Fall | Winter 2010

The Kingdom of Mustang, one of the last remaining sanctuaries of ancient Tibetan Buddhist culture, is located on the north-central border of Nepal and Tibet. From September 15 to October 1, 2010, a small group of trekkers will follow the ancient trails of trade marked by mani walls, chortens and monasteries on our way to Lo Manthang, the walled capital of Mustang, where the King of Mustang continues to reign over this tiny Tibetan Buddhist kingdom.

The commons is the main focus of a group of collaborators from around the world called Commons Action for the United Nations. We are bringing awareness of our shared ecological and social resources— our commons—to UN policy and programs. Our goal is to highlight the necessity of commoning processes, where people at local levels claim sovereignty over the resources they depend on for their livelihoods and quality of life.

The recent BP oil spill was a huge disaster, yet the Gulf of Mexico has long been an abused ecosystem. For decades, the Mississippi River has drained pollutants into the Gulf from nitrogen rich cornfields, chemically-treated golf courses, oil-polluted parking lots and sewage runoff. The Gulf is home to a huge and aging oil/chemicals infrastructure, including nearly 4,000 drilling and production platforms. Critical habitat for shrimp and fish is jammed together with heavy industry. Believing they need both industry and habitat, the loyalties of the local people are often conflicted: their voices often silenced. To re-energize them, new ideas are needed.

On a gorgeous sunny morning the Kosmos team drove 30 minutes south to meet new economist Susan Witt on the picturesque grounds of the community land trust in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. She greeted us at the car and showed us inside the New Economics Institute’s rustic office building to a light-filled room with rows of bookshelves. Susan co-founded the BerkShares local currency program in 2006 and has watched as this experiment in community empowerment has garnered international media attention. Since putting the currency into circulation, the BerkShares website has received more than 7 million hits—an impressive number even before you consider that the institute has a staff of just three. About $2.6M BerkShares are invigorating the financial bloodstream of the Berkshires, Susan’s home region, and the program’s goal is steadfastly being realized. BerkShares provides a model to other progressive communities around the world that want to establish their own more self-sufficient, independent, resilient and sustainable economies.

Myanmar—Burma—is unlike anyplace I have seen before, even in extensive travels on four continents. It’s a land of contradictions, breathtakingly beautiful and vibrant, yet poor and isolated. A former British colony, and under Japanese occupation during the second World War, the country has been run by a military dictatorship since 1962, and has been virtually closed to interaction with the outside world.

Maude Barlow gave this stirring plenary speech, full of hope even in the face of ecological disasters, to the Environmental Grantmakers Association annual retreat in Pacific Grove, California. Barlow, a former UN Senior Water Advisor, is National Chairperson of the Council of Canadians and founder of the Blue Planet Project.

It was so fulfilling to spend several days with a dedicated and skilled group at the first Global Synergizer gathering. Our collective work continues as we strive to articulate the shared vision that has brought us together as world changers.

Nicanor Perlas, a dynamic advocate and activist, has altered the course of national and global events over the past 30 years and has influenced the lives of millions. He has organized numerous civil society movements to challenge oppressive structures in the Philippines and to create a more just, sustainable and nuclear-free society.

Images and Voices of Hope (IVOH) is an organization that celebrates media professionals who are bearers of hope and brighten the sense of possibilities in all of us. Their goal is to host reflective conversations—about 50 so far—on the impact of images and stories portrayed in the global media.

The fall of the Soviet Union initiated a new passage of American identity. Then the 9/11 War took us a long way down the road to journey’s end. This passage is also a migration. America has not simply abandoned one collective identity for another; we have become a different people, a different idea.