World Ark Magazine - January/February 2008 - (Page 8) ASKED & ANSWERED C O M M U N I T Y M AT T E R S A Wake-Up Call from author David Korten Author David Korten helped birth a new way of thinking with When Corporations Rule the World, a look at the destructive powers of global corporations. In his new book, The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community, Korten argues that corporations are only one manifestation of a system in which a small ruling class holds the power and controls the resources. Korten argues that if humans are to have a future, we must instigate a new era based on equity, sustainability and partnership. Interview by Austin Gelder | WORLD ARK ASSOCIATE EDITOR WA: What’s the most important message you want readers to take from your new book? Korten: Current human knowledge and technology create the possibility to turn a potentially terminal human crisis into an epic opportunity. It is now within our means to unleash human potentials for cooperation and creativity that the cultures and institutions of Empire have suppressed and denied for five millennia— and every person has a role. WA: For whom did you write The Great Turning? Who would benefit most from reading it? Korten: Millions of people want to make a positive contribution to creating a world that works for all. I wrote it for them—for everyone who wants to know why we are in our present mess and what we must do to get it right. WA: How does your new book differ from When Corporations Rule the World? Korten: The historical framework of Corporations goes back to the founding of the British East India Company in 1600. The Great Turning, which takes a perspective of more than 5,000 years, yields far deeper insights into where we have gone wrong as a species. In Corporations, I focused on exposing how the legal structure of publicly traded global corporations concentrates unimaginable economic power without democratic accountability, strips decision making of normal human sensibility and actively rewards greed and violence at the expense of people and nature. The Great Turning expands on and goes beyond this structural dysfunction to explore the deeper psychological, cultural and spiritual roots of our crisis. Continuing reports of egregiously unethical conduct at high levels compelled me to recognize that the behavior of many of our most powerful political and corporate officeholders fits the clinical definition of the psychopath or sociopath. The psychopath or sociopath can appear to be very charming, but lacks any 8 January/February 2008 | WORLD ARK www.heifer.org http://www.heifer.org
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