Schumacher College Interview: John Croft

John Croft taught at the Schumacher College this February as part of the course Climate Change: Seeing the whole picture. Between activities we met and spent some time discussing climate change, how it is challenging course participants and the word at large.

Q: Taking a holistic look at environmental and social sustainability, what should the place of activism on climate change be amongst any number of pressing concerns?

Concern about climate change is integrative. Social, economic and environmental issues have been considered silos, as disciplines within walls. Climate change touches everything and has the ability to break down barriers between disciplines. Climate change also brings history back into consideration. There are periods which have experienced climate change before. These help us see things in a larger perspective.

We see apathy around issues such as climate change. Activists assume more information is needed. The problem actually is the inability to deal with emotions that information evokes. People are afraid of negative emotions, so suppress emotions and deny the positive emotions. An integrative future would be one, if handled properly, which would integrate the emotional, intellectual and practical. A full range of emotions imparts reason. Energy that would have been involved in denial is then available for action.

Q: What do you see are the biggest challenges for your course participants, those you have worked with this week, in challenging climate change in their activities?

Climate change is propelling us towards a period of unpredictability. The pace of change, good and bad, is accelerating. And what it is doing, is creating a time of emerging ambiguity. We are at a tipping point in human culture. Small changes can have a huge impact. The challenge for course participants is to use this, to be creative and flexible. The best way to meet this future is to create flexibility, create resilience.

The difficulties of the world get externalised and we tend to look to groups to blame. We need to move beyond groups of people. Economics values scarcity. Look into the eyes of the person next to you – there is only one of them in the universe. So, respect each other deeply. Reach out and build a community.

strong>Q: What three things should the general public do to challenge climate change?

Three things: Mitigation, adaptation, alleviation of suffering. The more we mitigate the less we do other two. If not, as a world community, then we will need to adapt more, if not sufficiently, we will need to increasingly alleviate suffering. In reality we will likely need to do some of all three. It depends on us what the proportions are.

Don’t be ethnocentric about this. Impacts of the human world reach further than just the human world. The ecology of the body is the same as ecology of the world. The water in our bodies is the same as that in the oceans. The air we all breathe is the same air. But also, it is important that we build fun and celebration in what we do, show appreciation and gratitude for the things around us. We should not just focus on the dark but on the light too.

Interviewer: Anna Lodge, Schumacher College, March ’07

Biography of John Croft – “here“http://www.schumachercollege.org.uk/ShortCourses/Short_Course_Teachers.html#Climate

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