admin July 1st, 2008
Why is it that “energy independence” is embraced by the left and right, but you never even hear anyone utter the phrase “food independence?”
Read Frances’s new Huffington Post blog, a response to the idea of “hoarding food,” as most recently seen in The New York Times article “Hoarding Nations Drive Food Costs Ever Higher.”
Read (and comment on) the post here.
admin July 1st, 2008
At Small Planet we love to hear about co-travelers of Living Democracy. Accounts of their origins and recent triumphs are always inspiring. We call these “Stories from the Edge,” and we will be sharing them here with you.
Here is the second, from our friends at the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy.
Recently the
admin June 30th, 2008
Below you’ll find a short Brattleboro Reformer article which answers that very question, giving an overview of Frances’ work and ideas and an update on what she is doing these days.
People creating change
This is a year filled with as much possibility as peril for our nation. However, what needs to be remembered is that the presidential election in November will not change anything by itself.
We had a chance recently to talk to author and democracy activist Frances Moore Lappé, who is busy these days spreading the word that, as she puts it, “hope is a verb.”
Continue reading here.
admin June 24th, 2008
KUOW 94.9 FM recently put up a podcast of Frances giving a talk at the Elliott Bay Book Company (Seattle) where she explained the power of ideas asking, for example, why there could be hunger in our world of plenty. Frances boils down her ideas clearly and engagingly, always with the desire to share and learn. Listen to her talk about the ideas behind Getting a Grip here:
admin June 17th, 2008
It’s been quite a month for Frances. If you’ve been following this blog, then you know she won the James Beard Foundation’s Humanitarian of the Year Award, and has a done a good deal of high-profile and wonderful indy press. In addition, her latest book, Getting a Grip, has been named the winner of the Gold/”Best in Small Press” Nautilus Award this year.
Frances shares the honor with some fine company. You’ll find a list of the other honorees here.
And to see more of the recent coverage of Frances, Getting a Grip, and her ongoing work as an author, food and world-hunger expert, and “Living Democracy” advocate, just scroll down — and keep coming back.
admin June 17th, 2008
Who is Frances Moore Lappe? What inspired her to write her bestselling book Diet for a Small Planet?
This video, featuring her daughter and food justice activist Anna Lappé, son Anthony Lappé and Nobel Prize winner Wangari Maathai, is a great introduction to Frankie’s life and work. Our very special thanks to David Bowen, Susan Ungaro, and Jorge Garcia-Spitz and Linton Media.
admin June 17th, 2008
Frances Moore Lappé
James Beard Foundation Humanitarian of the Year Award
2008, Avery Fisher Hall, Lincoln Center
Thank you my friend
With this award I feel affirmed in an insight I know I share with many of you here — that food can be our great teacher, even our great liberator. With nature as our guide, we know how! We know how to grow and eat so that all are nourished — artisanal, family-scale, diverse, ecological, community-connected farming and eating.
Worldwide, an awakening to this truth extends beyond anything I could have imagined when I began this journey.
Yet, we’re moving rapidly in two directions at once. The other, centralizing control and uniformity, is actively creating scarcity and hunger from plenty.
So how to maintain honest hope?
By going even deeper, by really, really absorbing the lessons of ecology — that all life exists in relational networks, and that change is the constant.
So, it is not possible to know what’s possible. And, since this is true, we are free. We are free to choose the world we want, knowing we each have power — that our every act makes ripples, creating our world moment to moment.
So, I toast you, food liberators. Our planet so desperately needs you.
admin June 10th, 2008
When Frances Moore Lappé has a question about something she does her research, reaches out, and asks away.
Recently she did just that, writing directly to Robert B. Reich, in response to her read of his 2007 book, Supercapitalism: The Transformation of Business, Democracy, and Everyday Life. Reich wrote back at length, clearly glad to engage in the back-and-forth. Below is the seventh installment of their correspondence. Keep checking back for future installments and please: share your thoughts by leaving a comment!
7. FML: On a deeper level, I am troubled that you believe it possible and desirable for human beings to carve ourselves up in order to act from opposing values as we show up in our varied roles. You argue that employees of corporations have no choice but to seek immediate return and that as consumers all we can do is seek the best deal for ourselves—to hell with the laborer or the environment. I feel that it is in part this false assumption about our nature—that we can act daily from opposing sensibilities and values and remain sane—that has led to the epidemic of depression. Companies that make it part of their explicit mission to do the right thing have an easier time finding strong employees because most people do not want to live double or triple lives!
RR: To explain is not to justify. Research shows that consumers prefer products that are the “best deals” in terms of cost and quality; they will not pay more for “socially responsible” products.* I wish that were not the case. I wish investors cared as much about the environment or social justice as they do about high returns. And so on. Again, my argument is not at all a justification. It seeks to explain why we are at this point in history. The good news is that we also have civic values — we are also citizens, in the sense that we care about the quality of our lives together. That we don’t express these values in our purchases and investments doesn’t mean they don’t exist. They are most easily and readily expressed through collective action — through democratic deliberation. But here, again, the central problem is the withering of our democratic institutions.
* Post-script note from
Fair trade and other ethical shopping and investing is, at 29 billion pounds a year, bigger than alcohol sales.
"Getting a Grip is not an ordinary book: it's more like a new pair of glasses, allowing you to see everything around you with greater clarity. Suddenly the world is more comprehensible, more manageable, even more beautiful. You won't want to take them off." --Barbara Kingsolver More Praise
