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Y2K Environmental/Sustainability materials




Articles concerned directly with environmentalism

 

Perhaps the most potentially catastrophic consequence of Y2K would be major nuclear power plant accidents, nuclear bomb explosions, or toxic releases. Please see our Y2K Toxics/Nukes page.

Why the Year 2000 Problem is an Environmental Issue by Tom Atlee. A broad overview of a dozen major opportunities and dangers that Y2K presents to the environmental and sustainability movements (as well as all the rest of us!). See also:


The social/ environmental implications of Y2K by David La Chapelle

Y2KO:  the Year 2000 Computer Crash -- Knock Out for Industrial Society Or Merely a Global Depression? by Mark Robinowitz - a strong progressive introduction to Y2K, unique in its description of environmental disaster possibilities and what could be done to prevent them. Includes links and quotes.



Broad social visions relevant to environmentalism and sustainability

Strategizing for Community: Preparedness for Y2K-induced collapse

The Year 2000 Problem and Sustainability by Tom Atlee. An extensive description of the kinds of things communities could do to prepare sustainably for Y2K.

Let's Use Y2K as a Doorway to Resilience and Renewal by Tom Atlee. Adventures in a permaculture site provide insights into the nature of resilience and how to build it in communities facing Y2K. From Just in Case: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Y2K Crisis, Edited by Michael Brownlee, Barbara Stahura and Robert Yehling. (Origin Press, 1999, $16.95)

Sustainability, Y2K, and the New World Order by Thomas Greco. We are about to enter a metamorphosis into a partnership-based integral culture.

Protecting Ithaca from Computer Chaos by Paul Glover. A description of how one town could meet the Y2K crisis with planning and action for sustainability.

Y2K and Our Big Bet by Larry Shook provides exciting evidence that we can establish decentralized, sustainable agriculture and energy systems throughout the U.S., if we just decide to do it in time. Actually, there's a whole page on this site of articles about sustainable agriculture and Y2K.

How to Think about Y2K -- for those who realize it is going to be a pretty big deal and who've always wanted a better world by Tom Atlee. Because the structures of "business-as-usual" will probably be seriously interrupted by Y2K, there is an opportunity to "move the rudder" of our civilization towards community, resilience, justice and sustainability. This article outlines why and how this can be done.

 

Action-oriented articles

The Year 2000 Problem: An Opportunity to Build Sustainable Community


Eight Steps to U.S. Y2K Food Security: An Open Letter to President Clinton by Carla Emery. In this letter Emery, who has been telling people how to get back to nature since the '70's, offers a detailed and do-able plan to prepare for Y2k and reduce starvation and panic. And since government may not follow her advice, she's starting to link farmers to citizens, herself.

A call for a progressive Y2K Agenda (in progress) by Tom Atlee. Liberals and progressives have a vested interest in how the Y2K crisis unfolds. Very good or very bad things might happen. This article describes those dynamics and how they play out in each of more than a dozen progressive issues -- from sustainability to feminism, from workers' rights to spirituality.

Your unique role in addressing Y2K by Tom Atlee. With Y2K, interconnectedness is both the problem and the solution. Find out how your connections and capabilities are the key to addessing this issue.

Y2K Movement Analysis and Recommendations by Laurence Victor. This book-length manuscript describes what it would take to midwife a new, sustainable post-Y2K civilization that is prepared for more collective challenges in the coming century (such as radical global climate change). Victor poses the need for personal and group learning and co-evolution, as well as task-orientation. He includes deep theoretical material as well as extensive programmatic recommendations. A must-read for activists.

The Challenge of Nurturing Self-Organized Y2K Responses is Tom Atlee's analysis of the dynamics used by the Y2K movement to organize itself.

All Together Now: The "Y2K Neighborhood" takes on the "Millennium Computer Bomb" by Larry Shook. This article is as emotionally compelling and inspiring as the Petersen/Wheatley/Rogers piece is convincing and visionary. This is what it feels like on the inside, to wake up to the reality of Y2K. Shook explores how the media has missed this remarkable story of human challenge and human healing that is unfolding in our communities.

Y2K Questions for Campaigning Politicians and Elected Government Officials


Y2K-relevant Sustainable Technologies


Other Y2K/environment-related articles

"Rachel's Environmental & Health Weekly" Y2K Summary - A good overview of the facts of Y2K by a respected environmental research journal.

The Vegetarian Approach to Food Shortages Associated with Y2K by Mark Warren Reinhardt, author of The Perfectly Contented Meat-Eater's Guide to Vegetarianism

Learn how to build healthy soil by composting human waste with informational links from The World of Composting Toilets. Although it may seem a bit odd at first, all human waste can be safely composted to create healthy soil in which to grow food. There exists a good amount of literature on the subject.

Monsanto's Genetically Modified Seeds Threaten World Food Production


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