Abstract: 
Historically, deep structural change in society has originated either from charisma or from crisis.  Since charismatic leaders seem to arise only once in several hundred years, for most transformative change we have to depend on crises.  Indeed, the economist Milton Friedman is reputed, to have said “A crisis is a terrible thing to waste”.  Although the ends for which he sought transformations were the polar opposite of what I believe is needed for a healthy and truly prosperous society, he did get the means right in an age deprived of the true mahatmas who can bring about a new societal paradigm. 

The crises of today are the life-threatening products of grossly flawed intellectual and ethical choices that we have made in our search for “development” over the past few centuries — particularly during recent decades.  Paradoxically though admittedly most tragically, they are also the life-saving rafts that could in principle bring us in to the safe harbour of a green, equitable and universally prosperous economy.  Despite the mindsets of those who make decisions at the highest levels, with their interests so deeply vested in the status quo, it is now a matter of civilizational, human and planetary survival that we urgently and fundamentally change, and in many cases turn upside down, the assumptions and practices of both the “science” and praxis of economics.

About the Speaker
Since 1982, Chairman of the Development Alternatives Group, the world’s first social enterprise dedicated to sustainable development.  Innovation by the nonprofit DA, and incubation and market delivery by the commercial affiliate, TARA create sustainable, scalable consumption and production solutions in rural India.  Earlier, after faculty positions at Harvard, Ashok Khosla became Director of the Indian Government’s first Environment Office and then Director of Infoterra in UNEP.  He has been Co-Chair of the UN’s International Resource Panel, President of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and President of the Club of Rome.  He was a member of the Government of India’s National Security Advisory Board and Scientific Advisory Council to the Cabinet and was awarded the OBE by the UK Government, the UN’s Sasakawa Environment Prize, UAE’s Zayed International Environment Prize, WWF’s Duke of Edinburgh Medal and the Award for Outstanding Social Entrepreneur by the Schwab Foundation. He has an MA from Cambridge University and a PhD in Experimental Physics from Harvard University.