Our unfinished voyage from the Whole Earth Catalog to Blessed Unrest
Blessed Unrest: How the Largest Movement in the World Came into Being and Why No One Saw It Coming
Summary: From seeing the whole earth, to standing up for the whole earth to really living the whole earth. The reality is the whole earth vision has been lost. We no longer live (if we ever did) in a world where humans live in harmony with other species in the biosphere and all have access to what we need to live healthy, safe and purposeful lives. Today’s existing entities cannot, or will not, do what’s needed to make this reachable for all. Perhaps this can be achieved by a bottom-up, global movement combining civil justice and environmental sustainability.
As Paul Hawken author of Blessed Unrest says: “The way we harm the earth affects all people, and how we treat one another is reflected in how we treat the earth.”
Seeing the whole earth
Whole Earth Catalog in 1968 – a revolution in self sufficiency
Over 50 years ago, Stewart Brand launched the Whole Earth Catalog. Steve Jobs, at a commencement speech at Stanford, described it like this: “It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along. It was idealistic and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.” It was indeed a valuable reference tool for people looking for information, tools, ideas around self-sufficiency and DIY (do it yourself) ways of life. Jobs closed his speech with the words quoted on the back cover of the 1974 final edition of the Whole Earth Catalog: “Stay hungry. Stay foolish.”
Going back to the beginning, one of the early editions of the catalog had one of the first color photos of earth from space. Appropriate! The photo above is not the cover photo but is from the same 1968 Apollo 8 mission.
Astronaut Edgar Mitchell, involved in several Apollo missions, says that in seeing the photo:
“You develop an instant global consciousness, a people orientation, an intense dissatisfaction with the state of the world, and a compulsion to do something about it. From out there on the moon, international politics look so petty. You want to grab a politician by the scruff of the neck and drag him a quarter of a million miles out and say, ‘Look at that, you son of a bitch’.”
Grabbing politicians by the scruff of their necks is tempting, especially today when we see the abuse of power in many countries around the world and the damage – social and environmental – inflicted on the majority of humans in the world.
Whole Earth Discipline in 2009, moving from individual to aggregate
In 2009, Stewart Brand wrote Whole Earth Discipline, An Ecopragmatist Manifesto. He explained: “The Whole Earth Catalog encouraged individual power; Whole Earth Discipline is more about aggregate power.”
The topics extend beyond those of the Whole Earth Catalog. He sees climate change, urbanization and biotechnology transforming our world. Some examples of subjects in random order: Climate change, the concept of the earth as a self-regulating living system (Jim Lovelock), geo-engineering, natural capitalism versus industrial capitalism (Paul Hawken and Amory Lovins), our ecosystem as an infrastructure, the need to accept nuclear power for energy, new urbanism movements (Peter Calthorpe), and slums that generate large amounts of domestic production in their countries.
Standing up for the whole earth
Who is moving forward?
Not corporations, trapped between conflicting shareholder and stakeholder goals, and multiple country differences
To be clear, shareholders invest financially in the company and are usually focused on short term goals. Stakeholders are not necessarily invested financially but are impacted by the actions of the company and tend to have a longer-term perspective. Examples include employees, customers, partners, communities and the environment. In this balancing act, most CEOs and Boards act in favor of shareholders.
Many companies operate in multiple countries and are thus subject to varying environmental laws defined by a given country’s priorities, geography and needs. Based on organizational power structures such as location of headquarters, country divisions, sales, manufacturing and so on, decisions are made that are not based on the well-being of everyone.
Not national governments with conflicting history, geographies and priorities
Rich developed countries and poor less-developed countries have conflicting perspectives. The former acquired wealth in part through actions over years that, inadvertently or through willful blindness, harmed the environment. The latter now say: “You had your chance, now let us have ours”.
The less-developed countries actually make up the majority of the world when it comes to population, but a minority when it comes to power and influence.
Not global entities weakened by consensus
Today we have some groups attempting to act as a global guide for the whole earth, but they operate on the need for consensus, which usually results in agreeing on the lowest common denominator rather than the original stated goal.
Initiatives such as the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP) have been a disappointment.
Living the whole earth
Is Blessed Unrest – our new model?
Ecological sustainability and social justice go together
In 2007, Paul Hawken wrote Blessed Unrest. How the Largest Movement in the World Came into Being and Why No One Saw It Coming.
The movement is made up of thousands of organizations around the world: small non-profit, communities, social justice groups, climate activists and more. None are governments or “official organizations”. These organizations are not aware of each other, and he learned about them when, giving talks around the world over 15 years about the environment – his specialty, people came up to him afterwards telling him what they were doing and giving him their cards. He ended up with over one thousand cards, then decided to do more research and concluded there were over one million of these small, unrecognized organizations working towards ecological sustainability and social justice. From Hawken:
“A Native American taught me that the division between ecology and human rights was an artificial one, that the environmental and social justice movements addressed two sides of a single larger dilemma. The way we harm the earth affects all people, and how we treat one another is reflected in how we treat the earth.”
Note: This article is a significantly revised version of the original one I published on my website Imaginize.World as well as on Inside Outsider, my first, now retired, LinkedIn newsletter in September 2022
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A thoughtful article and I remember seeing that picture for the first time as a 7 year old and thinking. That’s where I live but also how small we were as if in a lifeboat. I remember being in the SF MOMA and there was an exhibition called Made in California and there was a copy of the WEC as well as a Mac. If there is a hope it comes from Burke’s small battalions working sometimes in isolation but working to a common aim rather than some of the large NGO behemoths we see. Perhaps there needs to be more B Corps developed in capitalism Large in vision but small in size but also ones that can encourage people to implement their ideas. COP has been a disappointment but it was always going to be the case to get agreement with so many countries and agendas as you highlight. Perhaps it is only at the precipice that man can see and agree the disaster awaiting us. It’s either that or we need a Klaatu together with a Gort to appear as a deus ex machina to shake us out of our slumbers. That picture reminds us of how fragile we are but also how through the serendipity of a few atoms and chemicals coming together we are even here in the first place.