Romania Still Stands — And so do Other Dictatorships
By Donella Meadows
–November 30, 1989–
Until a few weeks ago if you’d asked me whether I’d ever visited a country so unpleasant that I would never want to go back, I would have answered yes, three — Romania, Czechoslovakia and East Germany.
In those places the air was thick with fear day and night, inside and out, in schools, homes and workplaces. [...]
When our Enemies Become Us, Who do we Become?
By Donella Meadows
–October 19, 1989–
“We have no model any more,” a Japanese businessman once told me, glumly. He meant that Japan, which spent centuries trying to be like China and more recent decades trying to be like the United States, has run out of nations to emulate. The Japanese now have to define themselves without outside help. They have to [...]
The Environment, the Capital Gains Tax and the Burden of Proof
By Donella Meadows
–September 21, 1989–
Whenever a large profit-making enterprise in this great nation is told that its activities might not be good for the environment, it calls for proof.
Whenever the government doesn’t want to deal with a problem, environmental or otherwise, it can delay almost indefinitely by demanding proof.
The Reagan administration held up action on acid rain for eight years, [...]
A Week to Reflect upon Leadership
By Donella Meadows
–June 9, 1989–
In Iran the Ayatollah died. In Poland the people, voting semi-freely for the first time in 40 years, rejected their party leaders. In the United States the Speaker of the House, two heartbeats away from the Presidency, stepped down, covered with mud. In China the People’s Army fired into a crowd of unarmed people.
It was a [...]
The People Should Do It, the Government Should Do It
By Donella Meadows
–February 9, 1989–
“I want my government to tell me what to do when it comes to recycling trash, and I want them to make it easy.
“I want my government to appropriate money to solar energy research instead of things like star wars.
“I want my government to tax me heavily if I choose to have more than two children.
“If [...]
