Systems Thinking: Earth Partnership Technologies
Those who fight environmental regulations and continue to support rampant over-consumption claim that all that is needed to solve our problems are new and better technologies. But environmental degradation and injustice are often actually the result of these kinds of "solutions."
The earth itself is our primary economy. A new systems awareness that values the earth and recognizes that we are all interconnected is needed in every institution: family, economics, education, politics, healthcare, and religion. Awareness of a working Partnership orientation will transform our culture's criteria of what is valued, resulting in a gradual shift toward laws that protect our environment, renewable resource funding and development, and food-growing and manufacturing processes that avoid waste and pollution.
A History of Domination
The underlying issue is the Domination culture in which our industrial technologies developed. Over-consumption is inherent in domination-oriented societies where consumption is a symbol of power and control is a substitute for emotional and spiritual fulfillment. If we believe in the Domination ethos of "man's conquest of nature," or a "resource/use mentality", we will continue to do irreparable harm. If we create regenerative Partnership relationships with nature, technology could vastly improve our lives and the capacity of the earth to heal and re-balance its systems.
"We are all part of an exquisitely interwoven web of life that is part of a resurging partnership consciousness. Deep inside we all carry this consciousness, it lies behind the profound connection many of us feel with nature." - Riane Eisler, The Power of Partnership
Economic Rules
Our present economic system depends on fossil-fuel resources that are terminal. It is a system caught in a cycle of over-consumption and despoliation. As long as businesses do not include in the cost of manufacturing that economists call "externalities" — such as the cost to our environment, caused by damaging industrial processes — we cannot curtail activities that pollute or exacerbate climate change.
We need economic policies that support Partnership relations and the implementation of climate agreements. We must support environmentally responsible corporate charters, international treaties that include diverse and indigenous voices and protect ecological integrity, and new economic rules that accord value to the work of caring for the earth. We need economic policies that care for people and planet.
CPS's Social Wealth Index (SWI) is working to create measurable indicators that uphold climate agreements. Both the SWI and the Partnerism Movement are part of a caring economy that ensures a more resilient and equitable economy.
