Greening Economics

by greenspacewriter 08/01/2012

The opening ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics illustrated, among other things, one of the most impactful and significant movements of Western civilization: the industrial revolution. Much like the staged interpretation demonstrated, the agrarian society of the past as to be stripped away gradually in order to make way for the upcoming industrialized society.

While this fundamental transition laid the groundwork for a culture that would embrace innovative technologies father than shun them, agrarian culture was, subsequently, pushed out to the margins of the social consciousness. What was once a world driven by an agricultural economy, rapidly became less and less rooted in the land.

For the past couple of decades, in particular, the internet and steady stream of new technological advances has led to a certain “industrial revolution 2.0.” No doubt, the concept of GreenspaceNYC would not have been born without the Web 2.0 movement.

Like all change, modernization has left society, especially the millennials, it seems, with a certain nostalgia for simpler times. That is not to say, by any means, that most would elect to trade in their smartphone for a horse or internet access for a farm. Instead, we’ve reconciled the agricultural with the industrial via the exponentially popular concept of a “green economy”: a system of sustainable growth and development that accounts for natural resource constraints and conservation.

While the question of how to successfully execute this sort of economic model on a global scale still stands, small steps towards maintaining a sustainable economic structure are being made, as shown by the UN’s attempt at the Rio+20 conference. Although the US economy’s current situation appears bleak, could green economics be the key to a brighter future?

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