Global Innovation. Techno-utopia. Flashes of genius. Social entrepreneurship. Innovation and the future of the US Economy.
All these topics were packed into the first day of The Ideas Economy: Innovation conference at Berkeley co-hosted by The Economist and the Haas Business School at Berkeley.
Program can be found at: http://ideas.economist.com/content/programme
The Economist is setting up a whole new series and approach to their conferences — there are two more coming this year on the Ideas Economy — Human Potential in NY in September and Intelligent Infrastructure also in NY in November.
Yesterday’s line-up of speakers was impressive and today’s is as well. We heard from:
Jared Diamond, UCLA and author of Guns, Germs & Steel
- He offered up 4 great challenges: the possibility of global collapse, global ceilings on resources, the vast inequalities globally that are impossible to maintain and the time-limit — time is ticking on climate, water, energy.
Panel on Building a global innovation society including Larry Brilliant, President, Skoll Global Threats Fund, Roger Martin, Dean of Rotman Business School in Toronto.
- Highlights were: the challenges of communicating risks to citizenry, the uncertainty of decision-making and the time-lag, questioning: where are our great leaders? Discussion of the rise of the city-state — city-states are large enough to have global impact and small enough to know where they belong. Discussion of communities in terms of the move away from independence and the adoption of inter-dependence. Does democracy work in a world that is running out of time? There are not enough people devoting their lives to solving these problems. It is about providing a “non-reductionist” education (Roger from a biz school perspective) where we need to teach adductive logic that helps us create new hypotheses not recycle old ones.
Arianna Huffington, Chief Editor, Huffington Post — Is America a third world country?
- She is writing a book on this topic. The American middle class is being “squeezed” and job growth can’t be based on consumption. Detroit 50% unemployment. Innovation is the only way to job growth. Citizens have a greater role to play — the growth of communitarianism — the longing to be involved in something bigger that transforms the lives of others and our own. Combination of profit and not-for-profit.
To come in Part 2: Ideas in Action: Social Entrepreneurship, Flash of Genius, The world is not flat?, Innovation and the future of the US Economy (with Christina Romer, Chair of the White House Council of Economic Advisers) and reporting on a “Oxford style” debate about whether or not government is an engine of innovation.
If America continues to cling to the suburban asphalt economy of the past. that Ms Huffington was so much of a proponent for, being called regressive will be a compliment. Innovation and progress go hand in hand, they are the only posssible cure…introducing the concept of innovation into the US politics and its economy is the best hope for freedom and democracy around the world.
The Obama administration has started, the Republican’s must get in the race. Innovation, fiscal conservatism, global marketplace engagement must replace unilateral military engagement. That is how ideologues of any religion will be defeated. That is how over time China will no longer hold so much US debt. Innovation will also lessen the choke hold that the Middle East Central Asia now has on the American economy as such a dominant supplier of oil.
I don’t know much about her — sounds like you follow the Huffington Post. What do you think about the health care reform act?