Jonathon Porrit on Climate Change
March 27, 2008 Posted by Kevin in : Bristol , add a commentJonathon Porritt is Programme Director of Forum for the Future and Chairman of the UK Sustainable Development Commission. He is an internationally respected writer, broadcaster and commentator on sustainable development, and writes regularly on the agenda in his blog.
In this recent interview on Local Gov TV he outlines how the Climate Change Bill will impact Local Authorities across the country, in particular, how the Carbon Reduction Commitment will require Councils to manage carbon allowances and make operational adjustments.
Lords of the Blog
March 21, 2008 Posted by Andy in : Bristol , 1 comment so farFor my final post I thought I’d point you to “Lords of the Blog” - a group effort by nine members of the House of Lords. As Shane says, it’s a dreadful name, but the content is pretty interesting.
Since I got the link from Shane, I should mention CivicSurf, the new name for his project that was until recently called Councillor 2.0.
Thanks to Stephen and Kevin for opening up the site to me for a week. I’ll go back to blogging at my normal spot here. Alternatively, I put links to the interesting things I find on my del.icio.us account. (If you don’t use del.icio.us, I’d really recommend signing up for an account. You can save your bookmarks there, but it comes into its own when you start building the network, because you can see what others are looking at too. It’s one of the few sites I check every day.)
Next week, things get closer to home as Makala blogs the opening of the Knowle West Media Centre. (**EDIT: Makala will be blogging week commencing 31st March)
Have a great Easter.
Why e-democracy matters
March 20, 2008 Posted by Andy in : Bristol , add a commentOne of the criticisms of e-democracy initiatives - for example, politicians using sites like Youtube - is that they represent a society dumbing down, disengaging with policy and embracing trivia.
Then you see what’s happening in the current US election.
In the last 24 hours, Barack Obama’s speech on race in American politics has received over 1.6m views on Youtube.
It’s 40 minutes long, sophisticated and almost entirely lacking in soundbites.
But perhaps an even better example of where we could be going is shown by this next video. What starts with a familiar setup - a vox-pop of a supporter being challenged about their candidate - turns into a real discussion of policy.
If you were editing TV news, you’d chop this off after 20 seconds. You wouldn’t think there was any appetite for this. It’s two guys, neither an expert, talking passionately about healthcare.
But this video has been viewed a million times.
Maybe Youtube videos, blogging MPs and online petitions don’t represent dumbing-down and trivia. Maybe they should be seen as what they are; experiments that could lead to more engaging, more meaningful and more inclusive politics.
Maybe we might end up talking about politics - as Jon Stewart said yesterday - like grown ups.
American Apparel: Legalise LA*
March 19, 2008 Posted by Andy in : Bristol , add a commentReading a magazine on the train last night, I came across this ad for American Apparel:
I thought was really strong and provocative. Whilst campaigning businesses aren’t new, it’s still rare to see a company come out and take a strong position on an “unpopular” issue like immigration reform, making a direct call for legislation and calling the status quo “an apartheid system”. It’s also rare for a business to take a stand like this without a charity or NGO partner sharing the headline.
Now, of course, there are likely to be benefits as well as risks in a campaign like this, but in this article one interviewee notes how “startling” it is to see an advocacy campaign run by a business that advocates for its workers rather than its customers.
You could change the logo at the bottom and this campaign could have come from an NGO or a charity.
Do you think it’s more or less powerful because it comes from a business? Do you think it will be taken more or less seriously by the public and policymakers as a result?
(*Now I know that it’s a US campaign, so strictly I should spell it “Legalize”, but I realised that in a previous post, I used the American plural “trade unions” rather than the proper English “trades union” and I am trying to balance things out.)
