...the core values that underpin sustainable development - interdependence, empathy, equity, personal responsibility and intergenerational justice - are the only foundation upon which any viable vision of a better world can possibly be constructed
Interpretation
Sustainable development relies on core values like empathy and responsibility for building a better future.
This quote emphasizes the fundamental values necessary for sustainable development, arguing that principles like interdependence and intergenerational justice are crucial for fostering a better world. It suggests that without these values, any attempt to create a sustainable and equitable future will lack a solid foundation and ultimately be ineffective.
In practice
In a speech about climate change, one might quote this to emphasize the ethical responsibilities we have towards future generations.
The collapse of the world's banking system and the impending disaster of accelerating climate change are not separate phenomena. They are simply the most visible symptoms of a particular model of capitalism that will bring civilisation to its knees. But those symptoms will not get sorted unless and until we commit to a radical transformation of the way we create and distribute wealth in the world today
We're never going to scare people into living more sustainably! We have to be able to demonstrate just how dynamic and aspirational such a world could be
Any regeneration project that fails to put environmental and social benefits at its very heart is unlikely to achieve anything more than a very short-lived spasm of spurious prosperity
As more and more people wake up to the fact that further growth does not necessarily bring improvements in quality of life (and often exactly the opposite), sustainability is going to become one of the key characteristics with which places want to be associated.
The future will be green, or not at all
Perfect freedom is as necessary to the health and vigor of commerce as it is to the health and vigor of citizenship.
And what is liberty, whose very name makes the heart beat faster and shakes the world? Is it not the union of all liberties - liberty of conscience, of education, of association, of the press, of travel, or labor, or trade?
One of the marks of a certain type of bad man is that he cannot give up a thing himself without wanting everyone else to give it up.
I certainly believe that we have a moral obligation to care for the dogs, cats, and other nonhumans whose existence we have caused or facilitated as part of the institution of 'pet' ownership. But I maintain that we ought to abolish the institution and stop causing or facilitating the existence of more 'companion' animals.
An image of thought called philosophy has been formed historically and it effectively stops people from thinking.
The world has a soul and whoever understands that soul can also understand the language of many things.
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