Memo39+Political+Implications--sferguson

I have a bad feeling about the implications for my own political future. If I am in fact complexifying what sustainability is, what is has become, what it is trying to be and what advocates are failing to account for it seems as if I am undermining the drive for sustainability. In part I think this depends on how I write the book. I could criticize social movements for failing to account for how their message is translated and/or appropriated, thus undermining the success of their efforts. I could criticize policy makers for failing to advance the technologies and infrastructure necessary for sustainability to have any hope of not being green washed. I could criticize industry members, even the greenest ones, for failing to take into account how the characteristics that they design into their products have impacts beyond the initial purchaser.

Neither of these options would endear me to their community nor prove effective as stand alone criticisms. What happens when I focus on all of them? If all goes well different communities would have something akin to blueprints for how to begin to deal with a) construction of consumer goods and b) how to manage these goods once they are out in the market. Developing the stories of New York, U.S. broadly, and Germany offers comparative fodder for discourse on how to proceed in the management of new and existing technologies through the interventions of social movements, advocacy organizations, industry leaders, political figures, and individual public citizens. What I would like to see is a porting of Germany's (and the EU somewhat generally) stance on the manufacturing of consumer goods and the strict standards they must meet for reduction in resources used, low toxicity, and ease of following the three R's. I'd also like to see the porting of the vast infrastructure and cultural behaviour surrounding waste. The invisibility of waste is a problem in the States, and most places generally, making the public understanding of its collaborative actions nearly impossible to comprehend.