The world-wide spread of extremely resource-intensive lifestyles and economic practices has become one of the most important challenges we face.

There is an increased awareness of human impact on the environment, however, the rate of environmental degradation is still on the rise.

Although many people are uncomfortable with the way things are, they are not motivated to act on their beliefs because they see no other way.

The environmental discourse is still confined to a relatively small minority
of elites and ‘experts’, and it remains incredibly top-down but there are no experts as we are all dancing on the edge of acceptable risk.

Is economic growth making us happier?

What type of change is possible?

By addressing things such as human well-being and the meeting of the needs in environmentally in a sound way, the discourse brings economy down to the grass root level of everyday life.

It enables us to ask questions such as:

How do we change the present day short-shortsightedness which is the source of most modern environmental and economic problems?

Messages of environmental risk should be effective in relaying seriousness and immediacy, but arguably, they are also in danger of breeding hopelessness and fatalism. Although many people are uncomfortable with the way things are, they are not motivated to act on their beliefs because they see no other way.

This is tragic because the way in which we perceive the future has a significant influence on the choices we make.

It affects our values, attitudes, coping mechanisms, expectations feelings, motivations and behaviors. The very act of articulating a future presents a tendency and inclination, which increases its likeliness of occurrence.

Could it therefore be possible to produce a set of different outcomes by providing engaging, lucid and optimistic alternative ecological future narratives?

I have posted many posts on the Subject but let’s try an other approach.

Suggest an inexpensive tool that could make a difference.  

Sufficient living questions the connection made between growth and quality of life.

The last time climate change happened was approximately 55 million years ago and it took 1000 years to recover from the level of elevated carbon after the extinction of dinosaurs.

Imagine a world without pollution and waste: Products are made from materials that are beneficial for humans and their surroundings. Imagine a world where humans can be glad that their actions benefit those around them.

It seems that people are not good at providing (quasi) exact statements of the future, but they can be better in stating whether the past trend will change and in which direction.

Over a hundred species are still becoming extinct everyday.  One and a half acres of rain forest is still disappearing every second.

These problems are link to a lack of ideas concerning how to deal with environmental problems and the future of our society.

It is always useful to conceive futures in a generational paradigm, because we find it easier to think of futures in terms of our children and grandchildren’s lifetimes. The decisions we make in the next 20 years will determine the fate of the earth and human civilization for centuries to come.

In this context, online news gives a quick overview on what is happening in the world and the use of the Internet as information source has become an inherent part of everyday life  leading to a sort of “big brother feeling” of being observed.

Unfortunately, most of our ecological future narratives are ambiguous or inherently pessimistic.

For instance, one of the most popularized means of living within nature are ‘sustainable futures. However this vision lacks clarity or a consensus over what it means to live ‘sustainably’. Moreover, a proliferation of ‘sustainability’ definitions leave some to regard it as a landfill dump for everyone’s environmental and social wish list.

In a sense of powerlessness. people perceive the environment to be a single totalising entity that is ‘out there,’ enabling them to remain emotionally distant, despondent and in a state of resignation.

High levels of non-engagement are further exacerbated by the lack of faith in the institutions tasked with combating the problems. People are choosing not to dwell on ecological problems by using reflexive strategies of non-engagement with global issues including the future.

The apparent lack of desirable alternatives is highly dangerous.

Could it therefore be possible to produce a set of different outcomes by providing engaging, lucid and optimistic alternative ecological future narratives?

In other words, if governments continue to think in four-year election cycles, businesses work from one financial year to the next and stock markets re-start everyday there is no hope of achieving anything.

When imagining futures, we also need to invent time for change.

What is needed is long-term thinking that reconciles itself to a planet that is 4.6 billion years old?

We support in the capacity to imagine and articulate preferred outcomes, which in turn mobilise action and creates an opportunity for the visions to embed themselves as possibilities in reality.  As opposed to the current approach of endlessly treating symptoms of a much deeper problem that is both out of sight and out of control.

Each and every individual needs to be actively (and creatively) involved by, possibly, visualising, spreading and implementing ideas of alternative societal models. We need a method that enables us to think beyond existing societal models.

While Industrial welfare state mainly defends business-as-usual change can only be achieved in the world to-day by what I call,

– An Universal Electronic Voice that demands change –
# UEV- Universal Electronic Voice.
When we want to enable consumers to execute truly effective change it is central to empower them to understand their role as important actors in the field.

This is beyond governments, and our present day world institutions.

Governments:  Because before they can mend a road there is an other government.  Institutions:  Because they have turned into gossip shops with no funds, run by the market.

We need to re-define what it meant by people power.

A unified electronic voice will do just that resulting in a movement that unified our cohesive efforts. That will enable the ‘democratisation’ of modern environmentalism that are fixated on finding solutions to one that imagines entirely new possibilities

The debate over climate change and whether it is being influenced by man’s activity has ceased. The prevailing view is that climate change is real and that it is influenced by human activity. The link between rising consumption and climate change is becoming clear and opposition to consumerism is growing.

Images of the future in which the Universal E Voice should be used as tools for making images become part of reality, it can be used to direct actions and decision-making.

Of course none of the above has any hope of becoming a reality unless we tap into the world of greed.

This can only be done by a collective demand to place a world aid commission of 0.05% on all High Frequency trading, Sovereign wealth funds acquisitions and foreign exchange transactions over $20.000, creating a perpetual funded fund. ( see previous posts)

As such UEV(universal electronic voice) does not describe the actions needed to achieve the described future however it would be the first step in the right direction to be heard.  We all know timescales are the best until after the critical period is over and we have the benefit of hindsight.

Now it the time to combine all of those how are Whining on the Internet and Social Media into one voice.

With the rather elusive and volatile character of the Internet creating a focus point for the over strain user of the Net when it comes to selecting individually important and relevant information to establish a collection pool offering one voice has many difficulties to over come.

Perhaps # UEV- Universal Electronic Voice might to the trick.

I am all ears to any suggestions.

The mere fact that more of these devices are constantly introduced to the market and the ways in which they are advertised show that yet again a different perception of the future.

This is only the top of the iceberg.

What more ecologically benign consumption and production patterns would mean in practice? is another question to be discussed.

And to what extent it is fruitful to talk about economy beyond the social? Is another in dire need of serious discussion.