commondreams | "It's time to talk about what's next. It is time for Americans to think boldly about ...
what it will take to move our country to a very different place, one
where outcomes that are truly sustainable, equitable, and democratic are
commonplace."
Those are the words of academic and author Gar Alperovitz, founder of the Democracy Collaborative, who—alongside veteran environmentalist Gus Speth—this week launched a new initiative called the "Next System Project"
which seeks to address the interrelated threats of financial
inequality, planetary climate disruption, and money-saturated
democracies by advocating for deep, heretofore radical transformations
of the current systems that govern the world's economies, energy
systems, and political institutions.
As part of the launch, the Next System Project produced this video
which features prominent progressive figures such as actor and activist
Danny Glover, economist Juliet Schor, 350.org co-founder Bill McKibben,
labor rights activist Sarita Gupta, and others:
According to the project's website, the effort is a response to a
tangible and widespread "hunger for a new way forward" capable of
addressing various social problems by injecting "the central idea of
system change" into the public discourse. The goal of the
project—described as an ambitious multi-year initiative—would be to
formulate, refine, and publicize "comprehensive alternative
political-economic system models" that would, in practice, prove that
achieving "superior social, economic and ecological outcomes" is not
just desirable, but possible.
"By defining issues systemically," the project organizers explain,
"we believe we can begin to move the political conversation beyond
current limits with the aim of catalyzing a substantive debate about the
need for a radically different system and how we might go about its
construction. Despite the scale of the difficulties, a cautious and
paradoxical optimism is warranted. There are real alternatives. Arising
from the unforgiving logic of dead ends, the steadily building array of
promising new proposals and alternative institutions and experiments,
together with an explosion of ideas and new activism, offer a powerful
basis for hope."
The mission statement of the project—articulated in a short document titled It's Time to Face the Depth of the Systemic Crisis We Confront
(pdf)—has been endorsed by an impressive list of more than 350
contemporary journalists, activists, academics, and thought leaders from
various disciplines who all agree the current political and economic
system is serving the interests of "corporate profits, the growth of
GDP, and the projection of national power" while ignoring the needs and
wellbeing of people, communities, ecosystems and the planet as a whole.
