The big news in the Williams household this week was picking up the keys to our new house from the estate agent. It seems to have taken a very long time, and I won’t bore you with it, but now comes the renovation project, bringing the 1928 mid-terrace into the 21st century. For some tips, [...]
Archive | July, 2009
The Yes Men fix the world
Among the more bizarre anti-globalization documentaries of recent years is The Yes Men. It follows a group of activist pranksters who set up gatt.org, a website that bears a passing similarity to the World Trade Organisation site. When gullible people got in touch and invited someone from the WTO to speak at their corporate conferences, [...]
Economic growth and uneconomic growth
The latest issue of Adbusters magazine is about ‘thought control’ in the field of economics. It includes an interview with Herman Daly, the godfather of the steady state, who explains the point at which growth becomes uneconomic: “the economy is a subsystem of the finite biosphere that supports it. When the economy’s expansion encroaches too [...]
Economy or Environment?
The government may be promising a billion pounds for wind power, ‘green collar jobs’, and a new low carbon economy, but is the message getting through? According to IPSOS Mori’s ‘issue index‘, the general public has not put the environment and the economy together yet. In 2006, the environment briefly overtook the economy as our [...]
Ed Milliband on transition towns
“…the mission of the Transition Towns movement is not just avoiding disaster but creating a better quality of life and a stronger community. This is an incredibly important message, and if I’m honest, I don’t think that those of us who believe in tackling climate change talk about it enough. The Transition Towns movement shows [...]
Sustainability – a concept on thin ice
I heard an intriguing lecture earlier this year from David Fleming, an independent mind if ever there was one. He claimed that he had abandoned the idea of ‘sustainability’ long ago. He compared sustainability to the Titanic, trying to create something unsinkable. Far better to create something that is resilient, that has inbuilt flexibility and [...]
Speaking louder
This week, this striking image from Survival International, the advocacy group for indigenous people. It captures our connection to the earth, and our dependency on it, quite brilliantly. More…
Being wrong about climate change
I’ve written before about how, if it turns out that I’m wrong about climate change and it doesn’t happen, I won’t have any regrets. The switch to renewables and a slower, more local way of life will be good for our health, our communities and our happiness, even if climate change itself turns out to [...]
The Bigger Picture 2009
Get your diaries out, this looks like a great event. The Bigger Picture is a one-day festival on London’s South Bank. Here’s the blurb: “Economic turmoil and social upheaval coupled with the threat of runaway climate change have revealed major failings in the current system. In response, nef has brought together a range of organisations [...]
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