Paul Hawken on the immune system of humanity

November 13th, 2007

My son, Asatar, recently attended the San Francisco Green Festival, which is a huge 3-day event with thousands of vendors, exhibitors, and speakers, all focused on creating a sustainable future for humanity. The following is his report on one of the events, a talk by the well-known environmental author and activist Paul Hawken, author of Blessed Unrest:

Hawken spoke eloquently about state of the environmental and social justice movements. His argument is that these movements are increasingly coming together, in a decentralized, organic, truly grassroots way. He talked about traveling the world, giving talks, and how people always gave his their business cards. He didn’t know what to do with them, so he threw them in a shopping bag. After a few years, the bag was full, and he had thousands of them. He wondered how many activists, non-governmental organizations, and individuals working for the environment or humanity there are. And it began a sort of odyssey, to figure out the contours of this movement. He compares it to the movement to abolish slavery. We look back on it now and think it is obvious, of course slavery ought to be abolished. (By the way, though slavery has been marginalized, it has not been abolished, as shown by the work of scholars such as Kevin Bales, Tom Brass, and my own work on slavery in prisons.)

Hawken argues that the environmental movement is the biggest mobilization of its kind ever. Just the idea that we could spend a good deal of our time working to improve the lives of people elsewhere, far away, who we have never met, who haven’t even been born, is a radical notion. And yet there are millions of people all over the world engaged in doing just that. Hawken compares this movement to the body’s immune system; the environmental and social justice movement is like the immune system of humanity, mobilized by an incredible contagion, which basically, is our own ignorance. The immune system is incredibly complex, and is continually sorting through the body, saying, “this is me, this is not me”, and tagging it. This is what modern activists do. They say, “this is humane; this is not.” Or “this is sustainable; this is not.” Like the immune system, this movement is decentralized, yet it works together, often against great odds. It was a very inspiring talk.

Following our minds has gotten us into a very difficult situation collectively. The only way out is to start following our hearts.

Puran

Entry Filed under: Ecology, The Heart