A Better World - 03/07/11

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Mitchell's guest today is Dr. David C. Korten, who most recently authored Agenda for A New Economy. David worked for more than thirty-five years in preeminent business, academic, and international development institutions before he turned away from the establishment to work exclusively with public interest citizen-action groups. He is the co-founder and board chair of YES! Magazine, the founder and president of The People-Centered Development Forum, a board member of the Business Alliance for Local Living Economies, an associate of the International Forum on Globalization, and a member of the Club of Rome. He is co-chair of the New Economy Working Group formed in 2008 to formulate and advance a new economy agenda.

Korten earned his MBA and Ph.D. degrees at the Stanford University Graduate School of Business. Trained in organization theory, business strategy, and economics, he devoted his early career to setting up business schools in low-income countries—starting with Ethiopia—in the hope that creating a new class of professional business entrepreneurs who would be the key to ending global poverty. He completed his military service during the Vietnam War as a captain in the U.S. Air Force, with duty at the Special Air Warfare School, Air Force headquarters command, the Office of the Secretary of Defense, and the Advanced Research Projects Agency.

Korten then served for five and a half years as a faculty member of the Harvard University Graduate School of Business, where he taught in Harvard’s middle management, MBA, and doctoral programs and served as Harvard’s adviser to the Central American Management Institute in Nicaragua. He subsequently joined the staff of the Harvard Institute for International Development, where he headed a Ford Foundation–funded project to strengthen the organization and management of national family planning programs.

David Korten's work is becoming increasingly vital as we transition from an old-world economic paradigm that has allowed for intense, irresponsible and rapacious abuse the majority of people worldwide by a mere 2% of the population controlling 50% of the planet's assets, to one that is based on local, cooperative economies with multiple-bottom-lines which include humane and eco-friendly/sustainable business practices.

Tune in for what will be a dynamic discussion about the future direction of the economy once people begin to localize and humanize it.

David was a guest on A Better World TV in 1996 which many of you may have seen-as it is aired periodically on MNN.