Archive for the ‘In the News’ Category
From Sustainability Science to Real-World Action: A Short History of the Balaton Group
Posted by Kindle Loomis, Published: October 15th, 2012
By Neils Meyer, Alan AtKisson
The Balaton Group is named for Lake Balaton in Hungary, where meetings have been held for most of the past 30 years. In the 1980s, Hungary proved an informally neutral ground between the Soviet bloc and Western nations. (image credit: Zsolt Halasi)
The Balaton Group has been responsible for the creation or accelerated development of a number of innovations in the [...]
Envisioning a Sustainable World
Posted by Kindle Loomis, Published: October 8th, 2012
By Donella Meadows
Donella Meadows, one of the founders of the Balaton Group and an early advocate of systems thinking. (image credit: Donella Meadows Institute
This is an edited transcript of part of a talk given by Donella Meadows at the 1994 meeting of the International Society for Ecological Economics in San José, Costa Rica, and recorded by Peter Griesinger. Meadows, cofounder of the [...]
Learning from the Past
Posted by Kindle Loomis, Published: October 2nd, 2012
By Sarah Parkinson
Looking Backwards to Move Forwards in a Year of Anniversaries
Happy anniversary to Silent Spring, The Limits to Growth, and other environmental milestones! (Image credit: lou.veyret via Flickr)
While making progress on social and environmental issues requires looking forward with vision and resolve, there’s also good reason to look backwards. This year marks the anniversary of a number of historical events important [...]
Social Innovations for Economic Degrowth
Posted by Kindle Loomis, Published: September 28th, 2012
By Andreas Exner, Christian Lauk
Members of the Ein-Harod kibbutz work at a stone quarry in 1941. The kibbutz offers an early example of how cooperative enterprise can shift goals from profit to concrete human needs, which are satiable and do not compel constant growth. (Image credit: Government Press Office of Israel)
At the beginning of the twenty-first century, we find ourselves in a peculiar situation: [...]
Setting Down Roots: Dennis Meadows on the Founding and Mission of Balaton
Posted by Kindle Loomis, Published: September 24th, 2012
Working with their Hungarian colleagues, scientists Donella and Dennis Meadows organized the first meeting of the Balaton Group in Csopak, Hungary, in 1982. Donella died unexpectedly in 2001, and Dennis relinquished all his responsibilities for organizing and financing the group after its 25th annual meeting in 2006. But he remains a steadfast participant in its meetings and a keen observer [...]
