Synopses & Reviews
"Occupy World Street is both visionary and profoundly practical in facing and dismantling the destructive rules and practices of today's globalization."--Hazel Henderson, author of Ethical Markets: Growing the Green EconomyOverpopulation. Unsustainable growth. Species extinction. Inequality. Desertification. Water Shortages. Climate Change. Peak Oil. Civilization is in the midst of a global collapse. Worse, the dominant political and economic paradigm not only fails to address the major crises of our time, it perpetuates them.In Occupy World Street, Ross Jackson argues that it is not politically possible to address the global crises we face under the dominant Neoclassical economic system-a system that champions endless growth on a finite planet, wreaks havoc on developing nations with exploitative trade policies, and is destroying the planet in a mad race for natural resources. A systemic problem, Jackson argues, must be addressed at a systemic level.Nor is it realistic, however, to imagine a wholesale return to local, self-sufficient communities after the die of globalization has already been cast.Instead, the initiative for change must come from a small group of minor nations that are prepared to "break away" from the current system that revolves around the IMF, World Bank, UN, and WTO. These nations must then form a new set of international institutions-detailed in the book-that are designed to serve the global community in a decentralized, democratic, and just society consisting of diverse and self-reliant nations in control of their own economies and priorities.
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"Amazing! Ross Jackson's proposal for post-collapse strategy is the first plausible, constructive scenario I have seen."--Dennis Meadows, co-author, The Limits to Growth
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"Occupy World Street is a masterpiece which deserves to get wide circulation and commitment by world leaders."--Maurice Strong, Secretary-General of the UN Earth Summit, Rio 1992
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"Occupy World Street is a monumental and inspirational call to action-and a long-awaited blueprint for how the actions should be implemented."--John Perkins, author of Confessions of an Economic Hitman
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"Occupy World Street is a profound and urgently needed roadmap for the future of human civilization"--Will Keepin, author of Divine Duality
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"Ross Jackson offers practical solutions to the course correction so sorely needed today."--John Renesch, author of Getting to the Better Future
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"A brilliantly detailed template for how to materialize enlightened global society."--Llyn Roberts, author of Shapeshifting into Higher Consciousness
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"Jackson's initiative has the potential to unite hundreds of NGOs and millions of ordinary citizens in the streets behind a single simple proposal (that could change the current dysfunctional game.)"--Hazel Henderson, author of Ethical Markets: Growing the Green Economy
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"Ross Jackson, who is one of the world's wise elders, describes a range of new global institutions that can give birth to a world of sustainable prosperity."--Duane Elgin, author of The Living Universe
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"Ross Jackson's reform proposals for our global institutions are more than astonishing-they are mind-blowing-pure creative genius. Let's do it!"Clinton Callahan, author of Directing The Power of Conscious Feelings
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"Ross Jackson has written the definitive analysis of why the current system cannot reform itself and why a completely new system must be born."--Jim Garrison, Chairman and President, State of the World Forum
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"Ross Jackson presents us with an extraordinary global plan to tackle the multiple crises of our times-awesome in conception, sensitive in detail, and realistic enough to succeed."--Richard Register, author of Ecocities-Rebuilding Cities in Balance with Nature
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"Many writers have inventoried the unfolding disasters that threaten the human future. Ross Jackson is one of the very few who goes on to spell out a visionary, yet practical, program of sufficient ambition to achieve a positive future. Best of all, he draws on his distinctive experience and credentials as a global currency trader to outline sound proposals for redesigning the badly flawed systems of global trade and finance that currently drive the world toward economic, social, and environmental collapse. This is a truly important book."
--David Korten, co-founder of YES! Magazine, author of Agenda for a New Economy
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Publishers Weekly-Jackson, chairman of the Danish-based foundation Gaia Trust and co-editor of Gaian Economics: Living Well Within Planetary Limits, provides a comprehensive and lucidly written history of neoliberal economics and its effects, tracing the inequalities inherent in neoliberal economic planning. Neoliberalism, as Jackson illustrates, isn't an inevitable historical development, but rather an "artificial construct" created by people with a self-serving strategy that neglects the rest of humanity. Jackson presents the fundamental flaws in modern economics, locates the turning point in regulation and economic behavior, and then shows how and why things have devolved to their current state through the actions of the IMF and WTO. He traces a new, emergent worldview, proposing a solution in the form of a Gaian economic system, in which smaller, decentralized, diverse communities with a degree of local democracy form the proposed utopia, in contrast to the branded neoliberal free market of corporate dreams. A return to a simpler, more satisfying, and sustainable lifestyle is both necessary and inevitable, Jackson argues. The book is a how-to, "get serious about survival" guide, laying out a "global governance structure" and providing us with several strategies to try to get there. Hopefully, Jackson's ideas won't fall on deaf ears.
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ForeWord Reviews-"Jackson's Occupy World Street is a multilayered treatise that defines and dismantles the global issues putting us at risk. He writes expertly on humankind's relentless rate of consumption that far exceeds Nature's ability to replenish. He crafts a devastating indictment of the United States as a declining democracy that's trending toward a "corporatocracy" and motivated by "elitist self-interest and indifferent to the dangers [of an economic system that] is driving our planet to ruin." He is ultra-precise in his presentation of our flawed and exploitive economic structure.Ultimately though, the book is a call for radical revolution of the current worldview and the formation of a new civilization that Jackson terms the "Gaian world order." This emergent worldview is based on ecological sustainability; universal human values; egalitarianism; and "ecological economics," which derives from the laws of physics and biology and recognizes that the economic system is "embedded in an ecosystem [that] is finite."Jackson details how to implement a Gaian world order that promotes global cooperative governance. His ideas are systematic, inspiring, and optimistic. For some, Jackson's notions may seem impractical, even unattainable. Yet, every revolution begins with an idea, and Jackson's book deserves widespread attention."
Synopsis
Ordinary citizens the world over have long paid the price for the swashbuckling behavior of the corporate and political elite. We've seen the reigning establishment widen the gap between rich and poor, champion endless growth on a finite planet, wreak havoc on developing nations, and ravage ecosystems in a mad race for natural resources.Now, as demonstrators worldwide demand change, Occupy World Street offers a sweeping vision of how to reform our global economic and political structures, break away from empire, and build a world of self-determining sovereign states that respect the need for ecological sustainability and uphold human rights.In this refreshingly detailed plan, Ross Jackson shows how a handful of small nations could take on a leadership role; create new alliances, new governance, and new global institutions; and, in cooperation with grassroots activists, pave the way for other nations to follow suit.
About the Author
Ross Jackson has a PhD in operations research (the theory and practice of problem solving). He was born in Canada in 1938 and educated in Canada and the USA. Jackson has lived in Denmark since 1964 and been a Danish citizen since 1972. For many years, he was a very successful businessman and independent management consultant in the field of information technology, working in many branches of business, later specializing in investment and international finance. He is now semiretired, focusing on writing and Gaia Trust.