Backcasting from long-term desired visions (that are based upon new paradigms) transcends current paradigms and imagines new ones. Backcasting brings the new paradigms into the present and asks what are steps toward these new ways of living, working, playing etc. Backcasting is concerned not with what futures are likely to manifest (forecasting) bu... See more
“We live in a world shaped by stories. Stories are the threads of our lives and the fabric of human cultures. A story can unite or divide people(s), obscure issues, or spotlight new perspectives. A story can inform or deceive, enlighten or entertain, or even do all of the above. Those who do not have power over the story that dominates their lives,... See more
in a 1978 paper, sociologist Elise Boulding argued that society was suffering from a type of “temporal exhaustion in which...one is mentally out of breath all the time from dealing with the present, there is no energy left for imaging the future.” And, little time left to reflect upon and understand the past.
The term ‘the commons’ has been increasingly used to refer not just to “things” or “assets” (as Silke Helfrich puts its) but more broadly to the “social practices of commoning, acting together, based on principles of sharing, stewarding and producing in common” .
Our culture is really doing a ten out of ten job in caring in the worst possible ways. There is no infrastructure to support parents of caregivers, so care makes you poor and exhausts you. (Solution: Pay caregivers! Universal and affordable childcare and eldercare!) Parenting has become more instrumental than it used to be: kids are a project, anot... See more
Social capital, defined by Putnam, is the “connections among individuals — social networks and the norms of reciprocity and trustworthiness that arise from them.”
This new, emerging paradigm emphasizes empathy, relationship, participation and self-organization, calls for new mindsets and postures of openness, speculation, mindfulness and a willingness to collaborate.