WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.020 Without further ado, let's let Greg Bourne take the stage. 2 00:00:03.080 --> 00:00:04.780 Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Greg Bourne. 3 00:00:11.240 --> 00:00:17.820 Thanks, Winston. That was probably the most showy welcome to an election that I've ever had, to be quite honest. 4 00:00:18.460 --> 00:00:21.180 Great, so thanks very much. And do use my chair and relax. 5 00:00:24.360 --> 00:00:29.080 Okay, ladies and gentlemen, I'm delighted to be here in Adelaide to talk at this Festival of Ideas. 6 00:00:29.660 --> 00:00:35.300 I've been to a few other writers' festivals, but never actually spoken at one, so this is going to be fun. 7 00:00:36.120 --> 00:00:39.620 The title of the talk is Society and Environment, a Focus on the Future. 8 00:00:39.800 --> 00:00:43.800 And when I was given that title, it also had a question mark at the end of it. 9 00:00:44.920 --> 00:00:49.500 And I believe that what we could have done is we could have just put an exclamation mark at the end, 10 00:00:49.540 --> 00:00:51.520 and that would have been the answer, Focus on the Future. 11 00:00:51.620 --> 00:00:55.060 We could all then just go on to lunch, and that would have been quite nice. 12 00:00:55.160 --> 00:00:58.500 But anyway, I decided that I'd actually talk a bit longer, so for 27 minutes. 13 00:00:59.200 --> 00:01:01.640 And I'm going to cover a number of topics. 14 00:01:01.820 --> 00:01:09.160 They are the state of the planet, language and sustainability, an idea whose idea, I believe, has come, 15 00:01:10.260 --> 00:01:17.480 economics and society, social change, and then finally a little bit about climate change and a concerned society. 16 00:01:18.540 --> 00:01:20.740 But let me start with the state of the planet. 17 00:01:21.740 --> 00:01:26.880 Well, first, WWF's mission is to stop the degradation of the planet 18 00:01:26.880 --> 00:01:28.860 and to find ways in which, 19 00:01:28.860 --> 00:01:30.280 man can live in harmony with nature. 20 00:01:30.480 --> 00:01:35.040 So, when I looked at the Millennium Assessment Report, which came out in March this year, 21 00:01:35.180 --> 00:01:37.140 and looked at the state of the planet, you think, 22 00:01:37.200 --> 00:01:38.600 oh, God, we're not doing very well. 23 00:01:38.780 --> 00:01:44.060 In fact, it's not just WWF that's not doing very well, it's all of us, all six billion of us. 24 00:01:46.820 --> 00:01:50.500 The Millennium Development Assessment Goals, sorry, the Millennium Development Goals 25 00:01:50.500 --> 00:01:54.260 were endorsed in September of 2000. 26 00:01:54.920 --> 00:01:56.420 And it's at the United Nations. 27 00:01:56.480 --> 00:01:58.320 They set these eight goals. 28 00:01:58.320 --> 00:02:03.460 They set the goals of reducing poverty, reducing hunger, child and maternal mortality, 29 00:02:03.880 --> 00:02:09.000 ensuring education for all, controlling and managing disease, tackling gender disparity, 30 00:02:10.320 --> 00:02:13.780 ensuring sustainable development, and then pursuing global partnerships. 31 00:02:14.020 --> 00:02:20.500 And so, between 2001 and now, an assessment was made of the ecology of the planet. 32 00:02:21.660 --> 00:02:24.960 Scientists from all over the world, and they have come up with this report. 33 00:02:25.040 --> 00:02:27.060 You can download it from the website. 34 00:02:28.320 --> 00:02:30.520 There were four main findings. 35 00:02:31.240 --> 00:02:32.540 And I'm going to paraphrase. 36 00:02:32.600 --> 00:02:37.660 And the first one says, over the past 50 years, humans have changed ecosystems more rapidly 37 00:02:37.660 --> 00:02:40.920 and extensively than in any comparable period in human history. 38 00:02:42.360 --> 00:02:49.420 The changes have contributed to substantial well-being, but have been at enormous costs. 39 00:02:50.740 --> 00:02:56.580 The degradation of the ecosystem services could grow significantly worse in the first half of this century. 40 00:02:57.200 --> 00:02:58.300 And, you know, we're not going to be able to do that. 41 00:02:58.320 --> 00:03:02.100 We're going to have to be a real barrier to achieving the Millennium Development Goals. 42 00:03:03.400 --> 00:03:09.900 And the challenge of reversing the degradation of ecosystems whilst meeting increasing demands for their services 43 00:03:09.900 --> 00:03:16.460 involves significant changes in politics, in policy, and practices that are not currently underway. 44 00:03:17.680 --> 00:03:22.540 But I'm going to expand more on the first finding, which is over the past 50 years, 45 00:03:22.600 --> 00:03:27.680 humans have changed ecosystems more rapidly and extensively than any other time in human history. 46 00:03:30.080 --> 00:03:36.560 More land was converted to cropland since 1945 than the whole of the 18th and 19th centuries combined. 47 00:03:38.640 --> 00:03:46.840 Approximately 20% of the world's coral reefs have been degraded, and another 20% more are expected to degrade in the next few decades. 48 00:03:48.200 --> 00:03:57.580 The amount of water impounded behind dams has quadrupled since 1960, and now there is roughly six times more water behind dams than there is in rivers. 49 00:03:59.540 --> 00:04:05.940 Since 1960, flows of nitrogen to the environment have doubled, and flows of phosphorus have tripled. 50 00:04:08.280 --> 00:04:15.720 And since 1750, the carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere has increased by 30%. 51 00:04:15.720 --> 00:04:18.780 And I'll talk a little bit more about global warming right at the end. 52 00:04:19.920 --> 00:04:28.300 And then in bold print at the bottom of this first finding is, humans are fundamentally and to a significant extent irreversibly changing the diversity of life on Earth. 53 00:04:28.300 --> 00:04:31.620 And most of these changes represent a loss of biodiversity. 54 00:04:33.320 --> 00:04:36.660 So what's to be done? The theme of this conference. 55 00:04:36.800 --> 00:04:39.020 Well, we first must focus on the future. 56 00:04:39.840 --> 00:04:47.400 But what I want to do now is talk a little bit about a slow and sure cultural shift towards sustainability that I think is going on. 57 00:04:48.160 --> 00:04:49.460 And I'm going to talk about language. 58 00:04:50.540 --> 00:04:57.400 Some time ago, I became interested in language and how it shapes the way we are in our relationship with society. 59 00:04:58.300 --> 00:05:01.160 And it was George Bernard Shaw who said, 60 00:05:01.260 --> 00:05:04.960 The Americans and English were two people divided by a common language. 61 00:05:05.980 --> 00:05:08.100 It's a bit frightening. 62 00:05:08.400 --> 00:05:11.020 And so language to me has become very important. 63 00:05:11.140 --> 00:05:16.840 When I was in BP, people used to say, you know, how do they understand the language that goes on in head office? 64 00:05:17.480 --> 00:05:21.560 And I said, you have to learn to read between the lines, even when there's only one line. 65 00:05:23.280 --> 00:05:27.180 And, but the key thing is, there are some real subtleties and nuances in language, 66 00:05:27.180 --> 00:05:29.200 which I will bring out in a minute. 67 00:05:30.180 --> 00:05:33.300 We've all had this experience of talking at cross purposes with each other. 68 00:05:33.700 --> 00:05:37.320 And some people we just don't seem to be able to communicate with at all. 69 00:05:38.400 --> 00:05:43.460 And so when we're looking at this world of sustainability where we're holistically trying to think about the environment, 70 00:05:44.480 --> 00:05:49.580 society and economics at the same time, it's no wonder we actually sort of trip up and fall over ourselves. 71 00:05:50.400 --> 00:05:54.120 So I want you to imagine for a moment three different people. 72 00:05:55.160 --> 00:05:56.160 Firstly, the businessman. 73 00:05:56.160 --> 00:06:05.000 Who did a degree in economics and marketing, founded his own company, took over a few on his way forward to making a lot of cash. 74 00:06:06.300 --> 00:06:08.800 And he is really on a big growth trajectory. 75 00:06:10.140 --> 00:06:14.480 You take another person in the same room and he's a bearded ecologist. 76 00:06:16.420 --> 00:06:21.580 He has many a company scalp under his belt, lived in the forests. 77 00:06:21.920 --> 00:06:25.320 You know, completely different person from the first. 78 00:06:25.320 --> 00:06:34.700 And then think of the person who is a social worker who maybe studied psychology and has walked in some of the shadowy parts of our cities. 79 00:06:35.200 --> 00:06:39.380 You put these three people in the room and you ask do they have a common language. 80 00:06:39.560 --> 00:06:41.280 Well, I think the answer is no. 81 00:06:41.440 --> 00:06:42.540 Not in the sense that I mean. 82 00:06:42.920 --> 00:06:47.520 They don't understand the nuances that each is talking about. 83 00:06:47.680 --> 00:06:50.260 They don't understand the worlds that they're coming from. 84 00:06:50.940 --> 00:06:54.880 And yet they're trying to talk about something which may be rather important. 85 00:06:54.880 --> 00:06:55.600 And that's sustainability. 86 00:06:57.260 --> 00:07:02.100 I'm a fan of Richard Rorty who is a contemporary American philosopher. 87 00:07:02.720 --> 00:07:07.940 And in his book, Contingency, Irony and Solidarity, he talks about the contingency of language. 88 00:07:08.480 --> 00:07:13.320 And how the development of new words and their common usage leads to societal change. 89 00:07:14.560 --> 00:07:22.680 He says, Europe did not decide to accept the idiom of romantic poetry or socialist politics or Galilean mechanics. 90 00:07:22.680 --> 00:07:27.660 That sort of shift was no more an act of will than it was a result of argument. 91 00:07:28.900 --> 00:07:34.620 Europe gradually lost the habit of using certain words and gradually acquired the habit of using others. 92 00:07:36.180 --> 00:07:42.660 And Rorty argues that changing languages and vocabularies are really powerful indicators of social change. 93 00:07:42.800 --> 00:07:49.860 And he says, changing languages and other social practices may produce human beings of a sort that have never before existed. 94 00:07:50.280 --> 00:07:51.380 That's really powerful. 95 00:07:51.380 --> 00:07:53.980 Human beings of a sort that have never before existed. 96 00:07:54.160 --> 00:07:56.900 And yet, I believe that's what we are actually going to have to do. 97 00:07:56.960 --> 00:07:58.280 And it's a shift that we're heading into. 98 00:08:00.180 --> 00:08:06.140 We need to turn no further than the word environmentalist to see what I mean about changing languages. 99 00:08:07.720 --> 00:08:16.720 For about a hundred years, it meant one who believes in the primary influence of the environment on the development of a personal group. 100 00:08:17.160 --> 00:08:19.000 As opposed to, and hereditists. 101 00:08:19.000 --> 00:08:21.580 So it was sort of the nature versus nurture debate. 102 00:08:22.700 --> 00:08:29.320 And it wasn't until the early 1970s that the word is used to describe a person who believes in protecting the environment. 103 00:08:29.500 --> 00:08:35.980 And I do remember at university when sort of the word environmentalist was just beginning to come in. 104 00:08:36.160 --> 00:08:38.000 So it's a new word. 105 00:08:38.900 --> 00:08:44.080 But with any bringing in of new ideas, there's always a backlash. 106 00:08:44.180 --> 00:08:47.380 And the backlash is also in language. 107 00:08:48.000 --> 00:08:48.580 So, 108 00:08:48.580 --> 00:08:51.700 this usually comes in terms of the pejorative adjective. 109 00:08:52.020 --> 00:08:57.240 So, we know about environmentalists, but we also know about tree-hugging environmentalists. 110 00:08:58.300 --> 00:09:02.800 And when you look at the pejorative adjective for people who are working in the social field, 111 00:09:03.000 --> 00:09:07.060 sort of people who are rather more liberal, they're usually known as bleeding-hearted liberals. 112 00:09:07.680 --> 00:09:13.560 And for me, who was a businessman for many, many years, you know, you are normally known as a fat cat capitalist. 113 00:09:14.500 --> 00:09:17.620 So, whichever way, you know, as the new word comes in, 114 00:09:18.140 --> 00:09:19.540 people react to it. 115 00:09:19.560 --> 00:09:20.920 They don't necessarily like it. 116 00:09:22.280 --> 00:09:24.820 But I think we're comfortable using the word environmentalist now. 117 00:09:24.880 --> 00:09:29.780 It's been around for 30 years and a lot of business people would say that they are environmentalists as well. 118 00:09:31.280 --> 00:09:37.300 Sustainability in the way we currently understand it is still more recent. 119 00:09:37.400 --> 00:09:43.020 The first occurrence according to the Oxford English Dictionary is in 1980 in the Journal of the Royal Society of the Arts, 120 00:09:43.080 --> 00:09:47.600 where they talk about sustainability is the management of both individual wild species, 121 00:09:47.600 --> 00:09:50.820 and ecosystems, and it's critical to human welfare. 122 00:09:51.100 --> 00:09:54.040 So that's the first time it's used in the way we begin to think about it now. 123 00:09:55.100 --> 00:09:58.860 And sustainable development, again in the way we think about it, 124 00:09:58.920 --> 00:10:02.640 is best known from its definition of development that meets the needs of the present 125 00:10:02.640 --> 00:10:06.220 without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. 126 00:10:06.320 --> 00:10:13.620 And that came out in the, from the conference, Our Common Future, by Gro Harlem Brundtland. 127 00:10:13.800 --> 00:10:14.660 So that's 1987. 128 00:10:16.380 --> 00:10:17.580 The concept of ecological development, 129 00:10:17.600 --> 00:10:19.500 ecological sustainability goes back a bit further, 130 00:10:19.600 --> 00:10:21.500 and the idea of sustainable development, 131 00:10:22.680 --> 00:10:27.520 they're basically in and around the sort of the 80s and 90s. 132 00:10:27.560 --> 00:10:30.000 They are new. They are really new concepts to us. 133 00:10:32.120 --> 00:10:36.780 As society tries to seek the real definition of sustainability or the truth, 134 00:10:38.280 --> 00:10:41.380 for me it's useful to go back to Richard Rorty's book, 135 00:10:41.520 --> 00:10:46.820 and he quotes Nietzsche as saying that truth is just a mobile army of metaphors. 136 00:10:46.820 --> 00:10:49.840 So it's always changing. A mobile army of metaphors. 137 00:10:50.100 --> 00:10:52.700 So as we seek the meaning of sustainability, 138 00:10:52.880 --> 00:10:58.540 to me it's therefore something about observations, discourse, actions, 139 00:10:58.720 --> 00:11:01.900 actions together and understanding the consequences of those things, 140 00:11:02.040 --> 00:11:05.820 beginning to bear witness on change of things that are unsustainable 141 00:11:06.500 --> 00:11:09.440 and bear witness on changes that things are sustainable, 142 00:11:09.540 --> 00:11:13.720 and then slowly but surely being able to converse with other people 143 00:11:13.720 --> 00:11:16.480 and converting them to the idea of sustainability. 144 00:11:16.480 --> 00:11:18.040 And sustainability is an important part of sustainability. 145 00:11:18.940 --> 00:11:22.400 So we're in the midst of a language and vocabulary change, 146 00:11:22.660 --> 00:11:24.700 and in order to understand that language, 147 00:11:24.780 --> 00:11:28.140 we really do need to understand people in a different way. 148 00:11:29.360 --> 00:11:32.620 I was talking to CSIRO last year, 149 00:11:32.680 --> 00:11:34.900 and they had been asking me, 150 00:11:34.980 --> 00:11:38.520 how do you communicate the science of ecosystems 151 00:11:39.300 --> 00:11:40.880 or the science of biodiversity? 152 00:11:41.780 --> 00:11:44.840 And I said, well, one thing you don't do is sort of put on a white coat, 153 00:11:44.920 --> 00:11:46.340 stand in front of a television camera, 154 00:11:46.340 --> 00:11:47.340 and start talking science. 155 00:11:47.680 --> 00:11:49.580 It doesn't work. It just does not work. 156 00:11:50.000 --> 00:11:51.340 I don't know what your magazine's like, by the way. 157 00:11:52.980 --> 00:11:55.440 But you don't do it with a white coat. 158 00:11:55.620 --> 00:11:57.680 And so I was talking to them about, you know, 159 00:11:57.680 --> 00:11:59.120 what were all the issues that faced Australia, 160 00:11:59.280 --> 00:12:02.340 and I was sort of given books on what the issues were. 161 00:12:02.420 --> 00:12:07.120 So I penned a few lines and sort of a little bit of a poem. 162 00:12:08.760 --> 00:12:09.360 And it says, 163 00:12:09.480 --> 00:12:11.400 Feral pests and imported weeds, 164 00:12:12.200 --> 00:12:13.720 rivers stressed and water needs, 165 00:12:14.200 --> 00:12:15.820 air quality and health in cities. 166 00:12:16.880 --> 00:12:18.680 Global warming and climate change, 167 00:12:18.920 --> 00:12:21.000 increased loss of biodiversity range, 168 00:12:21.640 --> 00:12:23.900 land degradation and soil salinity, 169 00:12:24.540 --> 00:12:26.460 ecosystem breakdown, such a pity. 170 00:12:27.360 --> 00:12:31.480 The first letters of those seven lines spell fragile. 171 00:12:32.180 --> 00:12:33.680 And the whole idea was to say, 172 00:12:33.820 --> 00:12:37.260 look, if you can come out with any way of communicating what is important, 173 00:12:38.040 --> 00:12:39.780 it doesn't matter about the science. 174 00:12:40.060 --> 00:12:43.900 You know, the science can be behind lots and lots of good fundamental science, 175 00:12:44.000 --> 00:12:45.340 but you have to be able to communicate it. 176 00:12:46.000 --> 00:12:50.320 And so whether we listen to the words of people like Dorothea McKellar 177 00:12:50.320 --> 00:12:52.660 or Tim Flannery or Hugh Mackay 178 00:12:53.340 --> 00:12:56.280 or a host of other poets and scientists and commentators, 179 00:12:56.300 --> 00:12:58.600 they all talk about the fragility of our land. 180 00:13:00.780 --> 00:13:03.760 Communicating the case for change is quite difficult. 181 00:13:03.940 --> 00:13:07.200 And the OECD asked this question, 182 00:13:07.420 --> 00:13:10.780 how do we make distress in the future relevant to the present? 183 00:13:11.660 --> 00:13:14.900 And I actually find that's not a very good question. 184 00:13:15.520 --> 00:13:19.540 Mainly because we all put off tomorrow anyway. 185 00:13:20.060 --> 00:13:22.880 You know, no one wants to think about this long run problem stuff. 186 00:13:23.200 --> 00:13:26.980 And also, you know, if you're bringing bad news all the time, 187 00:13:27.040 --> 00:13:29.640 then how do you get people to do anything? 188 00:13:29.840 --> 00:13:31.800 There's a sort of collective impotence that goes on 189 00:13:31.800 --> 00:13:33.660 if you bring bad news all the time. 190 00:13:33.800 --> 00:13:36.960 So to me, a more empowering question is, 191 00:13:37.000 --> 00:13:39.120 how do we build a future which is bright and prosperous 192 00:13:39.120 --> 00:13:43.100 and which man lives in harmony with nature? 193 00:13:43.100 --> 00:13:44.980 That's a much, much more empowering question. 194 00:13:45.580 --> 00:13:47.540 And it's these sorts of questions that we ask 195 00:13:47.540 --> 00:13:50.920 that actually begin to allow people to change and embrace change 196 00:13:50.920 --> 00:13:51.900 and begin to look forward. 197 00:13:53.540 --> 00:13:54.440 So what's to be done? 198 00:13:54.820 --> 00:13:56.820 Well, again, we've got to focus on the future. 199 00:13:57.340 --> 00:13:58.920 But we've also got to wrestle with economics. 200 00:14:00.100 --> 00:14:02.520 So we're going to move into economics now 201 00:14:02.520 --> 00:14:09.800 and do so because a lot of writers, commentators and thought leaders 202 00:14:09.800 --> 00:14:12.760 have talked about the interconnectedness of ideas. 203 00:14:13.100 --> 00:14:15.820 Social ideas, environmental ideas, economic ideas. 204 00:14:17.320 --> 00:14:20.020 And strange that this group may seem, 205 00:14:20.100 --> 00:14:24.780 I'm going to talk about some economists, environmentalists 206 00:14:24.780 --> 00:14:28.160 and feminist commentators as well as some social commentators. 207 00:14:28.980 --> 00:14:32.700 And the thing they have in common is they alert us to the gaps in our own thinking. 208 00:14:33.420 --> 00:14:38.940 And they try and bring about ways to make us think about what's going on 209 00:14:38.940 --> 00:14:42.040 as a conjunction rather than a conflict 210 00:14:42.040 --> 00:14:43.120 with society. 211 00:14:43.600 --> 00:14:44.520 So economists. 212 00:14:45.800 --> 00:14:49.420 70 years ago, Arthur Pigou, one of the early economists, 213 00:14:49.500 --> 00:14:53.420 identified that social losses caused by business activity 214 00:14:54.180 --> 00:14:57.840 cannot readily be brought into relation with the measuring rod of money. 215 00:14:58.940 --> 00:15:02.220 And many economists, many, many economists have tried to find out 216 00:15:02.220 --> 00:15:03.980 what is the value of a sea otter? 217 00:15:05.040 --> 00:15:08.520 What is the value of traffic congestion? 218 00:15:08.980 --> 00:15:11.500 And some have even dared try and find out 219 00:15:11.500 --> 00:15:12.860 what is the value of a wife? 220 00:15:14.520 --> 00:15:16.760 Very, very, very courageous economists. 221 00:15:17.840 --> 00:15:19.760 Carl Kapp over 50 years ago, 222 00:15:20.720 --> 00:15:22.980 preempting the current resurgence of interconnectedness 223 00:15:22.980 --> 00:15:25.580 expressed through concepts such as corporate citizenship, 224 00:15:26.000 --> 00:15:26.760 warned, 225 00:15:27.500 --> 00:15:31.040 it is reasonable to assume that the social costs of private enterprise 226 00:15:31.040 --> 00:15:33.860 are likely to increase in importance and magnitude 227 00:15:34.500 --> 00:15:39.100 the more society becomes aware of and learns to appreciate non-monetary values. 228 00:15:39.820 --> 00:15:41.480 And I believe society has become aware of this. 229 00:15:41.500 --> 00:15:42.300 And I believe we are becoming more and more aware 230 00:15:42.300 --> 00:15:44.160 of non-monetary values all the time. 231 00:15:46.520 --> 00:15:47.040 Environmentalists. 232 00:15:47.200 --> 00:15:50.120 Paul Hawken and Amory Lovins have also stressed the difficulty 233 00:15:50.120 --> 00:15:54.260 of putting a monetary value on natural capital, 234 00:15:55.060 --> 00:15:59.360 such as ecosystem services, clean air, and so on. 235 00:15:59.420 --> 00:16:02.320 But they do recognize that zero is not the right answer. 236 00:16:04.300 --> 00:16:07.160 According to Daniel Bell, the prominent sociologist, 237 00:16:07.280 --> 00:16:10.140 the economy finds direction not by the price mechanism, 238 00:16:10.140 --> 00:16:14.400 but by the value system of culture in which the economy is embedded. 239 00:16:14.760 --> 00:16:17.140 So again, this mix of economy and culture, 240 00:16:17.300 --> 00:16:18.340 economy and society. 241 00:16:19.440 --> 00:16:22.580 And feminist commentators, Ann Summers and Marilyn Waring, 242 00:16:22.720 --> 00:16:26.480 both stressed that only those activities assigned a monetary value 243 00:16:27.140 --> 00:16:30.160 are currently valued by society as worthwhile. 244 00:16:30.480 --> 00:16:34.260 And they cite how often that work relegated to women, 245 00:16:34.320 --> 00:16:35.720 such as parenting and housework, 246 00:16:35.740 --> 00:16:38.140 has been systematically devalued and undervalued 247 00:16:38.140 --> 00:16:40.120 because they don't appear on a balance sheet. 248 00:16:40.140 --> 00:16:41.280 Or a profit and loss account. 249 00:16:42.300 --> 00:16:45.760 So these thinkers, to me, are all pointing to a world 250 00:16:45.760 --> 00:16:49.240 which is connecting in a holistic way, 251 00:16:49.380 --> 00:16:52.180 society, the environment, and the economy. 252 00:16:53.440 --> 00:16:56.380 To my mind, the paradigm that we're striving for 253 00:16:56.380 --> 00:16:59.740 is one which I call sensible development. 254 00:17:00.520 --> 00:17:03.500 And the reason I do so is because 255 00:17:04.300 --> 00:17:06.680 the two words, sensible and development, 256 00:17:06.880 --> 00:17:08.340 are very, very seldom paired, 257 00:17:08.340 --> 00:17:10.140 and so it sounds odd to the ear. 258 00:17:10.300 --> 00:17:13.020 But there are two things that we really do want. 259 00:17:13.540 --> 00:17:16.160 Sensibility and development. 260 00:17:17.560 --> 00:17:20.160 And to me, sensible development is one in which 261 00:17:20.860 --> 00:17:23.840 any development that activity goes forward 262 00:17:23.840 --> 00:17:27.280 creates a surplus in each of the three dimensions, 263 00:17:27.520 --> 00:17:30.040 the environment, society, and the economy. 264 00:17:31.420 --> 00:17:33.160 So we want social progress, 265 00:17:33.480 --> 00:17:35.240 and that's the surplus generated 266 00:17:36.040 --> 00:17:38.280 when we practice sensible development. 267 00:17:38.340 --> 00:17:41.000 We actually want net environmental benefit 268 00:17:41.000 --> 00:17:43.080 out of any development that goes forward. 269 00:17:43.320 --> 00:17:44.920 And of course, we do want profit, 270 00:17:45.660 --> 00:17:48.220 which is the surplus and the surrogate 271 00:17:48.220 --> 00:17:49.340 for economic value added. 272 00:17:49.460 --> 00:17:50.240 We want all three. 273 00:17:51.740 --> 00:17:54.260 But let's also recognize that when we talk about 274 00:17:54.260 --> 00:17:55.280 sustainable development, 275 00:17:55.460 --> 00:17:58.120 seldom do decision makers think of it. 276 00:17:58.500 --> 00:17:59.740 It's too far off. 277 00:17:59.940 --> 00:18:02.160 It's 20 years or 50 years hence. 278 00:18:02.260 --> 00:18:05.060 It's something that we will know that we either have done 279 00:18:05.060 --> 00:18:07.480 or not done in 50 years' time. 280 00:18:07.480 --> 00:18:09.760 It doesn't actually help them and inform them 281 00:18:09.760 --> 00:18:11.140 in the day-to-day decision making. 282 00:18:11.360 --> 00:18:13.460 So I'd like them to actually start thinking 283 00:18:13.460 --> 00:18:14.440 about sensible development. 284 00:18:14.540 --> 00:18:16.660 So anything you do has to create a surplus 285 00:18:16.660 --> 00:18:18.480 in those three dimensions. 286 00:18:21.420 --> 00:18:25.800 Now to do that, we have to do some social change, 287 00:18:25.940 --> 00:18:26.280 I believe. 288 00:18:26.900 --> 00:18:28.080 And how does it come about? 289 00:18:29.800 --> 00:18:31.400 I mentioned earlier that sustainability 290 00:18:31.400 --> 00:18:34.160 is a word whose time perhaps has come. 291 00:18:34.320 --> 00:18:36.880 And I know that when I came back here in 99, 292 00:18:36.880 --> 00:18:39.900 the S word was hardly about. 293 00:18:40.140 --> 00:18:44.180 But by now, we do have in South Australia, 294 00:18:44.220 --> 00:18:45.700 but Western Australia and Victoria, 295 00:18:45.760 --> 00:18:47.440 state sustainability strategies. 296 00:18:48.740 --> 00:18:52.120 In New South Wales, there's the Department of Energy, 297 00:18:52.200 --> 00:18:53.440 Utility and Sustainability, 298 00:18:54.340 --> 00:18:56.580 Victoria Department of Environment and Sustainability. 299 00:18:56.760 --> 00:18:59.500 And to my mind, when governments start putting these words 300 00:18:59.500 --> 00:19:03.160 in titles of departments, things are moving on. 301 00:19:04.300 --> 00:19:06.540 But perhaps it's an idea whose time has come. 302 00:19:06.540 --> 00:19:10.340 And many people have heard the quote 303 00:19:10.980 --> 00:19:14.740 that nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time has come 304 00:19:14.740 --> 00:19:17.140 and quoted as from Victor Hugo. 305 00:19:17.300 --> 00:19:19.680 He actually says, and it comes from his book, 306 00:19:19.760 --> 00:19:20.600 The History of the Crime, 307 00:19:20.960 --> 00:19:23.160 one resists the invasion of armies, 308 00:19:23.200 --> 00:19:24.680 but not the invasion of ideas. 309 00:19:25.560 --> 00:19:27.620 And in the long run, I'm sure he's right. 310 00:19:29.000 --> 00:19:31.540 And I do believe, coming back to Rorty, 311 00:19:31.600 --> 00:19:33.780 that changing languages and other social practices 312 00:19:33.780 --> 00:19:36.100 may produce human beings of a sort 313 00:19:36.100 --> 00:19:37.320 that have never before existed. 314 00:19:38.940 --> 00:19:40.620 However, with the invasion of ideas 315 00:19:40.620 --> 00:19:42.680 comes an army of the reactionaries. 316 00:19:43.220 --> 00:19:46.260 And in all change processes, there are the progressives, 317 00:19:46.340 --> 00:19:48.700 the undecided and the reactionaries. 318 00:19:49.400 --> 00:19:52.340 And very often, it's the progressives who have something to gain 319 00:19:52.340 --> 00:19:55.360 and the reactionaries something to lose. 320 00:19:55.600 --> 00:19:57.700 And the middle ground are oblivious of what's going on. 321 00:19:57.800 --> 00:19:59.080 They're not even in the conversation. 322 00:20:00.340 --> 00:20:03.360 And just as in Britain, the Luddites actually knew 323 00:20:03.360 --> 00:20:06.080 that the whole of Britain would benefit from this. 324 00:20:06.100 --> 00:20:07.420 They knew from the introduction of weaving technology, 325 00:20:07.760 --> 00:20:09.840 but they personally would lose. 326 00:20:10.480 --> 00:20:13.020 There are many in this country that know that 327 00:20:13.020 --> 00:20:16.260 if we adopt sustainability in a powerful way, 328 00:20:16.840 --> 00:20:19.980 they will lose, even though society as a whole 329 00:20:19.980 --> 00:20:21.460 and Australia as a whole will gain. 330 00:20:22.760 --> 00:20:25.600 So I see three barriers to change. 331 00:20:26.000 --> 00:20:29.460 And they are structural, political and behavioural. 332 00:20:30.800 --> 00:20:33.620 In the first one, we have to recognise, 333 00:20:33.940 --> 00:20:35.720 especially in the world of sort of 334 00:20:36.100 --> 00:20:36.980 the current economic paradigm, 335 00:20:38.340 --> 00:20:41.640 that there are many negative externalities 336 00:20:41.640 --> 00:20:44.540 that come out of some of our industrial practices 337 00:20:44.540 --> 00:20:46.960 and farming practices. 338 00:20:48.000 --> 00:20:50.440 But the activity benefits a few 339 00:20:51.100 --> 00:20:54.440 and the disbenefit is transferred across the whole of society. 340 00:20:56.060 --> 00:20:57.780 So those few people, 341 00:20:57.980 --> 00:21:01.020 be they farmers, small business folk, large businesses or industries 342 00:21:01.020 --> 00:21:04.480 or even communities, react against change 343 00:21:04.480 --> 00:21:06.520 because they could perceive loss in value 344 00:21:06.520 --> 00:21:07.940 or perhaps loss in jobs. 345 00:21:09.200 --> 00:21:13.960 However, we who might profess ourselves as the progressives 346 00:21:14.480 --> 00:21:18.120 must also recognise that we too have derived enormous benefit, 347 00:21:18.460 --> 00:21:20.940 even if it has been disaggregated benefit, 348 00:21:21.260 --> 00:21:23.820 from those same businesses, industries and farms. 349 00:21:23.920 --> 00:21:26.880 We have gained a huge amount from the farming practices 350 00:21:27.480 --> 00:21:30.080 of 150 years or 200 years. 351 00:21:30.500 --> 00:21:33.700 But we as a society reap the disbenefit. 352 00:21:34.740 --> 00:21:38.020 Change therefore requires structural and sectoral adjustment 353 00:21:38.020 --> 00:21:41.320 and I believe that if we are going to change and move forward, 354 00:21:41.400 --> 00:21:45.060 we have to find ways in which those people who perceive 355 00:21:45.060 --> 00:21:47.300 that they will lose out of the change, 356 00:21:47.440 --> 00:21:49.800 we have to find ways in which they can win. 357 00:21:50.020 --> 00:21:52.960 We have to facilitate structural adjustment. 358 00:21:53.080 --> 00:21:56.080 It's not just a matter of saying stop this and start that. 359 00:21:56.320 --> 00:21:57.920 You actually have to facilitate change. 360 00:21:59.220 --> 00:22:00.720 The second barrier is political 361 00:22:00.720 --> 00:22:04.120 and it comes with the nature and type of democracy 362 00:22:04.120 --> 00:22:04.820 that we have. 363 00:22:05.180 --> 00:22:09.400 The pace of change in society, in our democracy I believe, 364 00:22:09.460 --> 00:22:12.000 is directly related to the speed at which societal consensus 365 00:22:12.000 --> 00:22:12.840 is built up. 366 00:22:13.380 --> 00:22:17.000 And that in turn depends on the function of the understanding 367 00:22:17.000 --> 00:22:21.160 of the issues and how those issues relate to the individual. 368 00:22:21.300 --> 00:22:24.180 What does it do to me really is the thing that matters. 369 00:22:24.300 --> 00:22:27.700 And then eventually perhaps what is my voting intention 370 00:22:27.700 --> 00:22:28.980 depending on those issues. 371 00:22:32.360 --> 00:22:33.480 However, unfortunately, 372 00:22:34.120 --> 00:22:37.080 I think the rate determining step of societal change 373 00:22:38.120 --> 00:22:41.200 is often expressed through the marginal seat. 374 00:22:42.500 --> 00:22:43.860 Unless there is a clear majority, 375 00:22:44.180 --> 00:22:48.060 seldom do our political leaders have the determination to lead change. 376 00:22:48.380 --> 00:22:50.260 And several times politicians have said to me, 377 00:22:50.380 --> 00:22:54.600 convince the public and then I'll have the courage to lead. 378 00:22:55.120 --> 00:22:56.160 It's a bit of a worry. 379 00:22:58.980 --> 00:23:01.260 Change therefore requires moving the middle ground. 380 00:23:01.500 --> 00:23:03.200 Those who have not yet decided, 381 00:23:03.200 --> 00:23:05.780 and those who do not yet understand the issues 382 00:23:05.780 --> 00:23:08.260 and the importance of them as individuals. 383 00:23:08.540 --> 00:23:12.500 And therefore again communicating ideas becomes of critical importance. 384 00:23:13.380 --> 00:23:16.680 The third barrier I believe to change is behaviour. 385 00:23:17.300 --> 00:23:20.640 Now I'm particularly thinking about the temporal dimension 386 00:23:20.640 --> 00:23:22.700 and I'm going to stray into Shakespeare 387 00:23:22.700 --> 00:23:27.340 and read you part of Act 2, Scene 3, 388 00:23:28.340 --> 00:23:31.180 sorry, Act 2, Scene 5 of Shakespeare's As You Like It. 389 00:23:32.540 --> 00:23:33.180 All right. 390 00:23:33.180 --> 00:23:34.120 All the world's a stage 391 00:23:34.120 --> 00:23:36.760 and all the men and women merely players. 392 00:23:37.020 --> 00:23:38.840 They have their exits and their entrances. 393 00:23:39.280 --> 00:23:41.960 And one man in his time plays many parts, 394 00:23:42.220 --> 00:23:43.700 his act being seven ages. 395 00:23:44.840 --> 00:23:46.120 The first, the infant, 396 00:23:47.180 --> 00:23:48.720 mewling and puking in his nurse's arms. 397 00:23:49.120 --> 00:23:50.860 And then the whining schoolboy 398 00:23:50.860 --> 00:23:53.240 with his satchel and shining morning face 399 00:23:53.240 --> 00:23:55.600 creeping like snail, unwilling to school. 400 00:23:56.500 --> 00:23:58.640 And then the lover, sighing like furnace 401 00:23:58.640 --> 00:24:01.060