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Capital Institute ... Regenerative Capitalism

Capital Institute ... Reimagining Capitalism (Full Version)

Burgess COMMENTARY

Peter Burgess

Reimagining Capitalism (Full Version)

https://youtu.be/Hb1byFOAMRE

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Published on Apr 20, 2015

Regenerative Capitalism is an alternative framework for capitalism that embodies a deeper purpose than merely optimizing financial returns, with the goal of promoting the long-term health and well-being of our human communities and the planet. Aligned with our latest understanding of how the universe actually works, the collaboratively created framework illuminates eight key principles backed by solid science and transdiciplinary scholarship. This video was produced by www.nicaskew.com.

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English (Automatic Captions) 0:01I think one of our challenges is that 0:03the more successful we become the less 0:07likely it is that we pause and question 0:10our own core assumptions 0:14a lot of people questioned capitalism 0:18post the financial collapse few of those 0:21conversations really go to the depth of 0:25thinking that i think is required 0:28I spent 20 years on Wall Street kind of 0:33learning a craft and a trade that 0:35enables me to be an informed critic of 0:39the way the system currently works the 0:44issues are much much more profound than 0:49I think we collectively have woken up to 0:52and at the root of it is the way our our 0:57economic system works and the way 0:59finance drives the economic system and 1:03i'm not talking about the bad behavior 1:05that led to the financial collapse 1:07that's in many ways just a symptom of a 1:10problem the problem is a much more 1:13systemic one 1:20so I was standing in in my dressing room 1:23looking in the mirror and and and and 1:27saw myself and said to myself it's 1:30people like you who are successful and 1:34think you're so smart that are the only 1:37people that don't really understand the 1:40way the world needs to work and yet the 1:43people that understand the way world 1:44needs to work feel hopelessly 1:48disempowered to affect the system 1:51because the people that run the system 1:54are so entrenched in their in their work 1:59way of thinking and worldview I wouldn't 2:03be working on this work and I'm not 2:05spent years in in a very uncomfortable 2:08place of questioning a lot of core 2:14assumptions and and then realizing that 2:17things weren't really the way they 2:19seemed and I wasn't as smart as I 2:21thought it was 2:26the world order as I understood it and 2:28thought made total sense became 2:32increasingly questionable in my mind and 2:36and certainly the most profound peace 2:39being this notion of an economic system 2:44that's predicated on exponential growth 2:46which requires exponential use of 2:49materials fundamentally doesn't work on 2:52a planet that's fixed and scale the math 2:56simply doesn't add up and a lot of 2:59people will not their head and say yeah 3:01that's a problem and then then we go 3:04back to doing just what we've been doing 3:06so it's a it's kind of an intractable 3:10problem and and and i believe the root 3:15of it is and how we think about the 3:17purpose of investment capital what you 3:20know what is it that we're trying to 3:22accomplish when we invest our money 3:28the core purpose of of investing as 3:31understood in our system is to invest 3:35money in order to grow that capital into 3:39more money we have a system that that is 3:42designed to optimize the growth of 3:48financial capital return on money at the 3:53expense of the stock of natural capital 3:57nature and increasingly at cost of 4:01social capital we have an imbalance 4:03between you know system that very nicely 4:07grows financial capital thinking that 4:09that will solve the the the prosperity 4:13of humanity 4:14that's a system that I don't think 4:16ultimately is going to work because it's 4:19it's a reductionist approach to thinking 4:21that you can manage just the money piece 4:24separate from the environmental 4:28consequences are in the social 4:29consequences that the economic activity 4:33that that money stimulates causes and so 4:38it'sit's reduction is thinking as 4:40opposed to holistic thinking and just 4:43like in the world of medicine there's 4:45been a big movement now toward thinking 4:48more holistically about human health 4:51my belief is that we need to have a 4:53similar shift in our economic thinking 4:56in many ways a lot of what we need to 5:01understand we already know we just what 5:05we don't know is how to how to cause the 5:09system to shift we we understand what's 5:12wrong with the system we don't know how 5:14to change it in many ways our problem is 5:18that the finance system behaves and 5:21believes that it's on top of the 5:24economic system driving it when it needs 5:27to see itself as underneath it in 5:30service of it and that that's tricky 5:34when when our culture and our system 5:37rewards finance people with the most 5:42money the most power is pretty hard as 5:45humans to remain in his in a in a 5:48position of service the will to fix the 5:51system begins with the will and 5:55curiosity to be open to having to 5:59rethink the way we think the world works 6:02and that's not easy for for people to do 6:06that that's threatening to academics 6:09that's threatening to people in 6:10positions of power 6:12no one likes to wake up one day and 6:14decide that you know their understanding 6:17of the way the world works is flawed 6:23if these problems weren't truly 6:25civilization threatening if we don't get 6:28this right 6:29it would seem easier to be comfortable 6:34as a philosopher and just pursue the 6:39questions for the sake of the questions 6:41but the questions have profound 6:45importance to to the future of life on 6:52this planet and and the time clock is 6:55ticking and we're late 7:02I feel like now have an understanding 7:04that i didn't before and with that 7:07knowledge comes a responsibility we need 7:10to recognize that the path Ron and and 7:16put down are somewhat childish ambitions 7:20and egos and personal desires and and 7:25come quick come together and do the 7:28right thing