We grow connectedness!
The vision for creating Economics for Peace Institute began as the response to an unshakeable query. The question posed: What would good look like?What would it take for local people to be a part of public decision making in real terms?
Economics for Peace Institute advances neutral, science-based, participatory research strategies to improve public decision-making. We are an environmental policy think tank conducting both basic and applied research. Specifically, we connect electeds and people with fieldwork that makes sense! The Institute places particular importance on place-based indicators of community well-being and ecosystem stewardship.
START UP HIGHLIGHTS
The organization officially registered in the state of Colorado soon after President Obama’s election in January 2009. He’d just written his first memorandum of office in support of transparency, open governance and participation.
The founder drafted core values and associate agreements. Advisors and the Board of Directors formulated our governing bylaws and mission statement.
Economics for Peace Institute, a nonprofit, works globally through education, research and economic development to build peace, foster sustainability, and restore the Earth’s natural systems. The Institute’s work is measured by local people for its social benefits, its economic fairness and its ability to preserve ecosystems for future generations.
With international volunteer expertise, talented associates crafted the “out of the box” dove logo.
We quickly grew into an organization of over twenty very talented volunteers. Highly-trained and insightful people became involved because they saw that tangible steps could be taken to strengthen public involvement. We began partnership agreements with leading conservation and sustainability research centers.
Soon later, in 2009, we attracted a workshop in Portland funded by the USFS NW attracted academics and high-ranking federal administrators from across the country. In 2010, Myriem and three Institute associates presented at ecr.gov 2010 conference. At that time, NEPA reform was considered important.
We engaged in strategic planning, formulated operational budgets and received ongoing regional support. Our organizational acronym is | epi |, pronounced “ehpee” like the epicenter of an earthquake. With the advent of web 2.0, we proposed the “| epi | center” – a hub for opensource solutions and best practice in participatory research translated into the lexicon of governance in the United States.
However, a sabbatical of one summer in 2010 turned into several years. Our founder became participant observer in the surging local food, upcycle and natural building movements. Read update to learn more.
Starting Anew
With a keen focus on getting back to work, the current Board of Directors formed in the Fall of 2015.
In 2016, our work was referenced in a significant peer reviewed anthology, The Environment in Anthropology (Second Edition): A Reader in Ecology, Culture, and Sustainable Living, edited by Nora Haenn, Allison Harnish, Richard Wilk and published by NYU Press.
Now in 2017, we launch the Guild for Social Fieldwork. Our goals remain to sustain our work through revenues from training workshops for regional and federal planners. Now instead of being the “epicenter,” we’ve created the Guild and this site as an opensoure DIY hub for social fieldwork and support!
We plan to update the Institute’s website built in Drupal. First, we begin with an exploration of an alternative web development platform: WordPress.
TOWARDS A NEW ECONOMICS
A new economics depends on social fieldwork. With community-based indicators or well-being and ecosystem stewardship, we as citizens and planners can better design development projects to restore and protect the values we most cherish. Socio-cultural research is critical to this quest.
Good decisions arise from good information and we simply are groping in the dark with reductionist metrics. We need to gather ourselves in the place we enjoy and share together until such time as we are crystal clear on what is important. Let’s focus as communities in every circle of these communities bridging the divide and talking deeply about community well-being and ecosystem stewardship. We will learn and practice what it takes to converse effectively and with wisdom. We will learn to listen with purpose.
We grow connectedness!
The Institute has for focus the connections and interrelationships. If we pay attention, we can restore our awareness of those connections.
We promote community well-being and ecosystem stewardship as the foundation of an economy that works!
Let’s connect across socially-constructed, jargon-driven divides – most of which is nonsense. That means it makes no sense. As humans, our best gift is making sense of things. Let’s be human. We need to connect across the gender and class divide. We need to connect across the historic, cultural and color divides. It doesn’t matter much anymore who did what to whom? We have to figure out what we all actually share in common. We need to connect on what matters, like community well-being and ecosystem stewardship.
Cornerstones
Nourish the Soil | Do Social Fieldwork to get Real Local Input
Spread the Seeds | Unite our Understanding with Local Indicators of Quality of Life
The Institute’s vision is to nourish the soil and spread the seeds of a new political economy – a democratically run economy that encourages the restoration of our morale, our welfare, our good will, peace among all people and a sustainable future on this beautiful planet we call our home, our mother, and from whom we draw life.