NEW – Indicators, MDGs, SDGs, and GDP
On Thursday 16 May, I attended an excellent public seminar on the power of indicators and numbers in the context of sustainable development. Hosted by UNDP and the Dag Hammarsköld Foundation, in Stockholm, it featured two powerful women speakers: Sakiko Fukuda-Parr, former director of the UN’s Human Development Index and now a professor at the … Read more
What Music Means (to Me)
A few years ago, I heard someone ask the veteran global trend analyst Lester Brown — who is known for dire warnings about the state of the planet — this question: “How do you maintain your optimism?” “I have a one-word answer for that,” said Lester. “Bourbon.” As someone whose professional life often involves analyzing … Read more
Knowledge and Sustainability: The Global State of The Art
Recently I had the honor — and the amazingly complex challenge — of preparing a report for the new United Nations Office for Sustainable Development (UNOSD), based in Incheon, Korea. The title of the report signals its state-of-the-art global breadth: “Knowledge, Capacity Building, and Networks for Sustainable Development: A Review.” This report has been published … Read more
A Year of Work in Sustainability
As 2012 comes to a close, I plan to reflect back on the year in sustainability and write think-piece about it. There is a lot to reflect on at the global scale: there was Rio+20 and the Doha climate conference, there was the impact of a US election and a lot of new sustainability science … Read more
What the ISIS Academy Master Class is like …
In February, ISIS Academy will be coming to the Global Institute of Sustainability at Arizona State University for our next Master Class in Change for Sustainability, and our first such course in the United States (click here or click the image to download the brochure). What is that? you may be wondering. What is a … Read more
Report from OECD: What Winning Looks Like
Here’s a letter I sent out to my friends in the Balaton Group from New Delhi, India, where I was recently attending an OECD World Forum and moderating a panel on sustainability. I never thought attending a meeting on national statistics could make me so happy. /Alan Dear friends, I am reporting to you now … Read more
Why I Wrote “Purging Wallace Stevens”
Unfortunately, I was deeply affected by the poetry I loved and/or studied as a university student — Rimbaud, Tagore, Elliot, and so many others. Wallace Stevens was perhaps the most difficult to understand, and I loved his work all the more for that, just as I loved Wittgenstein or Hegel. I really understood very little … Read more
Flummoxed About My Music (plus, a free song)
Update 12 Apr 2013: I wrote this about six months ago, but now, I am no longer feeling so “flummoxed.” The musical path forward is getting much clear. See What Music Means (to Me). I confess: I am flummoxed. (Translation: deeply puzzled about what to do.) Why? Because I don’t know how to reach my … Read more
Jeffrey Sachs: “It’s going to take two generations …”
This morning’s Stockholm Seminar on the new UN Sustainable Development Goals — with Jeffrey Sachs as lead lecturer, accompanied by the Swedish minister for development cooperation, Gunilla Carlsson, and scientists Johan Rockstöm and Måns Nilsson — was not a tonic of hope. Moderator Johan Kuylenstierna did his best to inject a sense of forward motion … Read more
Announcing Two New Books from Alan AtKisson
Now available for purchase online, or for ordering through your favorite bookstore: two new books by Alan AtKisson Because We Believe in the Future: Collected Essays on Sustainability, 1989-2009 is a greatest-hits selection of Alan’s best articles, speeches, and blog posts over a twenty-year period. Woven together by personal commentary, these essays offer the reader … Read more
