By Anthony D. Cortese
~President, Second Nature~
Today we come together to celebrate the life and work of one of the greatest people I have ever met–Donella (Dana) Meadows.
The thought of the world without one of the brightest, most thoughtful, insightful, caring souls who truly lived the values she espoused is almost unbearable. Dana was a great visionary in a culture that is often lacking in vision. She was the first of the great systems thinkers that have helped us all see the world in a holistic and interdependent way, a great teacher, an outstanding mentor to thousands of people (including me) and a gifted communicator. In her own words, she was also “an opinionated columnist, opera lover, baker, farmer and global gadfly”.
She was best known to the world as the lead author of the international best selling book The Limits to Growth, published in 1972. The book, which reported on a study of long-term global trends in population, economics, and the environment, sold 9 million of copies and was translated into 28 languages. She was also the lead author of the twenty-year follow-up study, Beyond the Limits (1992), with original co-authors Dennis Meadows and Jørgen Randers. This groundbreaking work is one of the most important, misunderstood and misquoted books on the future of society and our environment since Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring. Limits to Growth and Beyond the Limits reached three main conclusions: one of danger, one of hope, and one of urgency. The press and many others in the scientific, policy and industrial communities picked up on only the first and third of the conclusions and tried to debunk it its conclusions, much like the reaction to Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring in 1962. Ironically, the recent IPCC reports on global climate change completely support the two books’ conclusions!
Dana used her brilliance, talents and many other wonderful attributes to benefit all people and the rest of the natural world. Dana was always one step ahead of everyone in anticipating or seeing the next challenge humans and the rest of the natural world would face and offering creative strategies to deal with them. In 1981, together with her former husband Dennis Meadows, she founded the International Network of Resource Information Centers (INRIC), also called the Balaton Group (after the lake in Hungary where the group meets annually). The group built early and critical avenues of exchange between scientists on both sides of the Iron Curtain at the height of the Cold War.
She spoke truth to power–she never shied away from calling governments, industries, environmentalists, journalists and others to task for policies, behaviors or actions that were unjust, harmful, ineffective or just plain dumb. She never let people who read her weekly syndicated newspaper column, “The Global Citizen”, people she interacted with in other ways or her students get away with denial of things that have been wrong in the world. And Dana did it in a way that made you stop, think and be willing to look yourself in the face and see the truth or to take action to right a wrong. I anxiously awaited her column every Thursday–it was just what I needed to keep up the passion and insight to work for a better world. She was highly principled, refused to compromise on issues in which she strongly believed and practiced what she preached–she lived the life and embodied the idealism we hope to emulate.
Dana was always hopeful and inspiring and a strong believer in the ability of humans to change and reach a higher, more just and ethical way of being. She saw “change not as a sacrifice but as a way of learning, staying alive and moving to new places.” But Dana’s most endearing and admirable quality was to give of herself and her ideas with great humility and joy to everyone who would accept her incredible gifts. She was too young, too vibrant and too important to the world to die this young. We are grateful for all the years that she was alive, her insight and for everything that she shared with the world.
In the final edition of the The Global Citizen (a story she wrote about writing The Limits to Growth in 1972), she wrote:
“I’ve grown impatient with the kind of debate we used to have about whether optimists or the pessimists are right. Neither is right. There is too much bad news to justify complacency. There is too much good news to justify despair.
I am not afraid of the challenge of easing the throughput of human society back down within its limits–I think that can be done fairly easily and even with considerable benefit to the human quality of life.” Her own headlines for Limits to Growth would be:
“MATERIAL AND ENERGY THROUGHPUT MUST BE CUT, BUT NOT PEOPLE, NOT LIVING STANDARDS, NOT THE DREAM OF A BETTER WORLD”
I had the privilege of knowing Dana and learning from her–a true gift. I know that she is looking down on us today, a little embarrassed by the attention on her but happy to see how well her life and her message were received and will live on for a long time, especially through the many young students she taught. May we always remember the things she has taught us and the example that she set for us all to emulate.
Thank you, Dana, for your insight, your gifts, your love and for touching us so deeply! You will always be in our hearts and in our consciences giving us the courage to carry on the work to create a healthy, just, and environmentally sustainable world!
