We have an economy that tells us it is cheaper to destroy earth in real time rather than renew, restore, and sustain it. You can print money to bail out a bank but you can’t print life to bail out a planet.
The first rule of sustainability is to align with natural forces, or at least not try to defy them.
Business is the only mechanism on the planet today powerful enough to produce the changes necessary to reverse global environments and social degradation.
The most unrealistic person in the world is the cynic, not the dreamer.
Don’t be put off by people who know what is not possible. Do what needs to be done, and check to see if it was impossible only after you are done.
We are losing our living systems, social systems, cultural systems, governing systems, stability, and our constitutional health, and we’re surrendering it all at the same time.
Being a good human being is good business.
We can no longer prosper by increasing human productivity. The more we try to do, the more poverty we will create.
A local company has more accountability.
Working for the earth is not a way to get rich, it is a way to be rich.
The future belongs to those who understand that doing more with less is compassionate, prosperous, and enduring, and thus more intelligent, even competitive.
We subsidize the disposal of waste in all its myriad forms from landfills to Superfund cleanups, from deep-well injection to storage of nuclear waste. In the process, we encourage an economy where 80 percent of what we consume gets thrown away after one use.
The bottom line is down where it belongs – at the bottom.
You are Brilliant and the Earth is Hiring.
Wrong is an addictive, repetitive story; Right is where the movement is.
Most floods are caused by man, not weather; deforestation, levee construction, erosion, and overgrazing all result in the loss of ecosystem services.
Capitalism, as practiced, is a financially profitable, non-sustainable aberration in human development.
Don’t go to business school.
The promise of business is to increase the general well-being of humankind through service, a creative invention and ethical philosophy.
And also, more and more businesses really want to do the right thing. They feel better about themselves, their workers feel better, and so do their customers. I think this is equally true in the transnational corporations, but it is harder to express in those situations.