UNCONVENTIONAL The Natural Evolution of the Green Movement T
HE MEETINGS INDUSTRY IS RECYCLING, IT’S IMPLEMENTING CSR ACTIVITIES, AND IT’S pursuing LEED certification for venues large and small. So what’s next? In a recent article for the nonprofit Project for Public Spaces (PPS), Ethan Kent, PPS’s vice president, offers
a vision for “reinventing environmentalism with placemaking” — which is “the common-sense process through which the human places we most value are created and sustained.” Below is a chart from Kent’s article that outlines how such a reinvention might play out:
Current Environmental Agenda Minimize impact
Enlightened consumers Sustainability: sustain life
Design repairs the environment Celebrate nature as objects
Technical solutions for existing systems Emphasis on cost benefits and creativity Ecological capital
New Environmental Agenda Maximize quality of life and environment
Engaged citizens Creativity: enhance life Design serves ecosystems and communities
Celebrate nature as something of which we are part Develop new creative systems for broader solutions Emphasis on resilience and natural abundance Place capital
ON_THE_WEB: To read Ethan Kent’s article in its entirety, visit www.pps.org /articles/place making-as-a-new -environmentalism. To read Convene’s
Leading by Example profile of Fred Kent, PPS’s founder and president, visit http://bit.ly/k7BYBE.