Bursting At The Seams

Jeff Sachs is an eloquent speaker, he makes a compelling case for the need for sustainable development. In my favourite book on sustainable development that I have yet read, Jonathon Porritt makes the case that Capitalism As If The World Matters is a possibility... In this series of lectures Sachs shows vividly that we have no choice.

The speaches bellow are taken from the bbc Reith Lecutures website where they are avilable for streaming.


Lecture 1: Bursting at the Seams (MP3)

The 21st century will be marked by severe natural resource limits, the rise of new economic powers and the threats of failed states. These are tectonic changes with the potential to unleash global-scale upheavals. Global cooperation of an unprecedented depth and scale will be needed but we are not yet prepared for such cooperation.


Lecture 2: Survival in the Anthropocene (MP3)

The biggest challenges that we face - climate change, alleviation of hunger, water stress, energy - are translated in the shadow of ignorance into "us versus them" problems, with only the weakest links to underlying scientific principles and technological options.


Lecture 3: The Great Convergence (MP3)

Power and America have seemed synonymous for the last fifty years. No longer. Power in the 21st Century is shifting to the East: to India and above all to China. Facing up to the end of centuries of North Atlantic dominance - first Europe then the U.S. - will pose huge challenges.

Lecture 4: Economic Solidarity for a Crowded Planet (MP3)

This lecture considers the challenges of extreme poverty and the extreme worry of the rest of the world which fears for its own prosperity. It spells out the limits of the free market to solve these problems and proposes a plan of action which presents choices to those listening.


Lecture 5: Global Politics in a Complex Age. (MP3)

The key political novelty of our age is mass political awareness and mobilization. Mass mobilization has brought the Age of Empire to an end, and accounts for the failures in Iraq. No society any longer tolerates being ruled by another. Social mobilization can be a dramatic force for positive change.

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