Commentary by James Quilligan, EDA managing director Many people today are wondering, is the world losing democracy altogether? No. Not if we’re willing to take responsibility to restore it. As we contemplate the future of participatory representative democracy in modern society, it’s important to recognize the roots of democratic practice in our past. … Read More
7th International r3.0 Conference 2020
Redesign for a Regenerative & Distributive Economy: Closing Systemic Gaps r3.0 is pleased to announce its 7th international conference, on 8th to 11th of September 2020, strategically placed right after the summer break in Europe/North America, to help set a sufficiently ambitious tone for the fall/winter conference season … EDA Executive Director, James Quilligan, will… Read More
A simple plan for repairing our society: we need new human rights, and this is how we get them.
[Article commentary by James Quilligan, EDA managing director:] There’s no doubt that world civilization has entered a new phase. Given America’s overarching influence on the world during the postwar era and the threat to democracy that our nation is now experiencing, some people say that June 1, 2020, was the official beginning of a… Read More
Coronavirus Spells the End of the Neoliberal Era
[Article commentary by James Quilligan, EDA managing director:] What is the new normal dawning upon us as a result of COVID-19? Can we think in large enough terms to this understand this crisis and adjust to the new reality? Jeremy Lint, a cultural historian, explains how the Coronavirus has broken open the so-called Overton… Read More
A New Vision for Europe – Systems Change and Sustainability
Dear Friend: Can we solve our planetary crises while in a capitalist system? What might a new system look like? Some of the answers will be the focus of a conference (see the flyer below) to be held in Lisbon, Portugal, one of the global “hot spots” for social change. This event is being put… Read More
Will Green Growth & Innovation Save Modern Civilization?
[Article commentary by James Quilligan, EDA managing director:] A British colleague, Tim Jackson (Prosperity Without Growth, 2009), has recently organized the Centre for the Understanding of Sustainable Prosperity (CUSP). This blog by Daniel Hausknost reviews the basic principles behind CUSP. If you study this piece closely, you’ll come face-to-face with some serious myth-busting, exposing society’s… Read More
California Mayors Join Campaign to Buy Out PG&E
[Article commentary by James Quilligan, EDA managing director:] The gobsmacking idea of turning California’s Pacific Gas and Electric into a cooperative has got me thinking about Prout’s vision of how major corporations and large-scale utilities could be converted into cooperatives. Mainstream economists argue that certain companies can operate efficiently only by becoming very large. For… Read More
As the Climate Collapses, We can Either Stand Together – or Perish Alone
[Article commentary by James Quilligan, EDA managing director:] A cogent article in Resilience by Tim Hollo on why survivalism is the wrong answer to the effects of climate disruption in society. Instead of reactionary individualism, he observes, collective “urban living in harmony with the natural world, brought together with deep democracy and cultivating social cohesion, is the only… Read More
Solar panels cast shade on agriculture in a good way
Imagine you are a farmer struggling to keep up with production demands because of the increasingly stressful climate. Or perhaps you are a producer of renewable energy struggling with dramatic heat and weather. With increasing temperatures, solar panels get too hot to function properly, and crops demand more water, problems that are exacerbated by drought… Read More
Beyond Supply and Demand: The Dynamic Equilibrium Between Global Thresholds and Allocations
James Quilligan has been speaking about resource equality to global audiences. In February, he gave a keynote talk to the Global Thresholds and Allocations Council in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Here is his presentation for that event. Read More
