Time magazine did not come right out and say the commons is a key idea influencing our future in its March 24 cover on “10 ideas that are changing the world.”
But it came close.
Leading off the cover story in the number one slot was economist Jeffrey Sachs’ essay on Common Wealth, where he made a case for embracing sustainable development and eradicating global poverty in language that evoked the commons, even though he did not use the word.
“The world’s producers and consumers currently regard the air as free dumping ground for carbon dioxide and other climate changing green house gases. We need to correct market forces.”
Sachs, who first came to prominence for his harsh market “shock therapy” approach to the Russian economy after the fall of communism, now views the world a bit differently ways. He closed his essay with a quote from John F. Kennedy, which also invokes a sense of the commons: “For, in the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children’s future. And we are all mortal.”