Burgess COMMENTARY

Peter Burgess

Toronto Sustainability Speaker Series 3,711 members Member Information and settingsShare group DiscussionsPromotionsJobsMembersSearch Brad Zarnett Follow Brad According to Naomi Klein....you can't fight climate change without fighting capitalism' Do you agree? http://inthesetimes.com/article/17079/this_changes_everything_naomi_klein_lessons Brad Zarnett Founder, Toronto Sustainability Speaker Series (TSSS) Canada's premiere idea exchange for sustainability leadership Top Contributor 5 Crucial Lessons for the Left From Naomi Klein’s New Book inthesetimes.com You can't fight climate change without fighting capitalism, argues Klein in This Changes Everything. Like (5) Comment (14) Unfollow Reply Privately4 days ago

Comments Natalie Robinson, Rezwan Razani and 3 others like this 14 comments Jump to most recent comment

Brad Zarnett Brad Brad Zarnett Founder, Toronto Sustainability Speaker Series (TSSS) Canada's premiere idea exchange for sustainability leadership Top Contributor Just saw that Naomi Klein is coming to Toronto to give a talk about her new book. The event is sold out but the event will be streamed into the Atrium of the Toronto Reference Library. Anyone interested in going? Like Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 4 days ago

Peter Croppo Peter Peter Croppo Business Development at EH Controls Inc. Brad... Naomi Klein is obviously not the dumbest kid in the class & she speaks/writes very persuasively from her lofty perch. But I hope her book outlines a bit more in the details of how/why we need to thoroughly embrace her directives. For example, I see her position to change the Capitalist system & replace it with moral integrity as being a bit short on realism. How will we globally mirror what has happened to Greenburg, Kansas??? My point is how will we 'start over' when so much of the world is tied to BigCorp??? Her suggestions include how the Gov't will have to step up & fund the new direction. That might be possible over the really long term, but who's going to provide the funding for the Gov't when BigCorp has been decimated & everyone is unemployed & not paying taxes??? Perhaps that's how we will all get back to Square One & start over, doing it right??? Maybe, but at this time - forgive me for taking a shot at her - she seems well served by the same principles as most BigCorps who look at a crisis as an opportunity to produce a product or serve a consumer need. I'm not trying to scorch her whole position because there is value in furthering the discussion. However, does she see the current dilemma as an opportunity to write another book to sell to us??? Hard to blame her - it works!!! Cheers... Unlike Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 4 days ago Peter Burgess, Olubunmi K. like this

Natalie Robinson Natalie Natalie Robinson Director of Educational Design at Hopefield Sustainability Hi Brad and Peter Looking forward to checking out Klein's new book. I recently reviewed another book that compellingly explains what the shift away from capitalism looks like. Would love your feedback. http://hopefieldsustainability.ca/book-review-democratizing-wealth-building-community-sustaining-economy/ Natalie Unlike Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 3 days ago Peter Burgess likes this

Peter Burgess Peter Burgess Founder/CEO at TrueValueMetrics developing Multi Dimension Impact Accounting I like Naomi Klein's ideas ... but ideas are many, and few get much traction beyond the 'book circuit' even if they get into a book! My view is that we need to better understand the dynamics of society and the economy. We talk a lot about capitalism, but I like to call what we most talk about as 'financial capitalism'. This is only part of the story. There are other capitals that should also be part of the metric. There is physical capital, human capital, social capital, institutional capital, intellectual capital and natural capital. But we only have easy metrics for financial capital ... and we have learned how to optimize for the increase in financial capital, while doing damage (which we do not measure) to all the other capitals to a greater or lesser extent. We also need to get a lot more clarity about what is 'state' and what is 'flow'. And we also need to better understand what is progress and what is performance. And we need to put improving quality of life and standard of living (human capital improvement) at the center rather than the performance of the corporate organization (mainly financial capital improvement). Within flows ... the role of product (goods and services) becomes important, because it is product that flows out of natural capital, through institutional capital, using intellectual capital to improve human capital / social capital, and eventually do damage again to natural capital. Along the way, there may be increase to financial capital, but this is not essential to a viable multiple capital economic system Peter Burgess Delete 3 days ago

Brad Zarnett Brad Brad Zarnett Founder, Toronto Sustainability Speaker Series (TSSS) Canada's premiere idea exchange for sustainability leadership Top Contributor Natalie - you should try and listen to Naomi when she's in Toronto on the September 15th. http://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/detail.jsp?Entt=RDMEVT173181&R=EVT173181 Like Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 3 days ago

Jae Mather Jae Jae Mather Non-Executive Director Newform Energy Essentially she is correct about the need to fight the current paradigm of capitalist thinking but not necessarily capitalism. As Johnathan Porritt said there are thousands of types of capitalism. It is just that were all locked into using the current version which in its current form seems incompatible with our civilisations survival. In truth it would seem that capitalism presents us with one of the only opportunities to really change direction as it is all persuasive in focusing most of the worlds decision making. When externalities are properly brought in and true value is properly assessed it will become a powerful force for positive change. Like Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 3 days ago

Ruchika Arora Ruchika Ruchika Arora Development Researcher | Writer | Activist-Teacher | Initiator *Willing to relocate* (That's one slick oil wave comin') Klein speaks of the resource intensive, nature-razing, consumption-frenzied, labour-exploitative kind of capitalism that serves the super-elite, at the expense of virtually all others who *must* (literally) work to earn, yes? Now, we're getting to the heart of 'Sustainability' in the 21st Century ... Unlike Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 1 day ago Natalie Robinson, Peter Burgess like this

Peter Burgess Peter Burgess Founder/CEO at TrueValueMetrics developing Multi Dimension Impact Accounting I like what Ruchika Arora recently posted, but I would respectfully observe that the 'middle class' in industrialized countries emerged quite well from a century of capitalism.The problem is that the capitalism that worked until around 1980 has not worked so well since then because the economic realities have significantly changed. Up to around 1980 the world was short of labor, but modern technology has enabled productivity improvements that make labor less in demand, and this same technology has also enabled global supply chains that add further to the over-abundance of labor. In addition the population of the world has grown. In 1900 the world population was around 1.7 billion, now it is about 7.1 billion. Over this time consumption per capita has increased maybe as much as tenfold ... in other words the economy is about 40 times as big ... and when I last checked the planet is about the same size. Water (including oceans) land and air are all seriously stressed. The capitalism that we are using is only a limited edition of capitalism ... it is capitalism about financial capital, and ignores all the other capitals that are part of the social and economic system. It ignores physical capital, human capital, social capital, institutional capital, intellectual capital, and natural capital. Naomi Klein is articulate ... and I have sympathy with her ideas, but how do big things get changed? My experience as a corporate CFO a long time ago was that people respond very quickly to measurement and reporting of performance. The key is to be reporting the right things. Conventional accounting an money profit reporting works very well for maximizing growth of financial capital, but there is nothing to measure the impact on the other capitals that is happening at the same time. When we have accounting that is multi dimensional and measures impact on all the capitals, and when we have a system of quantifying impact that is relatively easy to understand, things can change. In my view with the right measures there will be rapid change, and more important, change in the right direction. Peter Burgess Delete 21 hours ago Jae Mather likes this

Peter Burgess Peter Burgess Founder/CEO at TrueValueMetrics developing Multi Dimension Impact Accounting Natalie ... I wish I had read your review of Gar Alperovitz's book 'What Then Must We Do' because it would appear that my thinking is much in alignment with what you are talking about. I very much like the theme of 'system thinking' and the underlying issue of immense complexity. With immense complexity it is impossible to predict long term outcomes with any precision. Having said that, an aircraft is a complex system, and it performs with amazing reliability. There are ways to get the right results from a complex system ... but none of these are in play in our modern and quite dysfunctional modern political democracies. I believe with considerable passion that the first step has to be to have alternative measures that get to grips with all the externalities that are ignored in conventional accounting and macroeconomic statistics. Such metrics would help us steer the economy and society in a better direction. Peter Burgess Delete 20 hours ago Natalie Robinson likes this

Peter Croppo Peter Peter Croppo Business Development at EH Controls Inc. Peter, I don't know how your comments could put our issues in clearer & more succinct terms. We must realize that ignoring all the inherent costs (disposal, environmental, etc.) that could be put off has come home to roost. Channeling immense efforts to identify those costs & thus assess blame may do us all a bit of good but will it then automatically be the path to renewal??? Mmmmmaybe... but BigCorp will have to move considerably to change their ways. I agree that Naomi Klein & Gar Alperovitz put forth some great ideas for solutions to some complex problems. But when we think about the size of the problems we face, do we really believe that the solutions will not involve BigCorp??? My suggestions have always been that the best way will be to engage BigCorp to solve the problems with survival as motivation. Who else has all the money to fund the best R&D/College brains to work it out??? If we don't & allow ourselves a 'retribution mentality' there will certainly be a revolt. I simply ask is a revolt & tearing apart what systems we have any guarantee that what comes next is actually survivable??? Sustainable maybe secondary..... Cheers.... Like Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 18 hours ago

Peter Burgess Peter Burgess Founder/CEO at TrueValueMetrics developing Multi Dimension Impact Accounting Responding to Peter Croppo ... I don't think I have said that big corporations should not be part of the solution, they absolutely must be. Almost everything in a modern economy flows through a big corporation or several big corporations, but they operate with a system of metrics ... conventional money profit accounting ... that ignores all externalities, and the capital markets punish companies when they do not maximize their profits. Since the beginning of the industrial revolution companies have sought to maximize the growth of financial capital ignoring all the other capitals. They are however, amazingly efficient in doing what they want to do ... but with prevailing thinking about performance, they don't tend to do what is best for society! Andrew Winston's book, The Big Pivot ... http://www.andrewwinston.com/books/ ... details how big company CEOs are talking a lot about operating companies in a better way taking into account issues like impact of supply chains, climate change, and so on. This is good, but I argue that CFOs who do the financial accounting and hold the purse strings cannot yet translate the ideas about sustainability, etc into a coherent numerical analysis. Improving the metrics is a fairly complex matter, but some of the concepts that have been so powerful for optimizing for the growth of financial capital can be used to address the impacts on all the other capitals that are presently being informed. I think it was Buckminster Fuller who talked about trimtabs ... which are little devices that make it possible for a small amount of energy to change the heading of a very large ship ... similarly, metrics which are well designed will make it possible for rather small initiatives to have a huge impact. The idea that metrics should cost a lot is to misunderstand what is possible with well designed information systems. Peter Burgess Delete 17 hours ago

Peter Croppo Peter Peter Croppo Business Development at EH Controls Inc. Peter, thanks for the response but my inference re costs of metrics being high was merely a thot that it would take much time & effort - the pushback from BigCorp might be the expensive part if we don't engage them properly. We need to find the way to get that prevailing thinking about performance, achievement - profit? - to better suit what is best for society. This may take small initiatives - trim tabs? - to get the boat moving in the right direction. After all, this is a mighty big boat to change course... Cheers... Like Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 4 hours ago

Jae Mather Jae Jae Mather Non-Executive Director Newform Energy In essence what we’re talking about here is sustainable procurement. If we don't assess value properly then were procuring in the dark with true success being often an accident instead of an actual output. There are a huge raft of sustainable procurement tools available that enable us to measure the local economic impact of any spend (LM3), the social return on investment (SROI), the full impacts of a spend (Impact Manager and Impact Predictor), identification of the difference between perceived performance and real performance (PROBE) etc. When these sorts of tools become a central part of purchasing decisions then we find ourselves in a place where huge increases in value become the norm instead of a rarity. Like Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 3 hours ago

Ruchika Arora Ruchika Ruchika Arora Development Researcher | Writer | Activist-Teacher | Initiator *Willing to relocate* (That's one slick oil wave comin') Ultimately, sustainability is about achieving *balance* among the social, environmental and the economic dimensions of development (we in the rich West are continually 'developing,' yes, or 'growing' or consuming/wasting, etc.). The 1987 Brundtland Report - officially known as 'Our Common Future' - certainly wasn't the first international sustainability report but it did help articulate what 'sustainability' - for the *mainstream* - means. Mainstream Sustainable Development (MSD) is only one type of SD; it all depends on your ethical position which inevitably shapes your worldview as much as mine as much as N. Klein's. Like Reply privately Flag as inappropriate 3 hours ago