The Great Turning Summit
A radically different World Economic Forum from those seeking to expand growth economics despite ever-expanding collateral damage to the Earth, humanity, and whole cultures, this unprecedented event would evolve a re-defined context of commerce intended specifically to heal our entire global malaise
Q1: Given that we know "context produces circumstances" and in light of Einstein's proposition that "we can't solve a problem by using the same kind of thinking that we produced it" ... isn't it time to re-examine the existing context upon which we have built the organizational structure and systems that have brought us to the threshold of a set of circumstances that clearly is jeopardizing life on Earth?
Beneath the entirety of our global malaise from climate change & peak oil, to poverty related issues, environmental, cultural degradation - and certainly global conflict - doesn't all of this sit fundamentally on the doorstep of how we have practiced commerce & our attitude toward Life?
Idea Description
Upon viewing “An Inconvenient Truth” and PBS interviews of Bill and Melinda Gates and Warren Buffet by Charlie Rose, I sensed our global malaise arises as “collateral damage” of something we have yet to address and speak whole truth about. It thus seems we have a critical need and transformational possibility in these times to merge efforts to address climate change and global philanthropy with a paradigm-shifting commitment to redirect the very source of the forces driving these circumstances – i.e., the very context of how we practice commerce, and from which politics and education serve it.
What will you do if you win $10,000 for this idea?
Create a professional, compelling invitation to forward thinking leaders such as: His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Mata Amritanandamayi Devi (Amma), Nelson Mandela, Bishop Desmond Tutu, Kofi Annan, Former UN Asst Secretary General Robert Mueller, Former President Carter/The Carter Foundation, Former President Bill Clinton, Al Gore, Senator Barack Obama, Bill & Melinda Gates/Gates Foundation, Angelina Jolie & Brad Pitt/Jolie-Pitt Foundation, Warren Buffet, Lester Brown/The Earth Policy Institute, Laurie David/StopGlobalWarming.org, Bono/The One Campaign, Christine Naylor/Results.org, Noam Chomsky, Hazel Henderson, Herman Daly, Jeffrey Sachs, Joanna Macy, Mark Anielski, et al
Vote for it now.
Would this be an assembly of national heads of state or ambassadors? If so, I think that you shold begin by petitioning your congressman. This may seem small, but it helps to have an advocate in the federal government. This is not a 'venture' per say, but it is an idea that will need a marketing effort as well as a business plan. I think you should partner with come economists and other academic to craft the format and to discuss the feasibility of what you have in mind. Here are a few links to get you started. These are other economic forums that you could model yourself after or differentiate from.
http://www.weforum.org/en/initiatives/gcp/Global%20Competitiveness%20Report/index.htm
http://www.leg.state.nv.us/lcb/fiscal/Economic%20Forum/
You could start smaller with your state or city. This would give you an opportunity to focus your ideas before your idea scales.