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Reconnecting with “the voice of the Earth”

Sunday, July 10, 2011 in Ecology, Evolution, Future, History, Inspiration, Leadership, People, Science, Story, Sustainability

Our conversation on Saturday was remarkable in a number of ways: passionate, profound, and thought-provoking, and resulting in a call for us to stay connected. There was talk of Google+ (which is not yet available to everyone),Yahoo groups, and perhaps other tools, such as a Meetup group. I want to make a request that we not limit ourselves to any one system at this point, but look for multiple platforms or media through which to deepen and expand the conversation.

In particular, I want to invite us to form a more robust, multi-faceted community, interlinked with others, and having a way to stay in touch, share ideas, collaborate, and conspire to bring about significant ecological, economic, and social change. The Sustainable Leadership Forum is, in reality, a network of leaders; a vehicle for dialogue and conversation; and an instrument for collaboration. It therefore seems a good time to inaugurate our Sustainable Leadership Network site, as a medium not only for us to communicate with each other but indeed to bring others into the discussion, and to share our own views in a larger, more open, and more public way.

Certainly, if the conversation on Saturday is to mean something it should lead to action, to connection and collaboration, to innovation and empowerment in a tangible form. Whether we choose to focus on the key economic actors—like Jason Clay of the WWF and his roundtables aimed at the top 100 companies who together control more than 25% of all major global commodities—or on reaching 50 million “social change agents,” or fostering a new “billion acts of green,” we need to speak out, to communicate with one another, to build relationships, structures, vehicles, and tools to change the world.

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Stepping Up to History

Friday, July 8, 2011 in Community Development, Evolution, Future, History, Inspiration, Leadership, People, Science, SLF, Story, Sustainability

(The following is a background for what we discussed at the Open House on July 9.)

As we continue to think about the role and the mission of the Sustainable Leadership Forum, it seems increasingly clear to me that, as a society, we are not moving fast enough or broadly enough to address the multiple challenges we face in the 21st century.

The most recent analysis of the evidence for this is Lester R. Brown’s World on the Edge (2011), the latest in his annual series of reports from the Earth Policy Institute. The first half book is a reasoned, thoroughly-researched, and compelling argument for recognizing that a worldwide environmental, ecological, and social collapse could occur at almost any moment. The second revisits the EPI’s prescription for preventing this, which Brown calls “Plan B” (currently in version 4.0, available free in digital format at the Institute’s web site).

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