The environmental movement of the seventies, precursor to the present movement for sustainability, was largely anti-technological. Technology seemed to be inherently large-scale; it produced nuclear power stations and polluting chemical complexes. But technology has taken a turn into the opposite … Read more
Sustainability has been a topic for some time: for forty years (counting from the ‘Limits to Growth’ report), or even for fifty years (counting from Rachel Carson’s ‘Silent Spring’). During those years, it has moved from the periphery to the … Read more
Until quite recently, a few developments seemed to be clear, at least to the editors of this website. The economy would become more sustainable by finding alternatives for oil (over the peak), natural gas (source of international conflict), and coal … Read more
In Europe we witness intensive social participation, coupled to increased self-confidence. People often decide to leave government and political parties aside. They seek and find each other in loose alliances, not heavily structured, in order to vent one’s indignation of … Read more
‘Everyone should read this book’ is a thought which does not come up often. But it did come up with me as I read ‘How the West was lost’ by Dambisa Moyo, a Zambian economist who worked for Goldman Sachs … Read more
In recent years, males with megalomaniac ambitions have formed absurd conglomerates which require likewise absurd controls for their management. The tops of fantasy organisations that collapsed, carrying names thought up by advertising agencies (in the Netherlands InHolland, Amarantis and Vestia), … Read more
Women play a much larger part in the European economy than twenty years ago. The development is both almost unnoticeable and swift. In the Netherlands, women now have the majority in the judiciary, and not merely in traditional sectors like … Read more
Ruud Lubbers, long standing prime minister of the Netherlands, now is one of the main advisors of the Rotterdam Climate Initiative. Energy efficiency, sustainable energy, carbon capture and storage, and biomass all have to contribute to a 50% reduction in … Read more