Jeffrey Sachs gives this years Reith Lecture to the Royal Society (Broadcast on Radio 4 and BBC 2)

Columbia University economist Jeff Sachs gives the first in this years Reith lecture series, entitled "Bursting at the seams" Sachs is truly an insperation. A great lecture and I don't think that he strays far from my views on anything throughout this first lecture of the series. With talks like this one we are left to wonder, couldn't somone like Jeff ever be president of the US? He certainly represents America well.


Todays lecture and futher episodes will be available here both as streaming audio and as mp3 files.

Sachs speaks of the true challenges that we face today, challenges that are not 'us Vs them' but 'us together for a common challenge' these are the challenges that are currently so poorly delt with.

Species loss, destruction of fisheries, fighting climate change, providing health care and basic facilities for the poorest billion people on the planet. Sachs is a radical, he believes that we can, and that we must deal with the roots of problems not the manifestations of these problems.

Technology has advanced hugely, the economy is stronger than ever, we can achieve huge changes with relatively little effort, we need to evolve the international institutions in order to enable a more reasoned and less reactive mode of international relations.

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