Dear cj,
Someone recently invited me to contribute to a book dealing with the
dimensions and urgency of global environmental decline. In explaining to
him why that wouldn't be my cup of tea, my own thinking was clarified about
what _is_ my cup of tea and why.
rkm
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Dear xxx,
Hmmm... All my writing has a certain focus, and that is the political
dimension. My belief is that pollution, deforestation, poverty, public
health (etc ad infinitum) are all technical problems well within the
capabilities of reasonably skilled people to solve - witness humble Cuba's
relative success for god's sake, working under formidable,
externally-imposed constraints.
What is lacking is only a political context in which human endeavor is
applied to solving human problems instead of serving corporate profit
interests. In other words, the only essential human problem is the
replacement of elite hegemony by genuine democracy.
We are like a man who is dying of thirst - sitting on a chair while a glass
of water is only a few steps away. While his strength fades, he reads
books (or exchanges email) about new waterworks construction technology
instead of getting up off his ass and walking over to the water glass.
We are also like a man who has been possessed by a demonic parasite and
whose brain has been disconnected from his body. While the parasite
controls his body for its own purposes, his mind has atrophied from lack of
use. If the parasite were to be detached, and the mind allowed to function
again, he would soon learn to take care of himself.
This in no way is meant to be a criticism of your book concept - it's
wonderful that people are working on the various technical problems. But
my own mission is the democracy/political issue: educating people about it
and limiting my technical attention to the problems of education, political
organizaton, and the architecture of democracy - which I see as three
fundamentally inseparable problems.
If such a perspective would fit into your book, let me know.
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Posted by Richard K. Moore - •••@••.••• - PO Box 26 Wexford, Ireland
Cyberlib: ftp://ftp.iol.ie/users/rkmoore/cyberlib | (USA Citizen)
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