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Capitalism
A Brief History Of The Sun
The first issue of The Sun came out in January 1974. The war in Vietnam was winding down, and Richard M. Nixon would soon resign the presidency. It was also the height of the energy crisis. The OPEC oil cartel had raised prices, resulting in lines at gas stations and debates about reducing dependence on Middle Eastern oil. So when Sy Safransky and coeditor Mike Mathers were deciding on a topic for the first issue of their new magazine, they chose “Energy.”
January 2004
The Sun Turns Thirty
An Unlikely Story
Step into any coffeehouse in any college town across the country, and you’ll find a couple of small, independent publications stacked by the door. . . . They publish a few issues and then disappear, or, rarely, last a year or two before becoming just a memory in the minds of a handful of locals. Now try to imagine that, thirty years from now, one of those odd little publications will still exist. Even more improbable: imagine that it will have found tens of thousands of readers all around the country.
January 2004
Sunbeams
April 2002You may break any written law in America with impunity. There is an unwritten law that you break at your peril. It is: do not attack the profit system.
Down To Business
Paul Hawken On Reshaping The Economy
I don’t believe you can train anybody, especially people in business. You can only present and embody ideas. I try to help people understand the idea that valuing and conserving our stock of natural capital can lead to astonishing breakthroughs in processes, products, and design. Again, people move toward possibility. Once they see that we can actually improve the quality of life for everyone on earth by using radically less “life,” they get excited.
April 2002Driven By Desire
George Draffan On Why the Global Economy Won’t Satisfy Us
How can I be a responsible citizen while participating in an international market? Even if my intent is to do good, I can have only the slightest knowledge of the impacts of my consumption. I can’t know what injustice or ecological destruction the manufacture and purchase of my computer, for example, has wreaked. I’ve had no contact with the women in Thailand who will get cancer from putting hard drives together. It is impossible to understand all the social and environmental impacts of a computer made in a dozen different countries.
December 2001I Am Bangkok Ut
“Sawadeekah. I am Ut. Number 32.” I have been saying this for two years now. Two longlonglong years. Enough to grow a callus in my private part.
October 2001
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