Can Big Governments Play a Role in Altering our Environmental Footprint? A Lament and a Word of Hope
Global environmental problems are big–hence, “global.” We therefore turn to world leaders to, well, lead. Yet over and over again we discover that they cannot agree, that they focus on short-term priorities rather than long-term sustainability. Is it time to give up expecting real change to come from this source? Is there an alternative?
Wendell Berry has long advocated a focus on the local: that we cannot love the whole world because we cannot know the whole world. Global change comes from deeply knowing, loving, and caring for, our local spaces. How can big governments protect and honor that local loving? Historically, they have not, turning instead to a world-as-machine view that treats everything as an anonymous and generic part of a huge (economic) mechanism.
George Monbiot, an activist, producer, and writer, examines these questions in his recent provocative blog, “The End of An Era.”
What do you think? What is he right about? What is missing from his analysis? Can Christians speak into his vision?
(And once you’re at his site, explore his history and some of other blogs. You may not agree with him, but he will get you thinking.)
I look forward to your comments!
Posted: June 27th, 2012 under King's Faculty, Looy.
Tags: activism, change, environment, government, local, Monbiot, sustainability
Comments
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Time February 2, 2013 at 1:52 pm
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Comment from John
Time July 9, 2012 at 10:52 am
Thanks for raising this important question. I think the fact that neither market institutions like companies, unions, banks and so on, nor political institutions like government, political parties and so forth, are willing to tackle climate change or the ecological question, only goes to show that there is something DEEPLY wrong. These failures should push us to look deeper, at the roots of our contemporary way of life.
Christians should be comfortable doing this, since the Gospel addresses us in the deepest source of our being, in our heart, calling for conversion. Some how, however, most Christians do not seem very willing or able to tackle contemporary problems. Why?
And why are some willing to do so, think of Martin Luther King, Bishop Tutu, Wendell Berry, Bill McKibben, and so forth.
John