How to thrive in the next economy - designing tomorrow's s world today

So heißt das neue Buch von John Thackara, das im September 2015 herauskommen wird.

Is there no escape from an economy that devours nature in the name of endless growth? John Thackara’s answer is a rousing ‘yes, there is!’ Drawing on a lifetime of travel in search of real-world alternatives that work, he describes in this book how communities the world over are creating a replacement economy from the ground up. Each chapter is devoted to the creative ways people in diverse contexts tackle timeless needs: restoring the land, sharing water, making homes, journeying, growing food, designing clothes, caring for each other. From Bali to Brazil, as well as Delhi, London, and California, Thackara writes of soil restorers and river keepers, seed savers and depavers, cloud commuters and e-bike couriers, care farmers, food system curators, fibershed stewards, money designers and more.

Read together, these encounters add up to a joyful new story about what an economy is actually for. In place of an obsession with stuff, money, and endless growth, this book describes social practices that cherish all-of-life, not just human life. Growth, in this new economy, means soils, biodiversity and watersheds getting healthier, and communities more resilient. Its core values are stewardship and health, in place of extraction and decay.
Thackara is inspired, too, by the ways artists in different cultures open our eyes to different ways of looking at - and acting in - the world. Seen through this new lens, the health of living systems, not money, is the ultimate measure of wealth, and work is a natural way to thrive, not just survive. These quiet but widespread changes are signals of reconnection, says Thackara - with each other, and with our local ecology. Marveling at the power of small actions to transform the bigger picture, he concludes that a great transition is under way. It’s the end of one civilization – but the birth of another.

John Thackara is a globally acclaimed technology visionary and design/innovation guru, John Thackara is Director of ‘Doors of Perception’, an international conference and knowledge network that sets new agendas for design, in particular for information and communication technologies.