the problem has been our inability and/or unwillingness (as individuals and communities) to engage with really big issues such as climate change in any meaningful or constructive manner.

Our inclination to turn over decision-making to others for example (whether to dictators, monarchs, professionals or councils of elected representatives) was deemed pragmatic. In reality it represented a disquieting social apathy – a deeply ingrained passivity that is extremely difficult to overcome. What is more it often allowed corruption, misconduct and oppression to thrive, to which we then turned a blind eye for fear of attracting still further repression. Many communities still suffer from that indifference today.

With the advent of today’s sophisticated communications systems and online social media, however, there can be no excuse. People are able to speak out and air their concerns, wielding power in ways that were previously out of the question. Today, the voice of each citizen can be heard. Individuals can contribute to a global community of mind (a collective intelligence for change) should they wish to do so. Indeed some commentators argue the case that it is increasingly impossible to remain quarantined from such participation, given the potency and insidious nature of new social media. Furthermore, new social networks help create the collective consciousness we so urgently need if rebooting civilization.

In attempting to address the inevitable impacts of climate change through mitigation and adaptation, the application of such crowd-sourced intelligence, supported by all the innate wisdom and expertise we can muster, is vital. But whereas collective intelligence urges the immediate deployment of smart technologies, a shift to clean energy, and the rapid phasing out of toxic products and practices, wisdom entreats us to pause; to change the conversation and thereby to pose questions that are currently not part of the debate.

As far as I am concerned some of the more important questions we should be pondering are not even on the agenda. While the greatest threats to the environment seem to be that nothing is done, that the wrong things are done too quickly, or that too little is done too late, the greatest threat to our social well being is that we act without wisdom.

For the most urgent questions for humanity no longer focus on the causes of global heating or to what extent humans are to blame, but how we can lessen the damage, what can be done to delay the more serious consequences, how we can tread more lightly on this planet and, above all else, how we should react in order to preserve for future generations what is uniquely beautiful and inherently precious about our world.

So far our response to these questions has been depressingly inadequate. On deeper, more spiritual issues, such as how we can accelerate our capacity to adapt to the laws of physics in ways that enable more sustainable relationships, with each other and with the Earth, there has been a deafening silence.

Here are a few of the key reasons, by no means comprehensive and in no particular order, and what we might do about them. They range from the detailed assumptions underlying cognitive discourse and activism to the meta-language and morphology of how the current global system is able to persist.

Distractions:

Global heating is but one canary in the coal mine of modernism - a disturbing symptom among many indicating a civilizational and environmental pathology in an acute state of distress and, quite possibly, collapse. Life-threatening certainly, and constantly deteriorating, it nevertheless distracts us from the main game.

Additional signs of breakdown range from unparalleled demands being made on Earth’s physical resources by an escalating population and continuing disparities between less privileged and more affluent individuals and communities, to a scarcity of potable water, conflicts driven by religious and ethnic differences, the rising costs of food production, ingrained social and economic inequities, demands for energy that cannot be met, as well as rules and conventions that exacerbate division, competition and conflict within society.

What these intertwined symptoms actually denote is a messy unraveling of the industrial paradigm and mindset; the end-game of a complex dynamic between three life-critical systems: energy, economy and environment. Adding further to our quandary is the fact that various amplifying feedback mechanisms are now accelerating this end-game out of our control. This has been largely brought about by the comprehensive failure of a set of organizing principles originally intended to maintain some semblance of order in the juxtaposition of (industrial) development and (social) compliance.

This unraveling is only peripherally connected to the issue of climate change, in that global heating is merely an emergent quality of the way the system has been designed to operate. Change the design (or, more importantly, the intentions informing that design) and we solve the problem of global heating – in addition to resolving many other related concerns. While we are preoccupied with discrete issues, however, especially when our tendency is to converge around explicit targets, an attachment to the goal itself assumes greater import, dragging us even further away from any deeper intentions.

At present every visible symptom seems to point to fundamental design flaws in the beliefs and frameworks used by the developed world to create wealth and maintain a quality of life the rest of humanity once envied - but now expects as a God-given right.

Together, these symptoms jeopardize both the highly sophisticated nature of our society as well as its more pragmatic capacity to produce and distribute life’s necessities. This threat can also be perceived as a collision between fate and desire. In that context, risks appear to have emerged as a direct result of the way we think - about our needs, our rights, our aspirations and our interactions, particularly relative to each other and to the planet. We must think again. Differently this time. Not only through a different lens but also from a higher altitude. And collectively. Indeed to avert the imminent chaos that would be brought about by extensive societal collapse we will need to review current assumptions and practices by addressing four imperatives:

·       Reimagining our collective purpose - particularly ensuring that prosperity, well-being, equity and justice are rights to be inherited by all human beings and not just a few wealthy individuals and corporations

·       Separating private ownership from shared assets (like the sky, scientific knowledge, silence, the Internet, forests, oceans, ecosystems and our cultural heritage and traditions, for example) thus ensuring protection and management of our common wealth

·       Reinventing current patterns of production and consumption by focusing on shared sufficiency rather than upon selfish excess

·       Restoring functionality and beauty to our lives within limits determined by natural laws over which we have no control.

Essentially these four imperatives equate to society’s new bottom line. They are non-negotiable. The real difficulty is that they require us to find ways of integrating and transcending current praxis in order to address more fundamental issues than just climate change.

That is easier said than done of course - as is proving to be the case every day. Global heating has become a melodramatic distraction we can ill afford. While most scientists generally concur it is vital to lower concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere (certainly below current concentrations if we are to avoid potentially disastrous consequences) and that the technologies to achieve this are readily available, the overall know-how, motivation and enthusiasm for change remains predictably naïve and parochial.

Political processes continue to stall because of corruption, greed, self-interest and the traditionally competitive nature of international negotiations. The mass media vacillate and polarise. Industry leaders sit on the fence, denying culpability, defending current investment decisions, threatening governments with mass job cuts and lobbying for as little change as possible. Investment banks shrewdly manipulate conditions to their advantage - new carbon markets potentially offering billions of dollars in profits. Meanwhile, on the edge of public awareness, numerous activists, each with a slightly different agenda, repeat their doom-laden mantras, confusing the general public who are already fearful and fatigued by the overwhelming uncertainties before us.

For the time being all pretence of leadership has been replaced by an oligarchy hell bent on milking every last drop of life from the industrial system even as it crashes. The lack of a compelling and appropriate vision and of a unified global purpose, together with the necessary collaborative will and mechanisms needed to escape the gravitational pull of the past, is deeply indicative of a society lacking the resilience, imagination and consciousness required to adequately transform its state of being.

Over the past few centuries our civilization has advanced incredibly and in so many different ways. Today, those of us fortunate enough to be living in the developed world enjoy levels of material well-being and life-styles that were simply unimaginable even a few years ago.

At the same time much of what was once fresh and beautiful about humankind has ossified into a rigid shell; homogenous, pitiless, seemingly devoid of any compassion, wonder or love. Bloated from excessive consumption, exhausted by pointless conflict, we await a crisis that enables the blueprint of a new society to emerge from the imaginal cells of our deepest communion, like the metamorphosis of a chrysalis into a butterfly.

It is quite likely that global heating is that emergency - or will swiftly become so if government inaction persists. Yet, as we know from catastrophe theory, all crises offer us a plethora of possible ways forward. In the context of climate change there are a few critical paths that lead to a better future for humanity as a whole. Others, and I fear these are the pathways we are intent on pursuing, chart a course that lock-in current divisions and convictions – especially the paradigmatic impulse linking progress to continuous economic growth and development.

So what do we imagine when we speak of a “better” future? What inspires us about this future? And how does it stack up with what we already have and what we believe we may be about to lose?

Spells:

Our cultures and lifestyles are dominated by popular myths - contagious fabrications packaged, spread by word of mouth and reiterated endlessly by the media. Myths are by far the most insidious and pervasive influence on our society. Affecting just about every aspect of our daily lives, these fictions shape assumptions and motivations which then determine how we think about ourselves, our activities, our relationships and our aspirations.

In essence myths determine what we believe, how we think and how we behave. They also control our decisions (albeit unconsciously) concerning what gets made, what gets seen and what gets heard.

One of the most enduring myths, relentlessly upgraded and refined by a creative elite, and promulgated by the image machinery of marketing and advertising, is the relatively contemporary dream of a society where affluence, freedom, comfort, health and well-being are universal attributes. This myth bolsters the emergent global psyche driving material progress and economic growth. Realistically it is also the chief cause of obesity, social addictions, illegal migration, people trafficking, bureaucratic red tape, war, youth alienation, drug dependency, civil unrest, psychological disorders, violence and even terrorism.

Gradually, unavoidably it seems, captivated by relentless consumption and a reckless quest for more and more of everything, we are all losing our minds to this spell.

Awareness of this predicament presents us with a moral dilemma. Founded upon the agency of uninhibited production and consumption, such a utopian view of society is now utterly at loggerheads with the need for us to live together within the limits imposed by nature; to be guided by moderation, sufficiency, less energy and possibly even zero growth. Zero growth, especially, is a concept utterly alien to human ambitions and inventiveness. It seems to be incompatible with any sense of progress. Yet that is the essence of the problem we face.

At least since the industrial revolution, possibly before, we have been conditioned to identify progress in concrete terms. By and large material wealth (together with its entourage of by-products emphasizing status, style, experiences, gadgets and technical wizardry, in addition to the speed and persistence needed to acquire these of course) is what we gauge, compare and value. Ironically, although there is an emerging consensus among psychologists that individual happiness and contentment is what most of us genuinely desire, the factors that might reasonably be expected to provide such fulfillment (collegiality, kinship, reciprocity, peace, the time to do simply nothing, read a book, or walk along the seashore, for example) tend to be valued far less.

Measures commonly employed by governments, such as Gross Domestic Product (GDP) are widely regarded to be symbolic of a successful economy and hence of a prosperous country. Our collective consciousness remains captive to these viral fictions of economic preeminence, particularly when they become the primary topic of conversation on dedicated television channels like Bloomberg TV or the Islamic Finance TV Network.

But by raising an abstract concept (the economy or markets, for example) to a position above that of tangible human enterprise, where financial frameworks and processes are intended to galvanize, enable and support such endeavors, we have laid bare the desolate nature of contemporary existence.

Thus we commit our lives to accumulating wealth as an end in itself, hardly ever taking the time to fathom how we could use the fruits of our labor more effectively. If this void is typical of individuals and their families then it is an emptiness even more apparent at community and societal levels. As a species we seem to have no higher purpose these days other than to keep making money, accumulating additional possessions that we then throw away, and consuming more and more stuff.

It does not take the brain of an Einstein to know that this is the paradigm we need to change. Some of us are anxiously biting at the bit, eager to change things for the better on any number of fronts. Others may need time to be weaned off current addictions and their underlying assumptions. Quite possibly they have more to lose – or are allowing principles of scarcity, rather than of abundance, to dictate their worldview.

A new society is struggling to be born – of that there can be no doubt. It needs to be as enchanting as the old as well as triumphing over prior fears, anxieties and phobias. Resilient, too, and environmentally sustainable. But this new society is contingent upon changed intentions and reinvented outcomes. That means designing it collaboratively and with renewed purpose.

Purposeful design (or deep design) targets our collective neural system, exciting our emotions, imagination and aspirations in the fulfillment of a new promise to replace the old. It is akin to aligning our interior psychological states (in terms both of individual and collective conditions and convictions) with the exterior infrastructures, artifacts, architectures and systems we want to construct.

Integral in nature and displaying a natural integrity, deep design entails the embodiment of new values (enacted through every strata of society - from individuals to institutional and community governance and management structures) and the composition of new myths (narratives reflecting the advantages to human beings, natural ecosystems and future generations ) to reflect new and enlightened circumstances.

As for those who bear the responsibility for letting go of a paradigm that has brought so much to so many in terms of material wealth and prosperity, we demand compensation: for that which we seek must shine with an intense beauty, a liberated civilization where we are able to relate to each other within an ethos of abundance, while assimilating and surpassing the economically-driven, rationally-controlled world of timetables and targets we still find so hard to set aside.

Metrics:

The science of climate change is concerned with the concentration of heat-trapping greenhouse gases in the atmosphere; particularly carbon dioxide, methane and carbon monoxide, along with airborne soot particles. In excessive amounts, greenhouse gases have the effect of raising temperatures so that they directly impact life on Earth.

Greenhouse gas emissions are the result of several factors, including natural events as well as human activities. Consequently our efforts to create a safer climate should not focus on the chimera of using legally-binding targets to reduce emissions, though the debate seems to have been reduced to that lowest common denominator. Emissions targets and timetables have become the primary focus for negotiations.

Yet numerical targets count for very little if they are not related to actual performance and do not truthfully reflect a deeper purpose. Goals and targets can actually assume a significance that deflects us from the realization of our overarching intentions. Indeed failing to distinguish between targets with intentions can endanger the entire undertaking and lead to greater confusion.

The difference is critical. Whereas we live out our intentions, goals and targets are simply signposts to fulfilling that purpose. Becoming too attached to measures can actually blind us from seeing what is changing that might require recalibration. Over-attachment can also encourage the manipulation of circumstances to our advantage if we begin to fear that the targets we have set are not achievable. 

In other words, authentic meaning will only manifest through policies and activities designed from a profound knowledge of the climate system, and the causes governing actual systemic patterns and events, working in harmony with our deepest ideals and intentions. We currently lack both conditions: we have no shared vision for the future of humanity, nor do we possess a sufficiently profound knowledge of natural systems. As a consequence alignment between the two is impossible.

Even our most erudite climatologists are ecologically illiterate to the extent that even the effect of cloud formations on global heating continues to bewilder them. Nor is our current digital modeling capability sufficiently advanced to be able to account for the impact of clouds on climate. Picking arbitrary targets in dynamically complex systems is equally futile. I can only conclude that there are far too many volatilities impacting the global climate system to be sure that the most relevant target has been chosen.

Multilateral government negotiations have failed to produce any meaningful agreement (and by that must be included the acclaimed Kyoto Protocol) since a gathering in Berlin in 1995. That was when discussions switched from focusing on agreed procedures to the setting of common targets.

Kyoto was based on targets and timetables for annual emissions reductions. No attempt was ever made to provide a mechanism for equalizing the efforts made by each country over time. This turned out to be an appalling oversight. While Kyoto seemed feasible in principle, and the degree of international consensus was an extraordinary achievement, the accord gave rise to a marked increase in emissions. As a result today’s emissions far exceed the most pessimistic forecasts when the Kyoto Protocol was negotiated in 1997.

Clearly the growth in greenhouse gas emissions in each country depends on any number of factors - including size, demographic, access to natural resources, economic structure, rate of growth, level of economic development and the degree to which policies focus on energy efficiency, for example. Consequently the amount of effort required to reduce emissions varies dramatically from one country to another. It is illogical to attempt to negotiate common effort from so many nations when so much divergence and variety typifies the whole.

If a consensus of nations is deemed necessary (and I query whether that might not be a delusional quest at this stage of society’s evolution) the entire negotiating framework must shift from the setting of national targets and timetables to broad principles for action in addition to measures for equating the marginal cost of reducing emissions across countries. This will require:

1.     An international agreement to keep carbon prices within an acceptable price “collar” [ideally through a carbon tax, a global emissions trading mechanism, or cap and dividend arrangements].

2.     A massive investment in systems of human activity that are adaptive, energy efficient, sufficient for our needs, and benign in their impact on the environment

Naturally, individual states should be free to enact policies most relevant to their unique circumstances. But on one condition: that a price is put on carbon and that price remains verifiable under international rules.

With any luck such a scheme would allow us to avoid the political shenanigans witnessed in Copenhagen which is likely to be replicated in Mexico in 2010 unless common sense prevails. It would also do away with the likelihood of grandstanding, points scoring and rent-seeking by those wishing to profit from the imposition of convoluted policies that promise a great deal but deliver absolutely nothing of significance.

Games:

As the world drifts ever deeper into crisis the machinery of government moves even more cautiously and with excruciating lethargy. Urgency is not a term commonly heard, least of all understood, in the bureaucracy’s lexicon. Of course there are reasons for this.

Traditionally the political process, and therefore most political argument, has been about balancing competing interests, where each position offers more or less equally legitimate alternatives. Eliminate the passion of conviction or ideology and most political decisions actually boil down to a matter of preference.

It is true that unambiguous moral issues will occasionally emerge. But mostly there is a valid range of views and subsequent options for and against specific policies. Which is why, sooner or later, we are persuaded to come to some sort of compromise. This agreement can then be enshrined in law until such time as alternative, more powerful interests emerge, or new knowledge demands a revision of the existing point of view.

Given this ingrained ritual it is hardly surprising that governments everywhere are attempting to deal with climate change as if it were just another matter of preference – a political problem, with an economic outcome, requiring specific choices to be made. But this time we are not dealing with a political problem. Climate change is different from any other issue with which our diverse political systems have had to deal over the centuries. It is unyielding and dynamically complex – a human emergency on an unprecedented scale.

Firstly, climate change represents the first universal threat to our civilization and quite possibly to our species. In terms of choice there are really only two significant options. We can rapidly cure our addiction to fossil fuels - difficult to do, but possible. Or we can consign future generations to destructive, long-lasting changes in the Earth’s climate system. The latter “Mad Max” scenario could well lead to millions of climate refugees, a total collapse of society’s conventions, civil disobedience and conflict on a scale that is unthinkable.

Secondly, climate change has not been imposed upon us by some external force or alien species. It is of our own making, having arisen from the way we live our lives and the manner in which we have elected to satisfy our material needs.

Western civilization has deliberately chosen a path of unlimited growth. Indeed the growth = progress mantra is so deeply ingrained in our subconscious we find it almost impossible to conceive of a world of zero growth. Intuitively we know our passion for unlimited growth is reckless. Indeed our greatest fear is that it may lead to our extinction. Yet we persist with business as usual. It is as though our normally rational disposition has imploded in a form of collective psychosis. And this blindness to alternatives is being led by those who are also blind to reality.

Thirdly, unlike political opponents, this particular rival has no interest whatsoever in the next election, or the one after that. Climate change cannot be worn down, corrupted, ridiculed or persuaded to change its mind. This time we are up against the immutable laws of physics. There can be no bargaining, no last minute deals, no heroic rescues.

Fourthly, in spite of irresponsible humbug and propaganda designed to confuse and misinform, this issue is becoming less open to question by the day. The worst fears of scientists who, for decades, have cautioned us to heed the signs of climate change or suffer the consequences, are now obvious for all to witness. In this regard there are a few unavoidable tenets we need to take more seriously.

1. The burning of fossil fuels creates greenhouse gases, especially carbon dioxide, that trap heat in the Earth’s atmosphere. Clearly the simplest way to reverse that heating is to stop burning fossil fuels. Governments can help by taxing carbon, which would eventually put old smokestack industries out of business. But this is not happening. Instead, governments of every persuasion continue to squander public money on “clean coal” and similar fantasies. Such barely concealed servility by governments in the face of aggressively melodramatic posturing from the powerful coal and oil lobbies merely delays the inevitable. Taxing carbon would undoubtedly result in a huge outcry from industrialists who will do everything in their power to prevent such a tax. There is now sufficient evidence, however, to conclude that we will be forced to take this action at some stage. It would be far cheaper to do it sooner rather than later.

2. Most peer-reviewed scientific analysis considers any concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere greater than 350 parts per million to be unsafe and therefore incompatible with life as we know it. As I write this we are already at 387 parts per million and climbing. A recent study by a consortium of European think-tanks showed that the various offers currently on the UN negotiating table add up to a world in which the atmosphere contains 650 parts per million of CO2 with an associated temperature rise of around 2.7° Celsius. This will be compounded still further if increased temperatures in the arctic continue to melt the permafrost, thus allowing methane to escape faster than before.

3. Technologies that can help us disentangle and solve the issue of climate change are not science fiction. They exist today. What has been mostly lacking in the developed world is the capital investment required to fund the scaling-up of these technologies (particularly those used to generate power from the wind and sun) and the will to bankroll new “green” industries. In China on the other hand, political leaders are pouring billions of dollars into clean energy as well as taking whatever action they can to make old industries more efficient. In the case of more democratic innovations, in particular those not protected by patent and therefore freely available for anyone to use, what was previously lacking was the knowledge of how simple, clean, technologies could be deployed at relatively low cost. With the emergence of the Global Innovation Commons that is no longer an issue.

4. Although most media attention (and blame) habitually focuses on the nation state and the protracted negotiations undertaken within the framework of the United Nations, the most radical policy changes are more likely to emanate from regions, cities and communities as concerned citizens increasingly take matters into their own hands. In this regard it is essential to take into account that today’s globalised world is not managed by the UN, nor by the flawed governance model that it represents and even less by a single nation state. The new reality is a multi-polar world of entwined relationships and alliances where social movements can ignite spontaneously, local groups can inspire global interaction, and numerous parties can unite in a vital cause.

5. As in the most pitiless of war games we remain unaware of just how long we have to take action. Nature has not specified a precise time limit. Most scientists agree it cannot be long. Perhaps a decade. Two at the most. We also know that the challenge will get worse and far more costly to rectify each year until, at a certain point, the global climate system escalates out of control. At that point any action whatsoever will be far too late.

For these reasons, and others mentioned only in passing here, the conversation must not be allowed to descend into a dispute between reformists and conformists, between the wealthy and the underprivileged, between east and west, north and south, or between differing ideologies.

Climate change is a universal consequence that affects everyone. It is not a political problem, nor are only certain nations or group of nations culpable. On the contrary, climate change is a civilizational question. It is a universal matter affecting those of us alive today as well as future generations. Consequently it must be solved by everyone.

It is this last imperative that is probably least understood. For while we dally, waiting for politicians and bureaucrats to agree on what should be done, orthodox leadership archetypes turn ever more sour. The myth of the hero-leader, spawned out of warfare, big business and competitive sport, nourished by our insatiable fascination with fame and celebrity, sounds its death rattle. In its place the genesis of a narrative based upon entirely fresh assumptions about leadership gasps for air, reaches for the future and struggles to take its first tentative steps.

Assumptions:

All human thought and pursuits are based on sets of embedded truths – assumptions regarding what is right or wrong, good or bad, fair or unjust. Assumptions give rise to values sets; emotional rules to which we (mostly unconsciously) adhere and that inform our life decisions. While there appears to be a set of universal moral impulses (for example that people have certain rights, that it is wrong to hurt people and that it is good to relieve suffering) we lack substantive, shared panarchic values that are capable of transcending individual differences. That is a quest we still need to undertake.

Mostly values differ from one culture to another, sometimes quite considerably. The raft of fundamental assumptions, and subsequent values, being used by climate change negotiators, and that consequently form the basis for national and international policy frameworks and agreements, for example, are tacitly accepted as being universally applicable. Although this is considered self-evident it is also clearly wrong. They are missteps in the dance.

Many assumptions, too, are deeply flawed. Examining these flaws helps elucidate why extravagant international efforts (like the recent UN circus in Copenhagen where 8,473 officially registered delegates from 191 countries ran around in a whirlwind of frenzied activity) seem to flounder and fail.

Each set of flawed assumptions highlights at least one facet of a belief system being brought to bear on the issue of how to address the climate change emergency. Each one, too, illustrates the veracity of Einstein’s famous dictum: that nothing will be resolved by using the thinking that gave rise to the problem in the first place.

The unavoidable conclusion is that if our thinking and our thought processes do not rapidly become more mature, more sophisticated and more conscious of our internal functioning and biases, we can be certain that the issues with which we grapple today will deteriorate and our worst nightmares will begin to unfold. Here are a few examples of what I mean:

1. Norms

I am personally most perturbed by disparities in cultural values and norms that, when not accepted and appreciated, lead to heated discussion, dispute and eventual disarray.

In Copenhagen, for example, it was clear that the Chinese delegates were unprepared for the faster-paced discussions introduced into the process by the Americans during the final two days of the meeting. Irrespective of the intentions behind such a move (and my strong suspicion is that the US negotiators knew precisely what they were doing) the Chinese are not culturally inclined to engage in such hasty decision-making.

Then again, the extreme points of view put collectively by developed nations on the one hand and undeveloped nations on the other were grounded in a time-related (i.e. past-future) continuum that was hardly considered and therefore remained unresolved. It was actually no surprise that a binding agreement remained out of reach with such a fundamental collision of values.

2. Numbers

The second set of assumptions that troubles me has to do with our fixation on numbers. We are in thrall to the culturally-charged memetic quality of “sacred” numbers that can then be used to attract and sway public opinion by signifying a particular thought. We become strangely attached to these numbers, often forgetting the overarching intent that led to our choice in the first place.

Such is the case with 350 (parts per million) in current climate change vernacular. Since its adoption by the influential NASA scientist James Hansen as a critical point of reference for the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, the number has assumed an emotional significance far beyond its actual scientific meaning. It has even spawned an online community entitled 350.org.

I have no doubt that our emotional attachment to this target (or any similar targets for that matter) is a huge risk. When it dawns on communities around the developed world that reaching 350 ppm will demand sacrifice and a massive change in lifestyles, we may well see business leaders, governments and regulators begin to manipulate things to their advantage.

But if 350 ppm is a problematic number, then numbers generally are an issue, especially large numbers. Large numbers are generally considered potent. They tend to denote great significance. For a while now the UN has been seeking a global consensus, which is why around 21,000 people actually attended the formal event of COP15 in 2009.  Summit organizers, along with the architects of social movements, often assume they must appeal to as many representatives from as many constituencies as possible to be taken seriously. If thousands of individuals are drawn to a particular event we imagine it must be pretty important; taking for granted that any agreed outcome is more likely to be implemented without further impediment. In other words we consider the strategic leverage of the crowd to be greater than with smaller numbers. This is a fallacy.

Consider the grand logic of a series of escalating climate change conferences convened with the sole purpose of inspiring relevant action from every man, woman and child on the planet. The consensus around this global community of mind would be so instantly catalyzing that prudent strategies for reversing global heating would be deployed in every country and without opposition of any kind. Our rational nature likes to suppose that with such unambiguous clarity the issue of global heating might simply go away.

Regrettably there is absolutely no evidence to suggest that would be the case. In fact such widespread understanding could just as well result in despair, confusion, fatigue and mayhem, especially where the resources needed to enable change are non-existent or in short supply. History shows that societies in crisis often leap from calm reaction to outright panic. It would almost certainly give rise to even greater resistance from those with vested interests in maintaining the status quo. And the sheer numbers of people trying to enact change, each in their own way, would probably result in confusion and social disorder on a scale that is terrifying to imagine.

So although some numbers matter a lot, others do not matter at all. In the context of climate change what really matters is not the numbers of people who are convinced we have a problem but that those people who have the authority and financial clout to do something about the crisis embrace diversity, act out of unity, and in ways that wisely benefit the entire human family.

Throughout human history and across all cultures, from the rise of the Spartan and Mayan empires and the bankrolling of the European Renaissance by the Medici, to Mao’s cultural revolution, the impact of Surrealism on contemporary art, and the astonishing economic success of the Republic of Singapore since independence, it has been relatively small numbers of people who have initiated, inspired and funded massive change.

Thus in any complex adaptive system, and particularly in the interface between human design and the natural environment, it is not the sheer number of agents that is critical for change, but rather strategically chosen “acupuncture” points that together release a new energy that is then capable of tipping the system into a different state. That is smart thinking and that is what we should be aiming to do vis-à-vis climate change.

3. Science

The third set of assumptions has to do with our relatively embryonic appreciation of the science of global heating. For example, notions that we can stabilize the climate at some point; that we can exceed and then pull back to lower concentrations of greenhouse gases; and that we can accommodate 2° Celsius (or more) of warming through adaptive policies are naïve in the extreme.

These assumptions have no foundation whatsoever in the way the Earth’s climate system actually behaves. Accordingly not only is the substance of current political debate virtually meaningless, the policies being pursued by developed nations are so at odds with the scale and urgency of the changes demanded by the science as to be derisory. They reflect a childlike belief that global heating can be averted by good intentions and wishful thinking. 

4. Money

The fourth set of flawed assumptions has to with money – explicitly the financial and political costs of creating a carbon-constrained future, and the prevalent use of orthodox debt-based capital markets as the model for handling investment.

While the developed world (led by the likes of the US, Canada and Australia) attempts to avoid acting harshly by putting limits on their traditional coal, oil and gas industries, developing economies (like Brazil, India and China) attempt to steer new benefits to their own constituencies through so-called “green” investments. This has resulted in tensions that are noticeable in every critical topic being negotiated. At an international level the dilemma appears quite straightforward: to what extent are individual states prepared to cut their emissions and how willing are more affluent nations to help poorer countries adopt cleaner energy and adapt to rising temperatures and extremes of climate?

At more profound levels, however, these issue are compounded, reaching into the core of our innermost convictions, touching every aspect of how we attribute value - and to what.

Value, economic or otherwise, still tends to be framed within an unchallenged, almost condescending, conviction that US-Eurocentric models, systems and institutions signify a pinnacle of human achievement. From national Reserve Banks to investment houses everywhere, economic and monetary strategies are mostly used to bolster and restore functionality to the existing system. Underlying assumptions and beliefs are unaffected. For example many, otherwise well-meaning politicians, seem to believe that the solution to poverty is to create even more consumers. But current patterns of excessive human production and consumption are precisely the cause of so many of today’s problems. There are too many of us consuming too much too fast.  Clearly a fundamental reframing is required.

Those most threatened by deep-seated changes to our civilization are the conservative patrons of economic industrialism - those inclined to preserve existing conditions and institutions. They already sense the fragilities in old empires. They see shifts they cannot comprehend. They hear the relentless message that their ideology is wrong, immoral even, and that adapting to the impacts of climate change will require much more than just the conventional functioning of capital markets, or corporations, or governments. Increasingly they cannot find even the briefest pause for breath in all the confusion. And their reaction, unsurprisingly, is to fight for all they are worth, propping up with even greater enthusiasm those things that delivered wealth to them in the past.

But this will not do. Ultimately the role of money and investment in society has to be remodeled. The issue of financing clean energy, for example, cannot be resolved by resorting to trade-offs (where effort is being mostly directed through short-sighted policies such as cap-and-trade or its like) but through integrating and transcending poles of thought in order to arrive at a new consensus, thus effectively reinventing competitive advantage and common benefit. In this regard, co-design, cooperative and open source innovation models, hold out new hope for different kinds of exchange in the future.

5. Futures

The fifth set of assumptions relate to (a) what can be done to avert a future that is ostensibly inevitable, yet destructive of all we hold dear, including the widespread panic that is likely to ensue if that occurred, and (b) how we actually navigate to where we want to go instead of feeling helpless victims of an inexorable force that is driving us over a cliff.

Over the past few decades futures studies have advanced our thinking and capability to design better, more integral, futures. Now is the time to harness that knowledge, rather than to turn our backs on it, using it more effectively to help transform our thinking. There are two critical aspects to using foresight techniques effectively...

Firstly, trying to plot a linear course from a dynamic present to a world-changing future can be a beguiling speculative exercise, but in practice it is bound to fail – especially when we focus solely on the external world of physical materiality but pay no heed to our inner worlds of deeply-held values and convictions.

Secondly, the human condition has become far too complicated to fully comprehend and to chart with existing tools, although it is not the long view that is so much the problem as the immediate future. By that I mean the next decade or so. Being caught up in such a convoluted here and now makes any attempt to map short-term future options (at least from our currently prevailing perspectives and altitude) out of the question.

So we become bogged down by the sheer variety and density of factors, forces and trajectories, some obvious but many barely perceptible. Inundated by this data overload (much of it noisy, contradictory and bewildering) we unintentionally infer a chaos from which it is increasingly difficult to extricate ourselves with our sense of rationality intact. In other words we remain trapped within prisons of our own invention.

Future studies teach us that because of this pervasive complexity in both our outer and our inner worlds it is vital to come to some kind of broad understanding and agreement as to our paramount purpose and intent before resorting to the reassuring routine of detailed planning. But finding such strategic purpose also requires uncovering common ground for collaboration, being clear about our shared aims, and articulating the most critical and desirable goals from an array of latent options.

We know that broadly defining a compelling future, one that is healthier, sustainable and more abundant than present actualities, is critical to progress being made. That means envisaging alternative futures, accompanied by a degree of consensus that it is technologically achievable, socially desirable, politically prudent, economically feasible and mutually beneficial. Only when that work has been done can we confidently stand in that future, commencing the work of designing viable future-to-present pathways and resourcing local activities that can be leveraged to meet shared aspirations.

Regrettably the majority of in vogue models, methods, practices and initiatives tend to result in rather aimless and uninspiring goals. Too often they lack foresight and clarity around a shared purpose - other than that of avoiding adversity or known problems. And even when that purpose is transparent they habitually neglect expressions of viable pathways to achieve a satisfactory endpoint.

6. Dimensions

Finally we are still using a set of assumptions regarding the speed and scale of change that is archaic. As climate change takes hold, altering major patterns of human activity in any number of predictable and unforeseen ways, the need to comprehend the non-linear nature of change in complex systems becomes crucial.

We are all familiar with, and have become somewhat unperturbed, by linear change. As long as one comprehends the most critical variables, and is able to monitor the impact of these variables in the system, it is possible to predict the outcomes from almost any sequence of events.

Most government and corporate plans are predicated on linear goals and processes. Indeed the entire discipline of project management is based on principles of linear cause and effect. I suspect the relative comfort we have with linear change is encouraged by the apparent certainty we feel (sometimes even an inevitability) when reviewing past patterns and events. Looking back it all seems to make sense. But the realities we are facing today are not nearly so neat.

Non-linear change, undisciplined and wildly unsettling, is disconcerting precisely because we cannot be certain of anything any more. Analyzing the past does not help while forecasting becomes potentially hazardous. In such situations we struggle to know what to do next. Unfortunately the impacts of climate change on our civilization will be linear and non-linear – both expected and surprising.

For example, convention has it that carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere, and therefore global temperatures, will increase gradually. This in turn gives rise to the expectation that we will be given sufficient notice to tackle problems before they spin out of control. That presumption is valid when dealing with linear change in a simple system. But the changes we are beginning to encounter are likely to be increasingly abrupt, erratic and massively disruptive.

Disruptive change does not trace orderly and predictable curves. This is why disruptive change within complex adaptive systems like the Earth’s climate require a different kind of comprehension altogether. Within this situation, even assuming that environmental sustainability itself remains a debatable issue, it is inexcusable to suppose that the UN, state governments or even city councils are capable of managing the ecology and the economy by command-and-control edicts in the manner they might otherwise exercise within their normal policy environments. This destructive delusion has no basis in reason.

Climate skeptics who resort to using limited sets of data to support their arguments are actually blind to reality. They can hardly be blamed for seeing the world in terms of perfunctory flows and outcomes. We are all taught to believe this is how things work. But to take their views seriously is to join those few eccentrics who still believe the world is flat.

Contredanses:

All of the above distractions, habits, myths, maneuverings and ways of seeing our global predicament are, I believe, serious missteps in the dance of societal renewal. It should be perfectly clear that each exposes an element of evolutionary risk. A few are extremely hazardous to the future of human life on this planet.

In the same way that paleoclimate records show evidence of abrupt climate changes, it is increasingly possible that official policy reactions to climate change may themselves be abrupt, hasty and ill-considered. After decades of governments failing to act, public sentiment is almost at fever pitch in some quarters. A backlash could be on the cards, in which case the repercussions could well force government policies into radically compressed timeframes.

Such spontaneous cultural tipping points, often triggered by a dramatic series of events, has led to revolutions and wars in the past. The possibility of that happening in this case should not be summarily dismissed.

Reprisals may already be brewing. Copenhagen was perceived to be a flop, after which public trust in the process took a nosedive. Strident remarks from esteemed observers branding political inaction “treason” and a “crime against nature” were increasingly heard. Influential journalist Elizabeth Kolbert described “a technologically advanced society choosing to destroy itself” while James Hansen and Rajendra Pachauri, generally regarded as two of the world’s leading climate scientists, concurred that the combined lack of urgency and political will could well doom our planet.

Meanwhile, that same planet is noticeably pushing back against human folly. Extensive droughts, fires and dust storms in Australia; widespread flooding in Asia, terrifyingly rapid melting of land ice in Greenland and Antarctica; earthquakes in China and Haiti; and mosquito-borne illnesses like Dengue spreading to regions previously untouched. Recent soundings show that the oceans are rising and becoming more acidic, while the Earth’s average temperature was higher in the past decade than at any time in the past century.

Critical questions remain: When will we react collectively to the need for a low-carbon future? Will it be in time to prevent further human catastrophes? When we react will it be out of wisdom or from panic? Are we headed for a pivotal point in evolution when we collectively and intentionally confront conventional wisdom? Do we have the will and the imagination to establish new rules for the betterment of civilization as a whole? If so will these need to be forcibly generated or will they emerge from a more conscious ethos of deep design and appreciation for each other and our environment? And if we should choose to continue with our customary incremental lethargy will our species be capable of surviving the challenges to come?

We must understand that there can be no simple nor single answer to such fundamental questions. No global treaty, charismatic statesman, technical innovation, international carbon emissions framework, transformed belief system or reformed practices will solve every issue facing us. It would be naïve to think so. Nor can we rely on celebrity politicians, philanthropists and business leaders, however influential, wealthy or powerful, to do what needs to be done.

From the rice farmers of Vietnam and the street vendors in Soweto to bankers on Wall Street, entrepreneurs in Shanghai and Emirs in Dubai, it is incumbent upon each one of us to contribute to the emergence of new thinking and new ways of being for body, mind and soul, in whatever ways we can each be most effective.

Yet as Jean Houston so wisely points out, there is also “an obligation of great faith that such discrete actions can add up to a whole that will shift the destructive trajectory” upon which we are currently set in more beneficial and plentiful ways.

Over the past century, breakthroughs in knowledge have repeatedly affirmed our universal reality as a dynamically complex, vital, abundant and interconnected whole. Quantum physics illustrates so exquisitely an abiding truth: that science and spirit are one and that we are intimately connected to each other, as well as being inextricably entangled with our environment.

Every so often we recall this primordial echo of a memory lost in the interstices of contemporary life. We instinctively sense such innate affiliation each time we hold a new-born baby in our arms, watch the sun set over the ocean, or walk in a forest after rain.

Yet most of our cultural, political and socio-economic structures behave as if this were not the case. Having been designed to operate like giant cogs in a Newtonian clockwork machine they are immovable, out of touch with reality, the result of an array of invisible cultural beliefs we have mistaken for reality.

But there is hope. People all around the world are awakening to the realization that our society can no longer afford to indulge such outdated worldviews. They know that in order to deal with the multidimensional crisis we are now facing, in ways that create better futures and a planetary civilization more attuned to nature, it is critical we act (and act wisely) on new realities. That necessitates (a) discarding a range of primitive fears that tether us in past ways of knowing, (b) catalyzing a compelling energy to help bring forth more enduring and holistic narratives of humanity, and (c) elevating and deepening our current discourse for invention and co-evolution.

Our starting point must surely be some shared view of utopia. Alas we have no authentic or abiding vision of what this world and its inhabitants could be, so splintered have our lives and aspirations become. A new story is paramount.

As the world turns on its dark side we are no longer able to rely on the ancient myths of Eden or the indigenous Dreamtime. They are not enough. The various covenants offered by religions are not enough. The genius of art and philosophy is not enough. Science, mathematics and psychology are wanting while politics and economics are utterly inadequate. Even the power of contemplation, of reflective practice, and even new practical solutions and initiatives, though essential, are hardly satisfactory.

So what will work?

Seers like Jean Houston and Ken Wilber agree, nothing short of everything will really be sufficient to hit the reset button of history. We will need to bring to this everything a compassion, accord and wisdom sufficient to release the conceptual, creative and moral passion required to explore new ways of being and relating.

Moreover we will never reach our desired destination by fighting existing realities. It is a waste of energy. There are simply far too many people with vested interests lining up to stop paradigmatic progress in its tracks. As the great inventor Buckminster Fuller was fond of saying: to change something we must build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete. Devoting more time and attention to what we want to create, rather than what we can sensibly leave behind, does not mean we can neglect the problems currently besetting us. But it does imply much more energy has to be given to the world we are attempting to bring into being.

Those more enlightened beings among us are already discerning a clear code emerging of how we can begin to imagine and design viable future pathways accessing everything – the totality of human knowledge and instinct. This code, (which I have frequently referred to over the years as the “C” society for reasons that are self-evident) is triggered and sustained by connectivity, cognitive capacity, cooperative action and complexity - as in diversity, inclusion, sufficiency and mutation rather than the stifling processes typically caused by uniformity, segregation, excess consumption and mindless preservation. 

Who can doubt that this moment in history is unique? Of course exceptional times call for exceptional responses and not simply more of the same. Yet uniqueness of the type now warranted invariably emanates from altogether higher levels of  intentionality – from a civilizational consciousness intensely focused on integrating and transcending past paradigms and poles of thought.

An elemental distinction between civilizations is whether they accentuate the spiritual or the physical realm. Within pre-literate societies these were (indeed are) identical. In our society science and spirituality, as well as our internal and external worlds, are striving to unite once again. What is evolving today, though, is not the individual but the living organism of humanity. Yet until we fully comprehend we are all part of a single living ecosystem, that we are all intimately connected to the Gaian biosphere that gives us life, and that cooperation and not competition is the key to our future existence, we will most likely continue to butcher each other and despoil the planet, like destructive cells in an autoimmune disease. So how should we encourage the dawn of a new wisdom?

In the obsolete paradigm of scientific materialism, an intense belief in matter prevails. Cartesian convictions that the universe is a machine, both visible and palpable, diverts attention away from the imperceptible and the unseen. Hence we become seduced by material comfort and possessions. In this paradigm the acquisition of material goods signifies accomplishment. So those that hold fast to these beliefs continue to mine the earth, fell the forests and pollute the air and the oceans in a degrading scramble for yet more and more material wealth. In this reality the logic is obvious: the more stuff we have and the more we own, the more successful we are thought to be.

We now have evidence that this paradigm is an illusion. New knowledge acquired just over a century ago rejects such a belief system out of hand. Quantum physics show us that the invisible domain we had learned to ignore is in fact the salient sculptor of the physical realm we venerate. But there are other false belief systems to which we still adhere.

The basis of Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution, for example, that life originated from random mutations and is dependent upon a struggle of the fittest for survival, is at best only half true. Today we know better. The fine balance between competition and cooperation within and between species is mostly determined by environmental  characteristics. In temperate conditions competition tends to thrive. In cold conditions, however, cooperation becomes essential.

Thus cellular biology tells us that the entangled web of life on this planet (the biosphere) is impelled by cooperation and community. In essence, our competitive struggle has been futile and anti-evolutionary, trapping us in hostility and confrontation with each other and our environment. Yet the original theory still endures, influencing Western culture in so many different ways.

When a society accepts specific answers to recurrent questions from a particular body of knowledge, they commonly turn to that same source for other truths about reality. In the Middle Ages people asked the local priest or to the Church to help them resolve problems in their daily lives. Prior to that it was the village shaman or the witch doctor. When science eclipsed religion we turned to scientists and technologists for the answers. Now it is time to turn to the custodians of integral thought. To more holistic, more integrated, states of being.

Within the context of holism, awareness, intelligence and connection are keys to the deeper design of a unified society living in harmony with its environment. Similarly, those belief systems that perpetuate current conditions, exacerbate problems like global heating, that cherish competition and that permit us to pollute and destroy the very things we need to survive, will only go away when we realize we are part of an intricate and delicate web of life.

This understanding, this wisdom of cooperation, is the philosophical vacuum without which international negotiations and attempts at reform or reinvention are bound to falter and fail.

Ideally the creation of a unified and unifying vision for civilizational renewal should be high on the agenda, indeed the most important mission, of our global institutions. It is not. In their current state and orientation international representative bodies are incapable of conversing at the level required, least of all are they capable of enabling a momentary stay in all the noise and confusion.

Trapped in past paradigms, their utter powerlessness in the face of complexity merely fuels public consternation. And as our united nations are anything but united, their efforts mostly confined to propping up what has been and their shrill utterances increasingly hollow and self-serving in a multi-polar world, a new form of intentional community will need to embark upon this particular mission. In this regard I remain optimistic.

I envisage a new resonance and connectedness emerging from a truly inclusive people’s assembly - an association of children, elders, men and women who are deeply conscious of the more systemic, longer-term issues, facing us and who have a desire to guide humanity in imagining, composing and enacting better futures. Comprising people drawn from all cultures and beliefs (entrepreneurs, social artists and innovative thinkers dedicated to unshackling the human spirit through deep design) such an assembly would give genesis to the fused civilizational consciousness we desire.

Such diversity and purpose would be an attractor, connecting the most exceptional minds around the world in order to liberate a new wisdom and serve as imaginal cells in the evolution of a new society.

An assembly of this nature would learn to model a genuinely integral praxis for society. It would articulate and legitimize innovative concepts such as the global commons. It would reinvent econometric evaluation, proposing policies intended to create and distribute wealth more equitably. It would reboot our dominant leadership archetype from the “leader as hero” model of the past to the “citizen steward” of the future. And through deep collaborative inquiry, dialogue and reframing it would seek to reconstruct everything from the media to education to civic engagement in an effort to liberate (rather than to oppress) knowledge.

Most likely it would not trumpet its work for all and sundry to criticize and deride. Gradually though, through a quietly coherent shift in consciousness, it will surely help give birth to the civilization we most desire, awakening in communities everywhere memories of our true nature and potential as creative beings inhabiting an abundant planet capable of providing for us all.

And so while high level discussions and international accords will continue, as they must, to provide a platform for incremental change; activists and social enterprises generate more people committed to fund and enact various good causes; and nation states carry on protecting their interests as best they can, those that perceive today’s crisis as the means for casting off what no longer serves us well, must take steps to fill the void that will otherwise exist in the renaissance of genuinely new ways of being.

What is the future for our civilization? How can we begin thinking like a species instead of self-interested individuals? What do we have that we value in common? What will it take to achieve an authentic community of nations? Above all else, what will it feel like when our systems of governance, finance, production, education and health care all work in concert with one another rather than in competition?

These are such critical questions to ponder as we take the first tentative steps of a new consciousness. In the past few years we have blindly undermined our capacity to shift the acquired, yet damaging, beliefs imprinted within our cultures for something far more sustainable and fulfilling.

It is now time to cast off that old paradigm, re-vitalizing and empowering ourselves, in order to advance towards a new and more compelling reality.

Many people have contributed through their own pioneering work to the ideas expressed in this essay and especially Jean Houston, Ken Wilber, Elisabeth Sahtouris, Bruce Lipton and Steve Bhaerman, Michel Bauwens, David Martin, Michael McAllum, Richard Slaughter and Hazel Henderson. The title, Paradigm in Progress, was borrowed with appreciation from Hazel Henderson’s seminal book Paradigms in Progress, published in 1995 by Berrett-Koehler, San Francisco.

 

 

Days of Miracles and Wonders

Are you quite sure you don’t mind giving this interview? 

I turned my attention to the monitor, or more precisely, to the young woman on it. She was new to Al Jazirra and had obviously been told I rarely gave interviews.  Following the Great Crisis of 2037, all unnecessary media contact by Academicians had been tacitly discouraged. 

I smiled. 

No, of course not. 

The young woman glanced down at her notes and cleared her throat. The red studio light blinked ON AIR.

Today we are pleased to welcome to the program one of our most eminent integral philosophers, Kazim Khalili.  Kazim, your mother sought asylum in Australia in 1999 having fled the Taliban. You never knew your father who was shot by the regime for adhering to liberal ideals. You were born, and spent your early years, in a detention centre in South Australia. Your release from detention came just before Christmas 2004 in a widely-publicised effort by the federal government to assuage growing concern in the community about conditions in those centres. Traumatised, you hadn’t spoken a single word while captive. Your first words were, ‘Wire not here. Is Kazim here?’  You were four. Your face, dubbed the ‘Face of Hope’ by journalists, became known to millions around the world.

Forty six years later and your life still remains something of a mystery.  Last year you were Time Magazine’s ‘Face of the Future’ - yet most people probably wouldn’t recognise you if they saw you in the street. Yasmin, your Vietnamese-born life partner, is a widely-published ethicist and former actress who also happens to be one of the most glamorous women in the world – yet the two of you seldom appear in public. You are a moral philosopher to some of the most powerful corporations on the planet and one of only 20 elected Sages of the Gaian Academy – yet you eschew political power, which could be yours for the taking. How can this be?

What a question!  I cast my mind back to those early days… 

After my father’s death, my mother, five months pregnant, gambled her life’s savings on securing safe passage to Australia. Like all politicians at the time, Australia’s political leaders were too egocentric, too taken up with their own self-importance and petty differences, to care much about refugees. All my mother wanted was freedom. Even this basic human right these, so-called civilized, people denied her. Dismayed and depressed she eventually set herself ablaze in full view of visiting dignitaries. Her suicide was an excruciating cry for the plight of all refugees; the kind of protest that causes even the most powerful to shudder. How could I not live my life wisely after such sacrifice?

How did you find growing up in Australia?

Oh, I can’t deny it was tough – just ask any immigrant from that time. My foster family, though kind, were not affluent. I wore clothes bought at the local market and because I spoke with an accent I was bullied unmercifully at school. Most Muslims were pilloried, receiving the kind of treatment dished out to greedy and corrupt officials today. I worked my way through college doing jobs nobody else would do. Cleaning public toilets, driving taxis, sweeping the streets…  Whatever was available. 

You studied philosophy and bioethics at University?

I did. I devoured every book I could get my hands on. It was a revelation.  Today we accept the idea that human purpose is bound up with experiencing and respecting all life, learning to grow and take responsibility for stewardship of the whole Earth and for each other. But we simply didn’t know that then. Indeed, such views ran counter to almost everything we took for granted and assumed about reality. Back then, for instance, it was widely assumed that biological control came about through dissecting life down to the minutest particle. By the end of the 20^th century James Lovelock’s Gaian hypothesis was more or less accepted by a majority of scientists.  But other significant thinkers, like Lipton, Sheldrake, Buchanan, Watts, Strogatz and Wolfram, for example, were considered wackos by many mainstream scientists. Bruce Lipton’s thinking, in addition to the pioneering ideas proposed by Roy Madron and John Jopling in their book The Gaian Democracies, provided the tipping point for Australia’s venture into a new form of "Gaian" democracy. It was Lipton, you recall, who first showed genes did not control biological expression and were but a small part of the equation. That was an amazing discovery. It was Lipton, too, who insisted long before anyone else, that by looking at the physical world through reductionist eyes, we had ended up viewing the world and human beings as though matter and the material world were the only things that – well, matter. Then there were remarkable breakthroughs in economics with the establishment of the first Commons Trusts, derived from the thinking of people like James Quilligan and Ken Wilber.

Today, we openly admit that all knowledge and all ways of knowing contribute to our comprehension of who we are; that understanding arises from perceiving both the material and immaterial worlds. We accept that love and joy promote growth, while fear and stress lead to breakdown of the system as easily as we accept constructs in quantum physics. This is why the Gaian Academy, which arose out of the Institute of Noetic Sciences and has become the key advisory body on global affairs, is necessarily based on a philosophy of wholeness. 

So the noetic sciences are more important to you than philosophy?

On the contrary. Both are absolutely integral to the Gaian worldview.  Noetic science brings emotions, aesthetics and spirituality into the ambit of science. But it is philosophy that shows us how to maintain a viable civic society. A love of philosophy helped me to understand how I might live my life with greater wisdom; how I might tread more lightly on this Earth. In terms of a career, though, it was a disastrous choice. Employers sought accountants, engineers and lawyers back then. Everything had become focused on individual and material progress, you see. Greed, competition, prejudice, ignorance and fear were rife. You can’t begin to imagine what it was like unless you’d lived through it.

The Great Awakening changed that didn’t it?  In fact it seemed to impact most things.

It certainly did. Oh, we’d had more or less ongoing ‘red alerts’ regarding issues such as climate change, the impact of pollution on the biosphere, terrorism, corruption in business and politics, and the dangers of genetically modified foods, for example. But in spite of the fear propagated by governments and activists alike, enthusiastically aided and abetted by the media it must be said, society had become complacent. We trusted that money, or smart technologies created by even smarter brains, would fix all our problems. The Great Awakening really forced us to come to terms with the stark reality of the human condition. After the collapse of the climate negotiations in Mexico in 2010 it became clear to most people that we couldn’t go on as before. But what to do?  In essence, we needed to find a different way to live our lives, and quickly too. The fallout from global climate change happened far faster than anyone had predicted you see. The Great Awakening also allowed us to develop new kinds of governance that moved beyond classic parliamentary models – what we now refer to as Gaian democracies.  Old governance and political models had long outlived their usefulness, it’s just that we hadn’t realised it.

What was it like living through the Great Awakening? How did it feel?

It felt…  Actually it felt as though the end of the world had come – like all those old science fiction films you see about Armageddon. Really, nothing can do justice to the sense of sheer dread shared by the community at that moment. The most damage occurred between 2020 and 2028. Scorching summers, protracted droughts and severe storms, cyclones and bushfires gripped the country. There were crippling water shortages. Power blackouts lasted days rather than hours. Entire National Parks were destroyed. Corals in the World-Heritage listed Great Barrier Reef were bleached white by the warm acid waters. Tourism collapsed completely. Almost 68 per cent of farmers went bankrupt – especially those that were still reliant on European-style crops and farming methods. It really did feel like the end had come. But without those disasters I doubt that significant change could have occurred. Mind you, we were fortunate in having Gaian principles and noetic sciences available to us. This knowledge, once considered heretical, now made perfect sense – even to those who had been sceptical about its unorthodox scientific pedigree. Severe problems we’d never imagined we could figure out, like soil erosion and desalination, for example, seemed suddenly possible to resolve. Our knowledge and our technologies had both shifted. As science assumed genuine systemicity, so researchers started incorporating diverse topics, relationships and methods in their work. One discovery followed another in quick succession. The innovation commons enabled ordinary people and small communities everywhere to start using low-cost democratic technologies bypassing any involvement from massive and uncaring corporations. It was so liberating you see...

What kinds of problems are you talking about here? Can you give us some examples?

By all means. One of the first things we did was to completely redesign and rebuild local energy systems so that they drastically reduced carbon dioxide and other greenhouse emissions. Breakthroughs occurred in the generation and distribution of solar, wind, hydrogen, and other forms of energy, together with new policies and financial instruments to accelerate the transformation process. The implications of this were staggering, especially in urban conurbations where every internal combustion engine, every coal-fired power plant, every methane-emitting landfill was transformed or replaced with an alternative that was climate-neutral and environmentally benign. At the same time we developed a globally- coordinated system for managing the global carbon balance at scientifically determined acceptable levels.

That system marked the beginnings of the Academy and its subsequent influence on global geopolitics, if I’m not mistaken?

Correct. That degree of global cooperation was simply unprecedented. The only way we could have started to deal with some of these problems was through agreed global policy settings. It worked. Indeed, it worked so well that the Academy is now the most influential global institution as far as applied holistic science and governance is concerned.

What other early Gaian policies emanated from the Academy?

Oh, far too many to list during this interview. But I can give you a feel for the scope of new policies back then. International efforts shifted from the previous focus on emissions (which was never going to succeed) to scalable and actions relevant to different situations and locales. The production and use of chemicals was completely overhauled so that no known toxins could accumulate in the biosphere. A tax was levied on carbon. Then there was a concerted effort to completely eliminate the threat of nuclear weapons and materials from escaping into the biosphere by finding new ways to transform highly radioactive and long-lasting materials like plutonium into more benign materials. The fact that nuclear energy is once again one of the most common forms of energy on the planet is a testimony to the innovations that have been achieved there. 

But not in the UK, US and Canada surely? Wave-power generators now produce most of their electricity?

That’s correct. Unhappily Australia had no mandated green-power targets at the time. Legislation still favoured fossil fuel polluters. So yet another Australian invention was commercialised overseas for lack of local investment capital.

Sorry Kazim, I interrupted you.  You were talking about the new policies emanating from the Academy…

I suppose the most important dual issues were the elimination of global poverty (largely through the application of sufficiency economy principles) as well as the threat of war. We shouldn’t underestimate the efforts that went into this – even though politicians only started taking it in earnest once they’d realised that poverty was creating all kinds of ecological destruction while increasing social instability and diminishing our humanity. War is far too dangerous in an era of globally destructive weaponry. In the first assembly of the Academy we agreed that nothing less than the full elimination of these two scourges would be sufficient to attain sustainability and establish the full proof of our maturity as a species.

And the physical environment, which is also an area close to your heart?

Because I’m an Australian, the physical landscape is a potent part of my personal identity and consciousness. Landscapes have both a tactile and an aesthetic beauty that is almost spiritually palpable, for me as for most other Australians, I suspect. My inaugural address as a Sage included policies designed to protect absolutely the integrity of the Earth's natural and agricultural systems. In Australia and New Zealand, hard boundaries were drawn around biodiversity preserves, critical ecosystems, and places of awe and wonder like Kakadu and Uluru, for example. I proposed that farmlands and food production should be protected from displacement by urban sprawl and colonization by overzealous profiteers. And I called for human habitations to become completely self-sufficient, no longer drawing down resources at unsustainable rates or destroying places of living mystery with thoughtless extraction, pollution, or overuse. All of which is now government policy I’m pleased to say.

But what of the Australian landscape itself. Does it look any different today?

Superficially speaking, probably not too much. Urban environments are designed far more elegantly. Most buildings are extremely energy efficient and look more sculptural than in the past. I suppose visitors from the 20^th century might be surprised by the lack of green in our inner cities. We no longer try to mimic European landscapes as we did then. Even our Botanic Gardens are full of native species. New legislation and methods of farming as well as broad acre permaculture projects have ensured the survival of critical ecosystems. The rivers are clean and the oceans have abundant fish.  There are probably more forests today than there were even 20 years ago.  The main difference is the fact that we’ve been able to produce a system whereby native and introduced species of flora and fauna can coexist. We haven’t had to opt for one or the other.

Kazim, can you say a little about how all of this has been achieved?

There were perhaps four critical elements, without which none of this could possibly have worked. First was the platform for change provided by the Great Awakening itself. Second was the new Gaian paradigm which balanced individual wealth with new commons and trusts and futures banks (designed to protect the rights of all people to things like fresh air and potable water) and repositioned the role of governments in that regard. The third had more to do with a critical mass of people from all walks of life, change agents if you like, who dared to take seriously the challenge of personal life-style transformation: the activists who called our attention to those issues about which society was in denial; the artists who helped us feel the gravity of our predicament and inspired us to strive for better things; the scientists and technologists who found breakthrough ideas to rapidly transform our way of life; the designers who fused beauty and functionality in a transformed world; and the business people who re-imagined and redirected capital flows, investment and talent in ways that recreated the world while enhancing global prosperity. Fourth, and perhaps most important, was the introduction of third-generation, people-powered, political systems as well as the establishment of participative processes and collaborative global institutions, such as the Academy. I doubt very much whether we would be here today if we were still enmeshed in the ego-based, corrupt political systems of the late 20^th century.

Kazim, thank you so much for your time. It’s been fascinating to talk to such a distinguished Sage about the evolution of Gaian society. In today’s world of preferential networks, collaborative communities and the tendency to downplay ego as a natural response to the 20^th century’s individualistic excesses, it’s not often we have access to such fascinating and inspirational personal insights. Is there anything you would like to say in conclusion?

Only that our journey continues still. So many dreams have been realised over the past half century. Humanity’s impact on nature has declined dramatically. We have learned to live as stewards of the biosphere rather than as ravagers of it. Wealth is being created in ways that were simply unimaginable barely 25 years ago and poverty is almost a thing of the past.  Society is transformed and it enriches us – spiritually, socially, economically. There is still much to be done though. Perhaps we will never completely understand why we are here. But what we’ve discovered already is quite profound and we are living together more compassionately and developing wealth more equitably as a result.

Kazim Khalili, thank you so very much for your time.  Namaste.

Namaste.