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Amazing Resource and Educational Book 2010-08-19

Reviewer: Cher Tanner

This is an amazing read. I appreciate the historical context Paul Hawken presents on social issues and how we got here while sharing his love for the earth and its people. A must have book for the enormous resource section at the end. If you care about social justice and environmental sustainability, this is the book for you. Happy Reading & for all you do, Take A Bow!

No Argument 2010-08-14

Reviewer: Chad Raymond

Hawken's book claims to demonstrate "how the largest social movement in history is restoring grace, justice and beauty to the world." He spends pages and pages listing a jumble of unconnected facts while tracing what he sees as the history of environmental awareness. Nowhere in the book is there compelling evidence that independent grassroots non-governmental organizations are more effective than states or international governmental institutions. The information used in the biographical sketches of people like Rachel Carson is freely available elsewhere -- nothing new here. I have used this book with college students as an example of how NOT to present an argument.

An In Depth Book 2010-08-14

Reviewer: Lic9995

This book was required for me to read over the summer. It seems like a good book but not for me. I am entering 10th grade and this book is classified as an 18 year old book. I did enjoy that it was a moderately short book. The book has a lot of information that could be easliy found and summed up in another book. It deffinately requires a dictonary and glasses. Each page is fulled with names, buisnesses, quotes, numbers for footnote to be found in the second half of the book(the appendix), and sentences so detailed i forgot what I was reading about.

It might just be my age and knowledge, but when I'm older and more knowledgable, I don't think I will be picking up this book.

A needed antidote to despair 2010-06-19

Reviewer: John D. Croft

Paul Hawken wrote of the epigram, when one sees the evidence of what is happening in the world one cannot but be a pessimist, when one sees what actions people are trying to take one cannot help being an optimist. One could add that the difference between an optimist and a pessimist, is that the optimist believes we live in the best of all possible worlds, whilst the pessimist is someone who is affraid the optimist may be right. This book aims to bring a degree of balance to both views.

With the failure of the Earth Summit in Johannesburg, the Doha Round of the World Trade Organisation, the Jubilee aquittal of Third World debt and most recently, the failure of the Copenhagen Climate Summit we see the same pattern emerging. In each case, the nations of the world are trying to solve our problems using the same institutions of competing nation states and multinational corporations that created the problems in the first place. As Einstein remarked, you cannot solve a problem with the same thinking as that which created the problem in the first place, yet that is what we are trying to do.

Even worse, governments are saying they cannot institute the kind of regulatory frameworks we need until they get a political mandate. Corporations are saying they cannot make the kinds of sustainable products we need until they get a large enough market. Both are looking at the community to make the move, yet the community, misled by the media, are waiting for the government and the economic corporations to make the move. This creates a vicious cycle of blame and inaction.

And yet many in the community are moving. Hawken's excellent book shows how civil society, based upon the intersection of social, environmental and indigenous programs are encouraging a majpor realignment in how our communities are responding to the biggest issues of the day. This book also gives the background history of this movement, going all the way back to the Abolitionists of the 18th century, rising through the civil rights and environmental movements of the 20th.

When a caterpillar turns into a butterfly, imaginal cells form which activate the caterpillar's own immune system to begin to dissolve the tissues of the caterpillar within its cocoon. These cells then form networks and act as the basis upon which a newe creature is born, a creature which hatches eventually as the butterfly. Hawken suggests that this "movement" is part of the immune system of the planet, and although he suggests that it is unknown whether the movement is strong enought and large enough to take the actions we need, it does offer a basis of hope.

His appendix of movement groups by itslef is worth the purchase of this book.

Like many, Hawken is effected by the gathering dark, by the failures of our governments and industries to undertake the reforms he has been advocating since he first published The Ecology of Commerce: A Declaration of Sustainability. Perhaps the growth of the social entrepreneurial movements in first second and third world communities, and amongst the dispossessed fourth world, can make a difference. Whatever is the case we must work to make it so.

A Fulfilling Read 2009-09-10

Reviewer: John R. White

Paul Hawken did everyone a favor in writing this book. It is very comprehensive and insightful, and the picture of the transformation of society it paints in very inspiring and hopeful. I have recommended it to several friends, and given it as gifts.
JW