Social Ecology: Society-Nature Relations Across Time and Space https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9783319333243 (I’m beginning to read this wonderful book of Helmut et al.!:
To begin to attain some semblance of holistic and sustainable local & global community health, we must recognize there are limits to the natural resource base here on Earth and to the amount of free solar energy arriving and available each day. Moreover, on this Eaarth every Have should set a goal to share down toward equity for all. This includes sharing with other species in Nature. Therefore, all peoples–leaders and common folk–should be working to develop low input/throughput as well as equitable socio-political/economic (ecological) systems.
The current fast-paced, high input/through-put, conventional neoliberal capitalistic system (of high tech and plastic chemistry; electronics and the internet; and much information … though not so much critical thinking, knowledge, wisdom & prudence) which is dependent on direct or indirect transformation of fossil fuel and other sources of concentrated “high quality” energy, is doomed in terms of its ability to sustainably provide quality life for all, including other species. Therefore, if we are to be a positively moral/ethical society, we must lower consumption and human/domesticated animal population growth, but in a sharing manner.
That we begin to consider what concepts and practices of sustainable livelihoods, the “right kind” of entrepreneurships, appropriate applied agroecology, and pacifism might mean for diverse cultures, traditions, and ethnicities is important! And “low input/throughput” economic systems (steady-state, small carbon & ecological footprints, low per capita energy transformation, smaller human appropriation of net primary productivity) should become a part of our history and spirituality, and a component of our sense of place and sense of community.
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I do believe in the essence and spirit of the starfish story and for this reason I regularly do “do-gooder”-volunteering in regions of the world with many who are relative Have-nots. Nevertheless, efforts at turning the tide toward a better Eaarth, i.e., changing the society-Nature relations across time and space … to realize a healthy neo-Earth of universal social justice/equity/equality, humaneness, and ecological sanity … is more important. https://eventsforchange.wordpress.com/2011/06/05/the-starfish-story-one-step-towards-changing-the-world/ https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9783319333243
