During this election year it is important to recognize that corporations pretty much run the world. Despite the outcome of the elections, they will continue to do so — at least until we organize and change the rules that have created the dominant neoliberal system.

We all support corporations. We buy from them, work for them, manage them, invest in them, and help them with our tax dollars. We have to ask ourselves — and answer — the following questions:

Question 1: Do we want to support companies that maximize short-term profits if that means causing the oceans to rise, destroying rainforests and other vital resources — in essence destroying the resources that support our economy?

The obvious answer: No.

But that is exactly what’s happening today. We’ve created a cannibalistic economy that is consuming itself — and us — into extinction. Paul Levy, the author of Dispelling Wetiko: Breaking the Curse of Evil, calls it the “Wetikonomy”: a reference to wetiko, an Algonquin word for cannibalism that was used specifically to describe the European colonialists and their destructive way of interacting with the world. The consequence of the corporate-led global economy is to destroy life in a perpetual quest to grow GDP.

Question 2: Change what?

What can we learn from the American Revolution? In 1773, most colonists believed the British were invincible. But George Washington recalled the Battle of the Monongahela during the French and Indian war, about 20 years earlier, when he had seen a huge British army badly defeated by a handful of Indians. “No, they are not invincible,” he said. “We just need to hide behind trees.”

We must change the story and the rules.

We are at such a time now.

When Milton Friedman won the Nobel Prize in Economics, he promoted the current story: “the only responsibility of business is to maximize profits, regardless of the social and environmental costs.” The rules governing business ever since reflect that story. That was in 1976, a time when financial capital was considered in short supply and nature abundant. No one was talking about peak oil or climate change. But that is no longer true. The situation has changed. The story and the rules must also change.

Question 3: What is the new story?

I was taught in pre-1976 business school that corporations should be good citizens, should serve a public interest, in addition to paying a decent rate of return to investors. They should give employees health care insurance, retirement pensions, job security, pay taxes, and support public service institutions, like schools and recreational facilities.

The acceptance of Friedman’s logic, the Reagan/Thatcher (counter)revolution, the hijacking of academia and the economics profession, the absurd concentrations of wealth and power among a tiny elite, and many other events have led to a new dominant moral and economic order called neoliberalism. We must now create a new story, one that states that the responsibility of business is to serve the public, to be good citizens, to contribute to our shared commons, and to create a regenerative economy rather than a cannibalizing one.

It is essential to recognize that the old story and rules have resulted in a dysfunctional system, a global failure on an unimaginable scale. We are in the midst of the 6th great extinction on this planet, and the first to be created by a single species. We need to build an economic system that is regenerative — that is itself a renewable resource — instead of one that is consuming itself into extinction.

We need new rules, regulations and laws that support ideas and processes that clean up pollution, that internalize the so-called ‘externalities’ of doing business, that regenerate destroyed environments, and that develop technologies for new, more efficient energy, communications, transportation and other systems.

Question 4: What can you do?

There are no simple answers to this question because so much depends on your context, your life path, your particular set of privileges and desires.

One place where we all can start is to look for and shine a light on the story behind the story. One of the things I learned through the process that eventually resulted in my book, The New Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, is that there are almost always stories behind the “official” story.

Recent incidents, such as WikiLeaks and the Snowden/NSA files, and great investigative reporting from Pulitzer Prize-winning ProPublica and the committee of journalists who published the Panama Papers, have exposed corrupt politicians and tax-evading billionaires.

Democracy depends on spreading information, on transparency and a healthy dose of skepticism. It demands that we question our leaders, government policies, and the ingrained logic of our cultural, political and economic operating systems. In order to create a less destructive world, we have to first be able to see the cannibalistic tendencies rooted in selfish consumption (wetiko) in our culture, in our community, and indeed, in ourselves.

The second aspect of what you can do is to create local, individual, and collective power to demand political change. Most change gets implemented on local levels — and it all starts with an individual or group of individuals. Social media has increased the power of each and every one of us in powerful ways.

Recently, a small group of activists and bloggers in Vermont, a state with less than 0.2 percent of the US population, got a law passed forcing corporations to label GMOs. As a result, some of the biggest food producers in the country — Kellogg’s, General Mills, Campbell’s Soup, Mars, and ConAgra — committed to the national labeling of GMOs.

The power of community organizing ended apartheid, gave women and Black people voting and civil rights, has ensured that corporations clean up polluted rivers, and almost brought an obscure Vermont senator and proclaimed socialist into the White House (and in the process deeply influenced the Democratic Party). The list of successes is endless.

Through joining and supporting social movements, we will inspire government to pass laws that will create a regenerative economy.

We have to demand that corporations serve a public interest. Corporations run the world and they depend on you. CEOs receive monthly summaries about email, Facebook and Twitter messages that come to their offices. They know they have to listen to their customers.

Pick a corporation you want to change. Start a social networking campaign: “I love your products but I won’t buy them any more until you pay your workers a living wage, clean up the pollution you caused, pay your taxes, and create transparency in your operations.” Send it to all your social networking circles and ask them to send it to theirs.

You are living at a watershed moment in history. This presidential campaign has, above all else, shown the power elites that we understand that the system is broken. Now we must change the story and the rules, and do it in time for civilizational and planetary regeneration.

John Perkins is the author of The New York Times bestseller Confessions of an Economic Hitman and, most recently, Hoodwinked: An Economic Hitman Reveals Why the World Financial Markets Imploded and What We Need to Do to Remake Them. Perkins just recently published The New Confessions of an Economic Hit Man.

Originally published on truthout.org

Photo by Jack Zalium

The post Seeing Wetiko: We Must Reject Economic Cannibalism appeared first on P2P Foundation.

Below we present a short review and a excerpt from the author:

1. Virginia Coyle’s review:

“Living in a text-message culture, Designing Regenerative Cultures is another kind of text message, an essential textbook for our times, filled with resources, references, practices, methods and pathways, and best of all questions we can each live into, alone and together. Our world has benefited from the contributions of many authors and visionaries, grassroots activists and social entrepreneurs, modern scientists and wise indigenous elders…. ancient and modern intelligence and creativity. And yet, the single-hero journey of brilliant ones can only carry us so far. Today there is a a deep need and longing for a local and global community of care on all levels in all disciplines. Daniel Wahl takes us there in this comprehensive ‘manifesto’, offering a wholistic picture of a way and a world we can be for, in lieu of the one that seems so headed for destruction. In Designing Regenerative Cultures, Daniel weaves an ‘old/new’ story helping and I suspect activating, readers to see, respect, learn from and go beyond, as he so clearly has, the great hearts and minds he references throughout. The book contributes to this awakening field as we find ourselves looking through a kaleidoscope of perspectives and teachings – different lenses moving in a spiral together through which to both view and live in our world. It can serve as a foundation for another ‘great turn’, a directory for next steps worth taking. Many will find inspiration and support to live the way we know we must, to live in the way we know we can if our species is not only to survive, but actually thrive in partnership with all of life.” (http://www.triarchypress.net/reviews-designing-regenerative-cultures.html)

2. An excerpt from Daniel Wahl:

“To move from a zero-sum culture (win-loose) to a non-zero-sum culture (win-win) necessitates widespread collaboration in assuring that nature also wins (win-win-win) and wins first, as she is the provider of the abundance upon which we depend. Only if we collaborate in creating a healthier, diverse, vibrant and bio-productive planet, will we be able to create regenerative cultures where nobody is left behind and everyone wins.

Win-win-win cultures ensure that life can continue to evolve towards increasing diversity, complexity, bio-productivity, and resilience. We can think of the three wins of regenerative cultures as individual, collective and planetary wins created through systemic solutions that nurture social, ecological and economic health and wellbeing.

Humanity is beginning to explore the fertile ground of creating win-win-win solutions that drive cultural, ecological and economic regeneration. Innovating win-win-win, integrative, whole-systems design solutions is about creating shared abundance through collaborative advantage. Such innovations generate ecological, social and economic benefits by optimizing the system as a whole, rather than maximizing short-term economic gains for a few to the economic, social and ecological detriment of many.

Climate change is only one of the converging crises requiring a globally coordinated response that is nothing short of civilizational transformation. Humanity is facing unprecedented challenges and unparalleled opportunities. ‘Business as usual’ is no longer an option. Change and transformation is inevitable.

Humanity is facing important questions: will we be able to steer creatively through this period of cultural transformation? Will we manage to co-create a life-sustaining and regenerative human civilization expressed in a vibrant diversity of locally adapted and globally collaborative cultures? The answers to these questions will remain unknowable for decades, yet they will define the future of humanity and the future of life on Earth. Yes, we need answers and we need to keep experimenting with possible solutions. Both are excellent ways to help us learn from our mistakes and ask better questions. Nevertheless many of the questions and solutions we are working on are based on erroneous assumptions about our real priorities and true needs. We would do well to follow Einstein’s advice and spend more time making sure we are getting the questions right before we rush into offering solutions that will only prolong business as usual, or patch up the symptoms of a system that is based on erroneous assumptions and will continue to fail until we initiate deeper changes by asking deeper questions.”

Photo by christianreimer

The post Book of the Day: Designing Regenerative Cultures appeared first on P2P Foundation.