Bioneers: Revolution From the Heart of Nature

Women-led movements arising around the world herald a profound shift that changes everything. Visionary women leaders Osprey Orielle-Lake, Leila Salazar and Lynne Twist report on the women leading the clean energy revolution in Africa, defending the Amazonian rainforest, and making peace in Liberia.

Governments and businesses are recognizing climate chaos as the threat multiplier from hell. The answer is not business as usual. How about crowdfunding and democratizing investment in clean energy? Young change-maker turned clean energy entrepreneur Billy Parish, founder of Mosaic, and banker Marco Krapels, co-founder of The Solutions Project, say 100% renewable energy is both possible and imperative.

How can we manifest the world we want, and who we want to be? Actor-activist Danny Glover and Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins, former CEO of Green For All, show how one sure path to resilience is to build community and social movements. That requires learning how to reach out across our differences – and it gets really personal.

How do we transform a vicious circle into a virtuous circle? How do we move from environmental degradation and the deterioration of human relations to restoration? From war to peace - from hatred to compassion - from isolation to community? How can one person make a crucial difference? Painter and professor Lily Yehs approach to community healing takes that which is broken and creates something whole and wholly new and beautiful through public art. From Philadelphia to Rwanda, broken places are her canvases. Peoples stories are the pigments. Peoples talents and creativity are the tools. At the heart of her work is the transformation of human heart.

Forty years ago when a logging road was blasted deep into the heart of the Brazilian Amazon, the outside world discovered the Surui people. Contact with the Western world led to their decimation by disease, warfare and illegal logging and mining. The Surui organized to save themselves and their homeland by electing a young leader to tell their story to the world. Chief Almir Narayamoga Surui traveled from the Amazon rainforest to the Google-plex to ask for help to bring his people back from the brink of extinction and save their precious rainforest. The collaboration with Google Earth Outreach manager Rebecca Moore has helped map a next world that marries the best of tradition and conservation with the best of high technology. Translation by Vasco van Roosmalen.

Ethan Nadelmann, founder/director of the Drug Policy Alliance, the nation’s leading drug policy reform organization, traces the hidden history of drugs laws, which are intimately connected with racism and the political exploitation of people’s fears. He offers a set of practical and effective policy reforms that are now being advocated by a rising tide of former drug warriors.

A popular character on a Spanish-language soap opera resonates so deeply with viewers that they become empowered and educated about reproductive health. Avatars in the virtual world called Second Life enable people of all faiths to better understand and respect Islamic culture. A global communications network crosses the digital divide to help women around the world share solutions for improving everyday life. Digital and media entrepreneurs Jensine Larsen and William Ryerson effectively use innovative media for social change. Digital citizen diplomats Joshua S. Fouts and Rita J. King design virtual games that help foster vibrant community and culture in the physical world. Theyre all demonstrating the game-changing power of technology to change the world for the better.

Half of Americans cannot name one component of the water cycle upon which all life depends. Yet water is at the root of every human endeavor - from manufacturing to agriculture, energy production and waste management. No water, no life. Join master permaculture designers Darren J. Doherty and Brock Dolman for both practical and poetic ways to re-educate earthlings in soil and water literacy. Their practical vision for regenerating ecological integrity and social resiliency prepares us for the challenges of climate change and environmental stress. But above all, they illuminate inspired pathways for restoring nature and people in the re-enchantment of Earth.

A living building is like a flower, planted and rooted to its place. It collects its energy from the sun. It harvests its water from the rain. This building does not pollute. It engages actively with the environmental around it. And its beautiful and inspiring. This is natures blueprint for building a better world, says visionary architect Jason McLennan. He designed the Living Building Challenge 2.0 to raise the bar on green building: meet or exceed what nature provides. While the standards seem impossibly high, it may be simpler than we imagined.

Climate change. Energy crisis. Economic collapse. We live in a time of unprecedented global crisisand opportunity. Theres a monumental amount of work to be done to make the transition to a restored world, yet young people are unemployed at astonishingly high rates. How can we unlock the green economic opportunities that will open the door to doing well by doing good for generation green and generations to come?Join Apollo Alliance president Jerome Ringo and clean energy leader Billy Parish for a hopeful glimpse into the organizations and programs that will give our children the opportunity to make a living and make a better world.

Why does “corporate personhood” consistently override the legal rights of citizens? And what about the rights of nature? Join innovative environmental attorneys Thomas Linzey and Mari Margil for breakthroughs on the ground of democracy.

History is a tale told by the winners. How then can we reclaim the voices of those who have been historically written out - silenced through the ages? Perhaps as women write herstory into history, well see clearly the eternal power, brilliance and unique value of womens contributions. Join media innovator Jensine Larsen and feminist historian Sally Roesch Wagner as they share the emerging landscape of an inclusive, sustainable and just society at whose heart is the leadership of women.

When a culture is disintegrating and the stories everybody believed in no longer fit, its time to rekindle our connection to ancient wisdom and universal truths. Mythologist, author and storyteller Michael Meade, founder of the Mosaic Multicultural Foundation, reminds us that the word apocalypse - which has come to mean the end of the world, actually means an unveiling. Once we penetrate that veil, its not the end - but the beginning of a new story the a new beginning to the old story.

We live in a society dependent on toxic chemicals. Today about 287 such chemicals trespass inside the blood of newborns and inside all of us without our consent. Despite the odds, ecologist, author and mother Sandra Steingraber is an optimist. She’s betting that the burgeoning global environmental human rights movement will free us from our deadly dependency. She believes our grandchildren will look back on us and marvel that our economy was once dependent on toxic chemicals and they will think of it as unthinkable

Our misbegotten industrial food system is one of our greatest vulnerabilities. It's dangerously fossil-fueled, toxic, monocultural and centralized. The real cost of cheap food is very high to both people and planet. Urban food innovators are designing vibrant new local food economies built on environmental and ecological integrity, sustalnability, diversity and equity. Join author Michael Pollan, Fair Food Foundation CEO Oran Hesterman, faith-based change-maker James Ella James and student leader Victoria Carter for a smorgasbord of nourishing morsels from the emerging locavore movement.

As the creation story of Judeo-Christian beliefs, the biblical recounting of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden has long had profound influence around the world. So what’s it like to be named Eve? World-renowned playwright and activist Eve Ensler explores her own personal journey into her namesake. The provocative author of “The Vagina Monologues” and founder of V-Day to end violence against women suggests there’s another story beneath the traditional story. For her, it’s both very personal – and very political.

Youth movements are rising to restore people and planet. De’Anthony Jones, a former President of the Environmental Students Organization at Sacramento State, Chloe Maxmin, co-founder of Divest Harvard, and Xiuhtezcatl Martinez, hip-hop artist and Youth Director of Earth Guardians, say there’s no better time to be born than now because this generation gets to rewrite history. It could be known as the generation that brought forth a healthy, just, sustainable world for every generation to come.

Archetypal stories guide our lives in profound and largely unconscious ways. Through reframing classic mythologies, we explore the resurgence of the archetypal feminine and its relationship to nature through a multi-cultural lens, with Jean Shinoda Bolen, author and Jungian therapist; Luisah Teish, author and priestess in the Ifa Orisha tradition; Sri Swamini Svatmavidyananda, teacher of Hindu Vedanta philosophy.

Transformational women leaders are restoring societal balance by showing us how to reconnect relationships – not only among people – but between people and the natural world. This astounding conversation among diverse women leaders provides a fascinating window into the soulful depths of what it means to restore the balance between our masculine and feminine selves to bring about wholeness, justice and true restoration of people and planet. Join Alice Walker, Jean Shinoda Bolen, Nina Simons, Sarah Crowell, Joanna Macy and Akaya Windwood to imagine a future where women, children, men and the planet can thrive.

As the world’s eighth largest economy, California is emerging as the potential game-changer for global climate leadership. Using strategic alliances and smart policies that integrate ecology, economy and justice, these climate leaders show how: Tom Hayden, lifelong activist and former California State Senator; Vien Truong, Environmental Equity Director, Greenlining Institute; Wade Crowfoot, Senior Advisor to Gov. Jerry Brown.

A handful of global business leaders are blazing trails to a biologically based "eco-nomics." They are fundamentally recalculating core assumptions to allow business to make good returns killing the planet. Ray Anderson, leading-edge founder and CEO of Interface, the world's largest modular carpet company, articulates his bold vision to operate the company to take from the Earth only that which the Earth can renew rapidly and naturally. His mission is a zero footprint by the year 2020. He calls on the entire industrial system to join him on the remarkable path to Mt. Sustainability.

Wounded warriors have walked through fire. They carry the scars forever, yet many have somehow managed to heal even the most horrific of their emotional wounds. Rather than turning away from those unimaginable traumas of war, abuse and violence, what can we learn from looking respectfully at their wounds? Our veterans and other survivors are on a transformational, ethical, and spiritual journey. Aqeela Sherrills, Ed Tick, and Eve Ensler share their inspiring stories to help us discover how we might keep the peace.

As the consumer feeding frenzy has gone global, each seemingly innocuous purchase of stuff we make today leaves behind a devastating legacy of waste that will envelop and even poison future generations for centuries to come. Ironically, it's not like all this stuff is making us any happier. Acclaimed filmmaker and environmental advocate Annie Leonard says we have choices to make, right now. Are we consumers? Or are we citizens of planet Earth? How can we change the self-destructive story before it's too late? And won't we be happier if we do?

As we navigate the onset of climate change, we're witness to the rapid obsolescence of the human systems built on the assumption of cheap oil. The clock is running out on expensive (and vulnerable) practices such as the long-distance, fossil-fueled global supply chains that transport the average bite of food 1,200 miles to reach our plates. Inevitably communities are moving toward a greater re-localization of such basics as food, energy and water. And that makes sense because that's how nature is organized. Famed restaurateur and local food advocate Judy Wicks is at the forefront of the movement to redefine business practices, grow greater security and nourish sustainable communities.

Would you believe, here at the beginning of the 21st century, that every order of fast-food served with a slice of tomato is part of a system of slavery and labor abuse that exists right here in the United States? The intense demand for cheap food from the largest corporate buyers drives farm workers into the ground. The courageous labor organizer Lucas Benitez calls for reform at all levels of the food supply chain -from growers and buyers to fast-food corporations and organic grocery chains. And he includes everyone who eats, because we have the market power to demand better treatment of those who harvest our food.

For a decade, the award-winning play "The Vagina Monologues" has pro­ vided a startling window into the conflicted complexity of women's relationships to their bodies and pervasive worldwide violence against women. By revealing the deeply personal stories of women and their private parts, world-renowned playwright and women's rights activist Eve Ensler gave birth to a global movement to end violence against women and girls with the non-profit organization V Day. V Day has raised more than $60 million to support grassroots anti-violence groups around the world through performances of this ground breaking theater work.

Just how dumb do they think we are? Who would believe that destroying the ecosystems on which all life depends, while dis-employing more and more people, is somehow good for the economy? But exactly that fiction of jobs versus the environment has been successfully marketed to us. Community organizers Van Jones and Majora Carter propose a radically simple solution for both environmental destruction and social inequality: Bring the rising green revolution to low-income, urban America.

For thousands of years, First Peoples have successfully managed the complex reciprocal relationships between biological and human cultures using Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK). Yet no prior human civilization has ever faced the globalized ecological collapse occurring now. In the face of unprecedented pressures on their homelands and ways of life, indigenous leaders Enei Begaye, Dune Lankard and Hawk Rosales are organizing in new ways to protect the environment-and spread their knowledge for the sake of all life on Earth and future generations.

Most American schools are flunking out when it comes to how well they integrate ecological literacy across the curriculum. And many are doing no better than a C average with the idea that schools should be actively engaged in sustaining the natural and social communities in which they exist. Fritjof Capra, co-founder of the Center for Ecoliteracy, Cheryl Charles, from the Children and Nature Network, and leading environmental educator David Orr explore what's working for the A+ schools that are successfully integrating ecological awareness, understanding and practices throughout the curriculum and the community.

Some of the best minds on the planet are busy cataloguing possible solutions to the crisis of climate chaos. Scientists, entrepreneurs and educators on technology's cutting edge offer a broad array of bio-based solutions that are already working to transition us to a truly sustainable civilization. Biomimics Janine Benyus, Stephan Dewar, David Orr and Jay Hannan offer a smorgasbord of startling solutions based on nature's genius.

Bathing suits modeled on sharkskin that win the Olympics. Low-energy display screens based on peacock feathers. Nature has done everything human societies want to do technologically-without mining the past or mortgaging the future. Acclaimed author, naturalist and biomimicry leaders Janine Benyus, Jason McCiennan and Bob Hawkins uncork a mind-boggling bouquet of breakthrough innovations that, like nature, create conditions conducive to life. This genuine scientific revolution shows why preserving nature and biological diversity is our best survival strategy.

“For the first time in history, a civilization - its people, companies and governments - is trying to arrest the downspin and understand how to live on Earth, a watershed in human existence.” Globally renowned social entrepreneur and author Paul Hawken eloquently portrays how we will win a sustainable future by losing the delusion we’re here on Earth for only ourselves.