We already have the technology we need to be sustainable. We don't need to have big, filthy, inhuman, industrial-scale manufacturing. As producers we have human-scale convivial tools and lean, clean, craft technologies. As consumers we can choose local, high-quality, natural products and services.
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In the 1970s E. F. Schumacher condemned the industrial system of production for the harm it does to individuals, communities, and nature. He wrote the influential book Small is Beautiful and summing it up, he wrote “man is small, and, therefore, small is beautiful.” The corollary of ‘small is beautiful’ is that ‘big is ugly’.
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The sustainability movement is often accused of being opposed to technology but the opposite is more true. Sustainability is tech-savvy and makes use of technology where it is appropriate to sustain a better, simpler way of life.
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Convivial tools include technologies, techniques and institutions that allow people to thrive. Unfortunately, people are losing touch with their innate productive capacities and are increasingly becoming passive consumers of life, as opposed to active producers of life.
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Should there be an automation tax?
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An article entitled “Robots could threaten up to half of all jobs" highlights the problem that workers are losing jobs because of the greed of a system focused on financial returns for a small minority rather than the well-being of all. Read more –›
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E.F. Schumacher Hero of Sustainability
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E.F. (Fritz) Schumacher was an economist, writer and social commentator. He is known for his proposals for human-scale technologies, localisation of production, and conservation of natural capital. Read more –›
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Plastics were a boon when they were first developed only 115 years ago. But, like many technologies, they become counter-productive, as they have quickly become a plague on the environment. Read more –›
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This is a short précis of the upcoming book by Econation founder, Michael Lockhart. "We only have one life, and we only have one planet; we shouldn't waste either of them on things that don’t matter."
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The ideal business is small. Businesses get big for one ultimate purpose: to get higher return on capital. Yet, big businesses do not enhance the well-being of people and planet as much as small businesses. Read more –›
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The World is Too Much With Us
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In this poem written in 1802 William Wordsworth wrote about the the negative effect that industrialism has on people's relationship with the natural world. Read more –›
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