‘We actually have a system for making the world a better place, and it’s called democracy.

But the winners of our age don’t like to use that system because they’ll only have one vote.’

Anand Giridharadas with a sharp analysis of how the elites have co-opted “philantrophy” and are reinventing themselves as our saviours.

I think Mariana Mazzucato is asking the right question: What is economic value?

Or put differently: If what is considered valuable doesn’t help build a better future, why do we value it at all?

What if we actually come out of these converging crises stronger?

Here’s a story to consider: It takes us through a transition based on equity and justice, while being firmly rooted in the reality of the challenges ahead. This is the second part of the series by Naomi Klein and The Leap, focusing on how we will have fixed things.

Check out the first part narrated by Alexandria Ocasio Cortez:

Both are highly recommended watching!

Arundhati Roy’s beautiful “The Pandemic is A Portal” turned into a video!

And this part will always stick with me, from her piece “War Talk”:

“Our strategy should be not only to confront empire, but to lay siege to it. To deprive it of oxygen. To shame it. To mock it. With our art, our music, our literature, our stubbornness, our joy, our brilliance, our sheer relentlessness – and our ability to tell our own stories.

Stories that are different from the ones we’re being brainwashed to believe.

The corporate revolution will collapse if we refuse to buy what they are selling – their ideas, their version of history, their wars, their weapons, their notion of inevitability.

Remember this: We be many and they be few. They need us more than we need them.

Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.”

There’s a lot of great videos on Sustainable Human, I really enjoyed this one with words from Daniel Schmachtenberger:

“Rivalrous dynamics multiplied by exponential tech self terminate. Exponential tech is inexorable. We cannot put it away. So we either figure out anti-rivalry or we go extinct - the human experiment comes to a completion.“

Silencio

I have been a silent activist for a long time now. For a decade, “a better future” has become something I have dedicated most of my professional and personal life to, but in 2016, after the US elections produced such a (back-then unfathomable) grotesque shitshow on top of the rise of far-right powers in the “Western hemisphere” as well as around the world, I needed to take some time to deeply reexamine everything I had been doing up until this point.

It’s two steps forward and one step backward, I know. But this was different. It felt like an epic failure, but not the kind that happens to startups before they “pivot” to a new value proposition, but a more fundamental one. Something in the operating system is wrong, and questioning everything literally made me speechless. How could I continue to write or speak publicly, if I was questioning the basis of my world views?

I needed to take a personal step back to put on my own oxygen mask first.

Three years later

As I am writing this, there are only three months to go until 2020 - a number that has long embodied the abstract idea of “the future”. While we are still living in a far-right, xenophobic, emotions-beat-empiricism, post-privacy, ex-internet-idealist world, the pendulum has swung back ever so slightly, with a resurgent climate movement that seems to be making the mainstream cultural impact we hoped for in 2014 and 2015.

After hundreds of conversations with activists and people from all walks of life, I am starting to regain my activist voice. I have a new awareness of the mistakes I’ve made - personally and within the organizations/actions I contributed to. As a result, I am very concerned with a radically-honest conversation on the effectiveness of our activism and how we measure progress/success, especially in the face of the ticking clock of the climate emergency. 

Today, I have made adjustments to my personal theory of change and I have become more discerning of whom I lend my support to (in parts also due to more time constraints). While a part of me still holds uncertainty over what is happening in the world, the past weeks have also rekindled a hope inside me: I see a climate movement that has not only brought divestment and carbon pricing into the mainstream public debate, but that it is bringing together groups that had not shared much in common or worked together previously.

Unexpected Places

One of the most surprising places for hope, on top of the social entrepreneurs I work with, Extinction Rebellion’s strategic escalation towards “above the ground” non-violent civil disobedience or the youth-led “Fridays for Future” climate strikes, is that even an institution like the Financial Times, ardent believer in free enterprise capitalism, understands that “the principles of good business are necessary but not sufficient”, with their editor writing “It is time for a reset”.

Time will tell if their actions follow these words. Who even knows how many FT readers would agree with them. However, I think it shows that a cultural shift in mindest is on its way. The video they produced is somewhat reminiscent of “The Age of Stupid”, with one difference: It carries the logo and distribution power of a newspaper that is considered “the most important business read” by the worlds financial elite.

I think it’s time for me to start posting and writing again about what gives me hope. Thank you for reading.

Our cities need more green spaces.

Simon Sinek’s ‘Golden Circle is a classic, and his talks on leadership in these times are really worth listening to.

“The joy comes not from comparison, but from advancement.”

United States of America in 2016, as of July 6: The police killed 728 people so far. There was only 1 day when police didn’t kill anyone (source).

I know, US Americans hate it when overprivileged Europeans tell you what to do, but if you haven’t yet, please watch the video of Alton Sterling being shot point-blank and tell me that was not murder. Watch Philando Castile die next to his girlfriend and her 4-year old daughter while she is not even allowed to touch him, still fearing for her own life being taken by a police officer. Or the 12-year old Tamir Rice shot from a police car in broad daylight. Or Eric Garner. Rekia Boyd. Michael Brown. Freddie Gray. Sandra Bland.

These tragedies have become such a commonplace thing. We’re getting used to them like we are to mass shootings, drone strikes or racist Trump statements. What is so incomprehensible to me is the lack of acknowledgement that something is truly broken in the system, and that it is systemic and rooted in history.

It’s a privilege to be able to show outrage online, just like I am doing now, and not be afraid that you will be next. To those of us with this privilege, I think the moral imperative is to make our outrage heard loud and clear outside of the echo chambers we live in.

There’s enough wrong in Europe at the moment and I’m not one to preach. I just hope that you, my US friends, will be able to fix this because this really needs fixing. A good place to start would be to admit, that there is a serious problem that won’t fix itself if you ignore it long enough.

I hope that you will take meaningful action, and of course I’m not talking about killing police officers like in Dallas. I’m also not talking about more discourse about structural racism in the USA - there’s been enough watching, enough talking. It’s time for change on a level that will end this systemic oppression. If amidst the sorrow you need some ideas on what can be done, this article describing what your city can do against police brutality making the rounds in my echo chamber might be a start.

Because if there are no consequences from millions of people watching black people get murdered by the police, then I’m with Dara Lind: ‘Watching those videos is nothing more than voyeurism.’

#icantbreathe #blacklivesmatter

P.S. In case you haven’t noticed, many of us only refer to you as the “Land of the Free” in mocking quotation marks. And that’s not because we disagree with US values such as life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness - quite the opposite in fact. It’s than in light of your actions, saying those nice words has become meaningless.

I am such a huge fan of Cameron Sinclair - I know few people who are such strong inspirational speakers who cut through the BS and are working on real impact. Plus, he’s a really great person: I had the luck to meet him at this same conference in 2012 (see here), and I could not find any attitude or ego. Just a genuine person who is interested in learning more and contributing his talents.

If you don’t know him, I highly recommend this talk.