Gaian Economics: Living Well within Planetary Limits (4 Keys to Sustainable Communities) - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1856230562 ISBN 13: 9781856230568

Publisher: Permanent Publications, 2014

Synopsis

Gaian Economics is the second volume in the Four Keys to Sustainable Communities series and sets out to explore how we can develop healthy and abundant societies in harmony with our finite planetary resources.

Using contributions from a wealth of authors (including Small Is Beautiful’s E. F. Schumacher, eco-philosopher Joanna Macy, and Rob Hopkins of the Transition movement), the editors address ways of reducing our consumption to levels that enable natural systems to self-regenerate and to do so in ways that permit a high quality of life—that we live within our means and that we live well.

Since the advent of the Scientific Revolution in the sixteenth century, humans have stood apart from the rest of nature, seeking to manipulate it for their benefit. Thus, we have learned to refer to the natural world as “the environment” and to see it, in economic terms, as little more than a bank of resources to be transformed into products for human use and pleasure. This has brought us to the brink of collapse, with natural systems straining under the weight of the population and the levels at which we are consuming.

We are, however, on the threshold of a shift into a new way of seeing and understanding the world and our place within it—called, by some, the “Ecological Age.” It will be characterized by a new understanding of our place as a thread in the web of life, of our interconnectedness with all other living things. Gaian Economics offers ways forward toward this Ecological Age, giving suggestions for how it may take shape, and how it would work.

The Four Keys represent the four dimensions of sustainable design—the Worldview, the Social, the Ecological, and the Economic. This series is endorsed by UNESCO and is an official contribution to the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development. The other books of the series are Beyond You and Me, Designing Ecological Habitats, and The Song of the Earth. The Four Keys to Sustainable Communities series was completed in 2012 and is now available in the U.S. for the first time.

About this title

About the Author

Jonathan Dawson is a sustainability educator, currently working as Head of Economics at Schumacher College in Devon. Until recently a long-term resident at the Findhorn ecovillage and a former President of the Global Ecovillage Network, he has around 20 years experience as a researcher, author, consultant and project manager in the field of small enterprise development in Africa and South Asia.

Jonathan is the principal author of the Gaia Education sustainable economy curriculum (www.gaiaeducation.org), drawn from best practice within ecovillages worldwide, that has been endorsed by UNITAR and adopted by UNESCO as a valuable contribution to the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development. He teaches this curriculum at universities, ecovillages and community centres in Brazil, Spain and Scotland. He has also adopted the curriculum to virtual format and teaches it through the Open University of Catalunya in Barcelona.

Ross Jackson, an expert in international finance and operations research, has long been an innovative leader in both the business and NGO worlds. He is chairman of Gaia Trust, a Danish-based foundation that supports the Global Ecovillage Network and Gaia Education, as well as hundreds of sustainability projects in forty countries. He is also director and owner of Urtekram, Scandinavia's largest wholesale organic-food company, and former chairman of Gaiacorp, foreign-exchange consultants and hedge fund managers. Jackson is the coeditor of When No Means Yes: Danish Visions of a Different Europe and Gaian Economics: Living Well Within Planetary Limits and author of And We ARE Doing It: Building an Ecovillage Future, among other books. He lives in Denmark.

Helena Norberg-Hodge is the founder of both Local Futures (formerly ISEC) and the International Alliance for Localization (IAL), and is a founding member of the International Forum on Globalization (IFG) and The Global Ecovillage Network. A pioneer of the new economy movement, she has been awarded the Alternative Nobel prize and the Goi Peace Award. She is also the producer and co-director of the award-winning documentary The Economics of Happiness. Helena was the first Westerner in modern times to master the Ladakhi language.

Review

The challenge that lies before us today as a global civilization is to find a way of living well within our means. This will require us to reorientate our values away from consumerism and towards life-affirming sustainability; to make do with less and to make much better and more efficient use of what we have; and to create systems that help us live and stay in harmony with our planet. This publication provides a wealth of views and perspectives. Containing contributions from some of today's most eminent theorists and most effective activists, it represents an overview of cutting edge thinking and practice in the evolution of an economy that serves the needs of people and planet. We hope that this reader will both inspire and empower people to learn their way to sustainability. From the Foreword by Mark Richmond Director, Division for the Coordination of UN Priorities in Education UNESCO Education Sector

About this edition

• Publisher: Permanent Publications
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 1856230562
• ISBN 13: 9781856230568
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 256
• Editor: Dawson Jonathan, Jackson Ross, Norberg-Hodge Helena