Well, does it?

On the one side we have the Milton Friedman mantra: ‘The Business of Business is Business‘…..

On the other, the World Commission on Environment and Development (The Brundtland Commission 1987: ‘Our Common Future’) cites as one of the necessary preconditions for a sustainable world the need for business to go beyond the limited requirements of the law to assume an ethical and moral responsibility for what businesses do in the pursuit of profit.   From a personal, rather than business perspective, the popular film ‘Pay it Forward’ suggests that in our individual capacity we should give when we can, not expecting to be paid back, but that the recipient should ‘pay it forward’ and do something for someone else in his turn (as opposed to ‘return’).

TED: Bill and Melinda Gates: Giving their money away….(Warren Buffet too!) this is one of the richest men in the world working with his wife to transfer their wealth into changing the lives of people in difficulty…..a sort of half-way house between the personal and the professional/industrial.  Warren Buffet was doing the same ( for years the richest man in America), who has bequeathed 80% of his wealth to the Gates’ Foundation.   If it can become the vision of the richest people in the world – why can’t we all see a way forward which isn’t all about self and profit.

Your task is to:

• think about this….
  • the world is now one of employment in the developed world…. but prior to the industrial revolution the vast majority of the population was self-employed.  It has changed once: to drive people into large factories…. might/could/should it change again?
  • Consider ‘money’: do we really need it?  Do some research – could we not exist on barter where we trade our time: and hour of an electrician’s time against an hour of a teacher’s.  Are there successful projects like this
  • Is it possible to live ‘off the grid’ and opt out of the ‘rat race’?  Look at new sorts of buildings which require no heating, produce their own electricity (and sell the surplus)
  • Is education the key…. and if it is are we doing it right?  Do see Ken Robinson’s spectacular challence and propositions for the world’s educational systems:
    • Killing Creativity
    • New Educational Paradigm
• So before you think about going into the business world as it is, consider whether or not it could be different or  better: the world has enough resources for us all, even with a growing population, but the issue is equality/inequality: can we find a fair way of resource allocation?  If we can’t then who the hell can?
• So engage in some research: are there projects that ‘break the mould’ – even if they don’t represent a utopia, if they are better, then why not develop them?  Is this what the anti-capitalism protestors at the G8/27 meetings are trying to say (though they are labelled as extremists in the process?)
• Look at energy for example: does it have to be nuclear or aeolian/photovoltaic?  Do we need to pollute to produce all the energies we need?
  • See the staggering presentation by Justin Hall-Tipping that turns the energy world on its head!  If we can do this then why are we burning billions of tons of fossil fuel still???

  Think about your industry: textiles, for example:

  • Eben Bayer: making 100% biodegradable ‘plastics’ from Mushroom Mycellium
  • Fiorenzo Omenetto: 1001 incredible uses of an ancient material: silk!
• Then there’s the infinite possibilities afforded by youth’s determination and optimism:
  • A 14 year old who built a nuclear FUSION reactor in his own garage!

 Your project then is nothing less than to change the world – produce a new model based on respect and fairness between individuals and between  nations and between humanity and ‘Mother Earth’.