Opening Salvo - Part Two
Optimism remains high that I shall maintain this novel effort. Two points to note, and a trailer.
First point - Brook Lyndhurst (the company I run - see the link to the right) - is not a 'think tank', it's a 'think river'. Tanks are too static, foetid almost, isolated and compressed. The best stuff comes when you move - as the Sundance Kid pointed out. This blog appears to be a tributary; but, a bit like the Amazon, it's difficult to tell precisely which is the main channel.
Second, an 'economy of enough' is something to do with becoming more grown up. When societies are young, they naturally focus on food and shelter and security; as they mature, they become concerned with art and literature. Western societies - or, more precisely, contemporary capitalism - is still predicated on a notion of 'more' that is essentially infantile, almost orally fixated. Isn't time we grew up, acknowledge that we have enough and turn our minds to finer things?
(I'm interested in whether this is the same kind of 'growing up' suggested by Richard Dawkins in "The God Delusion". I'll come back to this later.)
And the trailer? Well, the first thing to which I wish to attend in any depth is the recent epistle from the Strategy Unit at 10 Downing Street, enticingly entitled "Realising Britain's Potential: Future Strategic Challenges for Britain". It came out in February. I've no idea how many people read this kind of thing, but it strikes me that it's precisely the kind of forward-looking, thought-provoking material that the Prime Minister's own personal think-tank should be doing.
But is it any good? And what does it tell us about the state of things?
If you have the strength, check it out at: http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/strategy/work_areas/strategic_challenges0208.aspx
You'll see that they are inviting 'comments'. I shall be preparing comments over the next few days, and posting them here at the same time I send them to Number 10.
Enough for now.
First point - Brook Lyndhurst (the company I run - see the link to the right) - is not a 'think tank', it's a 'think river'. Tanks are too static, foetid almost, isolated and compressed. The best stuff comes when you move - as the Sundance Kid pointed out. This blog appears to be a tributary; but, a bit like the Amazon, it's difficult to tell precisely which is the main channel.
Second, an 'economy of enough' is something to do with becoming more grown up. When societies are young, they naturally focus on food and shelter and security; as they mature, they become concerned with art and literature. Western societies - or, more precisely, contemporary capitalism - is still predicated on a notion of 'more' that is essentially infantile, almost orally fixated. Isn't time we grew up, acknowledge that we have enough and turn our minds to finer things?
(I'm interested in whether this is the same kind of 'growing up' suggested by Richard Dawkins in "The God Delusion". I'll come back to this later.)
And the trailer? Well, the first thing to which I wish to attend in any depth is the recent epistle from the Strategy Unit at 10 Downing Street, enticingly entitled "Realising Britain's Potential: Future Strategic Challenges for Britain". It came out in February. I've no idea how many people read this kind of thing, but it strikes me that it's precisely the kind of forward-looking, thought-provoking material that the Prime Minister's own personal think-tank should be doing.
But is it any good? And what does it tell us about the state of things?
If you have the strength, check it out at: http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/strategy/work_areas/strategic_challenges0208.aspx
You'll see that they are inviting 'comments'. I shall be preparing comments over the next few days, and posting them here at the same time I send them to Number 10.
Enough for now.
[If there's a photo down here it was added
August 2017 as part of blog refresh. Photo is either mine or is linked to
where I found it. Make of either what you will.]
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