A preview of the unpublished book A CIVILIZATION WITHOUT A VISION WILL PERISH: AN INDEPENDENT SEARCH FOR THE TRUTH by David Willis
LESSONS LEARNED BY THE AUTHOR (Part 14)
A BUSINESS PLAN FOR SUSTAINABLE LIVING
Ian Chambers and John Humble opened Developing A Plan for the Planet: A Business Plan for Sustainable Living, published in 2011, with this dedication: “This book is dedicated to the millions of people who live in poverty, without access to education, clean water, health facilities or employment and who have no voice of their own,” and follows it with a quote from William S. Burroughs: “If a visitor were to arrive from outer space and looked at planet earth, their immediate request would be to ask to see the manager.”
The major advances our civilization has made
The authors continue: “Let us just imagine for a moment that we did receive a visitor from outer space and after a brief look at the state of our planet, they did ask to see the manager! What would our response be? We could imagine taking them to one of our global organizations such as the United Nations where we would probably highlight the major advances our civilization has made over the last 10,000 years – from hunter gatherers, to the wonders of modern science, medicine, communications and technology. However, our visitor would not be totally satisfied with this overview and we could expect him to ask a few telling questions about what is not working so well on Planet Earth.”
A few telling questions
“Questions about climate change, energy resources, food and water, global health, unsustainable population growth and the well-being of other species on the planet. At this point we would probably have to admit that we as a human race are facing some of the most challenging issues we have encountered as a civilization – all converging at the same time and with many needing to be addressed in the next decade if we are to be successful in dealing with them. We could imagine our visitor nodding understandingly and explaining that every planet faces challenges as it progresses. However the successful planets develop an overall plan on how to address the issues in a coordinated way and then work together to tackle them.”
Our interplanetary visitor would ask to see our ‘overall plan’
“At this point we know what the next question will be. Our interplanetary visitor would ask to see our ‘overall plan’ on how we are dealing with these challenges we are facing. How we are coordinating our efforts on a global scale? How we are working together to tackle these issues? We have to admit that we have no overall global plan to address these issues. We realize that the human race and Planet Earth are facing some of the most challenging issues in the history of our civilization, yet we have no overall, coordinated global plan on how to deal with them.”
We are the managers
“If this was a business, then our interplanetary visitor would probably suggest politely that we ‘change the management’ and appoint a new management team who can quickly develop and implement a plan to address these global challenges. The reality is that there are no other managers to appoint – we are ‘the managers’. Everyday, in everything we do, we all manage a part of the ‘business’ called Planet Earth. The reality is that it is up to each of us to make a difference in the areas we can impact. To be effective, this can only be done in a coordinated way. The time for talking is over. The time for coordinated action is now. We need a plan that can be implemented at national, business, community and individual levels. We have developed this Plan for the Planet as a starting point to demonstrate that using global business planning principles we can build a plan to achieve a sustainable world.”
We can build a sustainable future for all future generations
“If we commit ourselves to using known solutions and best practices, leverage our ability to innovate and adapt, and work together to implement these capabilities in a coordinated and cooperative manner, we can build a sustainable future – not only for our generation, but for all future generations.”