For those interested in the "sustainability space" (interpret how you wish), you might find the thoughts of John Thackara quite refreshing. He runs an international conference and knowledge network called Doors of Perception which sets new agendas for design. John is also the author of the book "In the Bubble: Designing in a Complex World". Personally, I think the man is a genius.
Both his newsletters and blog feature a headrush of inspiring material (warning, take in small doses!). In a somewhat recent post he delves into many of the same issues that we cover here on Celsias. For some food for thought, I've taken the liberty of posing a few excerpts here. Consider it mid-week mind exercise. Enjoy, and I'd be curious to hear your reactions and thoughts around these issues:
] Introduction: measuring what matters
“These are my principles. If you don’t like them, I have others”. Groucho Marx could also have been talking about environmental standards. Our world is awash in eco information, but starved of meaning. Hundreds of organisations churn out a flood of reports, graphs, studies, punditry – and lists.
So many lists! I'm supposed to be an expert on sustainability, but it still gives me a headache trying to keep track of the Triple Bottom Line; the Three Main Components (and Four System Conditions) of The Natural Step; One Planet Living's Ten Guiding Principles; the World Wildlife Fund's Three Forms of Solidarity; the Copenhagen Agenda's Ten Principles for Sustainable City Governance; the Framework of Eight Doorways of the Sustainable Schools Network; the 12 Indicators To Follow of the Earth Policy Institute; the 11 Indicators of a Sustainable City (developed by Montreal); and the Ten Hanover Principles promulgated by Bill McDonough.
Each list is the result of deep thought by smart and dedicated people - and there are doubtless other important to-do lists out there that I've missed. But can we please agree: enough already?
The pervasive tendency of politicians to dissemble adds to the uncertainty. Vague promises to use "as few natural resources as possible," "reduce waste to a minimum" or deliver the "greenest Olympics planned so far" amplifies our feelings of anxiety that not enough is being done - and that what is being done, is not being done fast enough.
How do we measure "sustainable"? What is the benchmark? How far is it from here, to there? And how long do we have to get there?
In the transition towards a more balanced economy and society, we probably do have to take numbers and metrics seriously. And if a well-engineered new economic system is needed, we probably need it to be more like a German car than an Italian one.
But this is not to say that numbers are all that matters. On the contrary, we a new synthesis of metrics and aesthetics. The what *and* the why are equally important.
...I'll agree with his point about many of these reports, though some of their findings can be eye-opening. How many do we really need? That is the question, and the floodgate of information can obscure the real picture.
] Beyond GDP
Numbers on their own are not meaningful unless we measure what matters.
For generations, Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has been the dominant measure of economic performance. Economic growth, productivity, and jobs were assumed to be the best way to measure well-being and happiness.
The fatal flaw with GDP as a measure of progress is that it does not take account of natural resources and ecosystems, nor of social and human capital. Both forms of capital - natural and social - are assumed in GDP to be free, and effectively limitless. Locked as it is into economic models and institutions, the GDP mindset guarantees that our economy is not sustainable.
But researchers and progressive economists have not been idle since Limits To Growth was published in 1972. After long periods of low-profile gestation, alternative systems of economic measurement are now emerging.
Thanks to today’s calamitous financial situation, the timing of their emergence may well be perfect.: As one system implodes, the architecture of a new one is ready to put in its place.
These new frameworks take into account a more complete measure of human and ecosystem wellbeing. With names like Ecological Footprint, Human Development Index, Happy Planet Index, and Genuine Savings Approach, they provide the elements of a post-GDP way of seeing, measuring and acting in the world.
... To his list of well-being measures, I'd add "Gross National Happiness" developed in recent years in the small country of Bhutan. They had a forward-thinking king (his son has since taken reigns of power) who noticed that Western notions of development executed in nearby countries (like Thailand for example) failed to bring many of the promised benefits. He wanted better for his people and devise a system to help make that happen.
and my personal favorite...
] Metrics, or aesthetics?
In his book Collapse, Jarred Diamond explains that societies fail when their elites are insulated from the negative impact of their own actions. Diamond focuses on Easter Island, where the overuse of wood products eventually destroyed its inhabitants' survival prospects.
The lesson applies equally to us, today. We are bewitched, as a culture, by a high entropy concept of quality and performance that drives us to waste astronomical amounts of energy and material resources. We lust for speed, perfection, control - but are blind to their true cost.
Big D economic development tends to view human, cultural and territorial assets - the people and ways of life that are already there - as impediments to progress and modernisation. A huge development industry measures progress in terms of economic growth, and increased consumption, and assumes without question that urbanisation and transport intensity are signs of progress. Development tends to devalue human agency and replace people with technology automation and “self service.”
One reason for our collective blindness is that so many of our collectively wasteful behaviours are hidden from view. Many heavy actions in daily life seem trivial in themselves: leaving the light on, printing out an e-mail, eating a plate of Kenyan beans. Our double-bind, until now, is that most of these wasteful behaviours have been counted as positives in the econometrics of consumption.
Our perceptions of change through time are especially weak. Our way of life is threatened by changes to our support system taking place over years and decades—but we tend not to notice changes over a few years or decades. We need new ways of looking at - and acting in - the world - a new aesthetics of sustainability so that, when we look at something like an airport we won't just perceive shapes, or performance, - but also embodied energy, or embergy.
Ever since this writer organised Doors of Perception 3 on "info eco" in 1995, our conference has repeatedly asked what would it take to monitor and measure our planet’s true condition – its vital signs - in real time. Over the years since then, we've been shown a variety of sometimes beautiful perceptual aids designed to help us understand the condition of the invisible natural systems that surround us.
Then, in Dott 07, a festival of sustainability projects in England, we ran a project called Vital Signs. It asked, “What would it mean to monitor the region’s vital signs in real time? How can we design indicators to look at ecological footprints, energy use of buildings, food miles, transport intensity, and housing density alongside traditional economic indicators? What technologies can we use to design means of benchmarking and communicating our progress?".
Our conclusion, after these and other experiences, is that we need metrics *and* aesthetics. Tomorrow’s literacies need to be process and systems literacies. Using this new sensibility, we need to design new perceptual aids to understand the state of our natural, human, and industrial systems. New kinds of sights, sounds, symbols, and experiences could tell us about how these systems work, what stimulates them, and how and why they change through time. We need to perceive the total embodied energy in everyday products. We need to sensitise ourselves whole systems and their behaviour, and to develop a positive appreciation of closed-and-coupled systems.
Aesthetics creates the need. Metrics provides the measure of change required. Design provides the means.
The transition to sustainability is not about messages, it's about activity. Most professional designers are in the representation business, so their first response has been to design a poster about sustainability, or launch a media campaign.
But emitting messages, however clever or evocative they may be, is not the same as helping real people, in real places, change an aspect of their everyday material reality. [editor's emphasis]
I'd solidly agree with the last point in bold. Actions over words is preferable, whether you're an individual, or part of a large corporation, organization, or government body. On that note, if you're looking for something you can do today to help change the world for the better, check out our Actions page.
More cool stuff on Celsias:
Needed: A Shift in Our World View
Disasters, Stuff, and What is Enough?
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