This article is reposted from Global Transition 2012.
A new website shows the worldwide emergence of a new economy, one that puts people and planet first, says nef fellow David Boyle. As people, communities and organisaitons begin to upload their projects, we will begin to see that, actually, the new economics isn’t so unevenly distributed after all.
It was never quite clear where or when the novelist William Gibson made his famous remark about the future – it is “already here – it’s just not very evenly distributed”.
Some sources say 1993, some say 1999. Either way, when it comes to the new economics, it is emphatically true. The planet may be struggling. The economy may be unbalanced. But it is possible to glimpse the Great Transition to a new economics partly by looking around us.
That is the thinking behind a new project called Global Transition to a New Economy, which includes a world map of where the new economy – the one that puts people and planet first – is beginning to emerge.
The map colour codes those elements, from local currencies to local economy projects, which make up the new economy and puts them on the world map.
It is also the first of what will hopefully be many joint projects between nef and our US partners at the New Economics Institute, plus Stakeholder Forum for a Sustainable Future and the Green Economy Coalition.
The Global Transition to a New Economy is part of the Global Transition 2012 Initiative, an international community of organisations and thinkers promoting a rapid transition to economies that maximise well-being, operates within environmental limits, and are capable of adapting to global environmental change.
Of course the map is pretty empty at the moment, not because there are no relevant projects or examples, but because it has only just begun. The American north east looks quite busy, but there isn’t much yet for Europe or other parts of the world – and just a handful so far in the UK.
We are hoping that anyone reading this, or stumbling across the map on the websites of the organisations involved, will put up their own projects and we can begin to see that, actually, the new economics isn’t so unevenly distributed after all.
