In 1973, I was invited to be part of a colloquium panel at Transylvania University - the topic was something related to changing social, familial, and sexual behavior. The question I was to address was whether the changes we were seeing in the mid-60s to mid-70s in the US were evidence of a social revolution. 

At that time, it certainly seemed that things had been turned topsy-turvy. There were frequent allusions to the generation gap, the sexual revolution, the decline of the family. Certain previously disenfranchised groups (people of color, women) were gaining a little more power, rights, and respect. Some of the silent people were finding their voices. 

Based on my limited memory, the 1973 cultural landscape looked different than it had when I was a young child. So were these changes revolutionary? Today, I don't know how in the world I thought that I was qualified to answer this question - I don't feel qualified to do so now. Keep in mind that in 1973 I was all of 20 years old, and that all I knew was what I had lived - a middle-class middle-sized life in the middle of Kentucky! And yet, I somehow gamely took it on.

My response then, as I recall, was that the changes, while perhaps experienced by individuals as revolutionary, were not evidence of a social revolution. A true revolution involves forcible overthrow of all aspects of an established society or government, and a replacement of what is overthrown with something new and markedly different. Power changes across the board are felt. Decisions are made using significantly different processes. New institutions replace old ones. A revolution, in my mind, is an intentional act, a focused movement resulting in pervasive change. What we were experiencing in 1973 felt more like social evolution, incremental changes within many populations and institutions that led to a sum greater that its parts - but these changes were occurring under the same government operating under the same Constitution.

Believe it or not, nerd that I am, I think about this question often as I watch what is going on around me, locally and globally. I think about it as I read and talk with others about environmental issues - climate change, global warming, sustainability, social justice. It feels like there is an accelerating rate of change on this earth in many areas - in information processing and sharing, in levels of consumption of material goods, in changes to the earth. 

Or is it my age, my stage of life, that makes me notice things in this way? I see bubbles of revolutions happening in different parts of the world - think of the spring of 2011 in the Middle East and Africa. But it all also seems gradual and incremental - an overthrow of a government does not result in the immediate establishment of the new government - there is lots to do to get there, if ever, if the old government does not come back and grab power.

In 2008, entrepreneur and environmentalist Paul Hawken wrote Blessed Unrest, his documentation of "the largest social movement in the world." He told stories of how millions of groups of people, from corporations to governments to small NGOs to community groups, were working to address the related issues of environment and social justice. Millions of groups and people across the world, not necessarily connecting with one another in any way, but nevertheless having significant impacts. I think of the recent March on Blair Mountain. Focused change, intentional effort - but not yet revolutionary in a large sense.

Others, like Bill McKibben for example, write about what will happen to the earth and human existence if energy policies, practices, and uses do not change - it is not pretty. Millions of people across the world are trying to do things differently, but the pace of change, of environmental degradation, is so rapid, that it might sometimes feel like pouring water into a bucket with a hole in it.

Are revolutionary acts required to mitigate or reverse climate change, to establish fully sustainable living practices that do not compromise the needs of future generations? What would those acts look like? Or will small but significant and cumulative changes make the difference - whether they be moving to local food production and distribution or dealing with corporate financial influence on the political process? Do individual actions matter? Can the small tremors caused by the millions of people involved in "the largest social movement in the world" result in a beneficent cultural earthquake? Evolutionary or revolutionary?

Another question - do hard changes come only when our backs are pushed to the wall? Like, when gas prices rise to $10/gallon - or when clean water is so scarce that communities fight over it. Or can we effect change when our lives are good?

I certainly don't have the answers. But I think about work done by Canadian psychologist Catherine O'Brien in 2008 about sustainability and happiness. She describes two conventional beliefs that present challenges to moving people toward more sustainable living - one, the belief that economic growth is synonymous with happiness and two, that consumption of material goods results in happiness. And I think about how pervasive these beliefs are in our culture and how they influence our daily thoughts and behaviors - mine included.

I don't think there are easy, black or white answers. I'm just thinking out loud and hoping to hear from others.

Oh. The radish. It's from my garden - just a little piece of my own tiny slow evolution - best eaten, according to Steve's mom, with a little butter, coarse salt, and a crusty baguette.

How cool is it to be at Chatham right now! Of course, the campus is at its most beautiful - and spring is finally here.

What is extra special cool about being here is that you get to meet amazing people with lots of smarts and good ideas. Today I listened to Patricia Allen from USC-Santa Cruz's Center for Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems. Dr. Allen is a candidate for a position in Chatham's new School of Sustainability and the Environment - her presentation today demonstrated that understanding how food systems work can tell us how sustainability in general works. In her words, food provides countless opportunities for reflection and action. Just as we are attempting to understand and promote sustainable living - sustainable health and well-being - with regard to water, air, time, animals and plants, the whole ecosystem, we are also doing so with regard food systems specifically. Here are a few points to consider:

• It is important to know public policy - what exists now with regard to regulations and subsidies related to agriculture, what is beginning to change, what else needs to happen, and how to make it happen. For example, we need to understand why food produced in large agri-businesses is often cheaper in the short-run than local and organic food - in part related to public policy - and also to think about the larger costs to health and the ecosystem in the long-run when we rely so much on agri-business for our food.
• It is exciting to hear that the US Department of Agriculture is looking at public policy and is beginning to talk more about local and organic foods - and about the use of regional food sources for school food programs.
• It is thought-provoking (and anger-inducing) to realize how deeply social justice issues are embedded into food systems. For one, the individuals who work on the farms, process the food in factories, and prepare and serve the food are often among the lowest paid laborers in our country. Many of them are undocumented workers (Dr. Allen estimates about 80% of farm-workers are undocumented) and thus have no recourse for addressing pay and work conditions - and yet large companies (and we, by purchasing cheap food that does not reflect its "true cost") benefit from their labor. In addition, the poorest people - usually divided along race and gender lines, in addition to income - are the ones who have the least affordable access to healthy foods. 

All of these issues related to food systems are also part of our discussions about sustainable health and well-being in general. Public policy often provides advantages to large industries that significantly contribute to environmental problems that result in poor health for humans and the ecosystem. And, thankfully, public policy is slowly changing in a positive direction with two steps forward and one step back. Still, the people who are hurt the most are those in less-privileged racial, SES, and gender groups.

I am talking about this because, as Dr. Allen pointed out, food is something we all need - and think about and enjoy. Every single day, we make choices about food - what to eat, where to get it, how to prepare it.  These choices have implications beyond our meals. These choices affect the health and well-being of ourselves and our families in the moment, and they also support by dollar power one or the other types of food production-processing-distribution systems - which has very real effects on the the long-term health and well-being of our environmental, social, and economic systems.

One excellent book about this topic is Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life. I am also going to check out Dr. Allen's Together at the Table: Sustainability and Sustenance in the American Agrifood System.

Let me know what you think!