The Earth Without People

The environmental debate over global warming is generally couched in terms of saving the planet which does not seem to be instigating a mass shift in consciousness among the inhabitants of Earth. Perhaps a better dialectical approach would be to speak of global warming in terms of saving humanity (from) itself.

The Earth will survive with or without us. If we, as a species, were to die out tomorrow Earth would simply continue along its merry way reclaiming the land. Remaining species of all kinds would adopt the new paradigm, reestablish relationships without humans and inhabit the landscape on their own terms – not ours.

What will it take to snap humanity out of its stupor? Is it necessary to be faced with imminent disaster to spur collective action? I don’t believe this is the case. Rather, what needs to occur is a reframing of the discourse by (and this is not an exhaustive list) scientists, world leaders and their political cadre, the media, institutions of learning beginning in primary school and within civil society.

There are signs that this process is beginning with the emergence of programs like the Transition Initiative (launched in the U.K. and picking up steam across the globe). Locally, a new social movement, Seattle Innovators, is gathering like-minded individuals who possess a wide range of talents and abilities. Here are their core tenants:

Our Idea

Climate change is a wake-up call to a system in decline, and the future of Puget Sound – our economic structures, government policies, and culture – will be determined by how we deal with this challenge. Addressing climate change means fundamentally re-thinking many of the big questions of civilization: where we live, how we move, what we eat, what really makes us happy. The greatest opportunities for economic development will be to create regional hubs of innovation focused on developing new approaches to these widely-shared questions.

Key Structure

The primary objective of this project is to provide a platform for collaboration that unleashes the creative potential of Seattle’s innovation scene in a sustained manner. Working across sectors, we must pool our talents in a way that leads to high levels of economic productivity for the region.

The Dynamic Triangle

The Seattle Innovators project itself is a playground for innovative design. We are actively developing a process that combines three essential functional elements:

Communities of Varied Expertise
Tool Building for Cross-Sector Collaboration
Knowledge Capture for Iterative Learning

It begins with a set of activities that bring people together. These “innovation socials” come in many forms – happy hour gatherings, open space conferences, evening salons, and design sessions – all of which bring together people with diverse perspectives around provocative themes that stimulate creativity.

These events provide the “social glue” for sustained effort among this ever-growing community of world-changers. Through the myriad conversations and interactions, opportunities appear to tackle chronic challenges and promote high-leverage positive outcomes.

Ultimately, we want to create action. This is done through a set of “innovation creations” of the Seattle Innovators’ CrowdSource Collective – a dynamic community of experts who come together as design teams, tool builders, and project teams that create together the capacities that aren’t possible on their own.

Projects are identified through the web of social activities and implemented either by internal development (e.g. a project team arises to pool human and financial capital for strategic action) or external request (e.g. we are approached by a client seeking special tools that the collective is uniquely situated to build).

All the while, knowledge is captured for “researching the innovation ecosystem” in the form of case studies, best practices, prototyping new models, and mapping efforts. Insights from these resources are fed back into the process to stimulate continued learning and improvement.

Our success depends on the talents and networks of many communities – including business, research institutions, finance, government, and media. We welcome strategists, visionaries, implementers, researchers, and technology evangelists.

There are some glaring omissions in this list. I see no representation being sought from individuals from low-income population groups. There is no mention of building bridges with Native Americans for the purpose of accessing Traditional Environmental Knowledge, or for linking up with Environmental Justice activists who are in the trenches and familiar with fundamental stumbling blocks for change – particularly with respect to the biggest resisters of all – big business and government.

There is also no mention of inviting or tapping into migrant communities in the Seattle area. Not only is there a substantial population of Hispanics, there is also a sizable population of individuals from Africa which is immediately accessible through the Southern Sudanese Community of Washington. There are visionaries and implementers within these groups and to not access their wealth of knowledge and manpower leads to a waste of creativity, talent and Traditional Environmental Knowledge.

Seattle Innovators are also neglecting groups sprouting up in the Pacific Northwest through the Transition Initiative, which is a grassroots community-based movement that should be hooked into and cultivated in order to harness a wider audience of like-minded innovators.

Barring existing omissions, Seattle Innovators demonstrates that there is a burgeoning awareness of the need to save humanity from itself and from the contrary impact of globalization on regional capacity and by extension resiliency.