Change Strategy

• Given the urgency, don't we have to work through the existing institutions?-

  True. We have very little time. We must act immediately to do what we can to reduce carbon emissions using the kinds of economic incentives that motivate the existing system. At the same time, we must be clear that a system driven solely by financial incentives is incapable of taking us where we need ultimately to go. Here is the larger picture in brief outline.

• No one gives up power voluntarily. Isn't violence inevitable?-

  Although we who live in privileged enclaves may not be aware of it, the world is already awash in violence. It ranges from the highly organized state sponsored violence of the U.S. occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan to the loosely organized violence of global terrorist networks and local street gangs. It includes as well domestic violence, street crime, and police brutality. All these many forms of violence are born of the fear, helplessness and alientation of a world in which a growing population competes to survive on a shrinking base of real resources in the face of extreme inequality.

• What about corporate control of media?-

  The corporate media are a powerful distorting force at the core of much of modern social dysfunction. They are, however, at a disadvantage. The lies that deny our humanity and misdirect our life energies must be constantly repeated. The truth has a far greater staying power because it aligns with our deeper experience and values, liberates us from the cultural trance, and builds our immunity to cultural manipulation.

• Don't the institutions of Empire hold all the power?-

  As powerful as they may seem, the institutions of Empire have only the power that we the people choose to yield to them. Although Empire has ruled for 5,000 years, our time is distinctive, because it brings both the imperative and the opportunity for people to make a collective choice to withhold their power from the institutions of Empire and redirect it to the work of bringing forth the new cultures and institutions of Earth Community. The imperative comes from the human confrontation with environmental limits.