The sustainability movement arose in an attempt to make human activities less destructive. Much progress was made, however, the overall degradation of the planet has continued. At this point, we need more than just sustainability, we need regeneration. We need to turn deserts into forests and provide the disenfranchised means to live up to their full potential. This is an incredibly complex problem, but there is a solution. It’s not a cookie cutter solution, but a set of concepts and tools that can be applied in a wide variety of ways to to change the dynamics of how a system functions on the most fundamental level.
I have created a framework to design organizations to constantly improve their impacts on the ecosystems, communities, and economies in which they operate. I call this Regenerative Dynamics. It’s a set of design principles (listed below) that can be applied to create a Regenerative Enterprise. To help hold organizations accountable to these principles, I have created the Regenerative Enterprise Design Certification, which I am offering through Earthling Enterprises in partnership with the Regeneration Federation.
Regenerative Dynamics can encompass an unlimited number of solutions for environmental, social, and economic redevelopment. However, none of these solutions will be successful if we continue using the same underlying systems that created the problems in the first place. The greatest limiting factor for the sustainability movement is only beginning to be resolved. The very systems that organize people to get things done need to be changed, and it needs to happen fast.
Businesses, as well as nonprofits and communities can dynamically evolve to optimize social, environmental, and economic benefits if we harness the full potential of the people involved. That requires distributing authority and ownership and empowering people through education and support systems. If this is done effectively, then applying the regenerative dynamics framework will create a roadmap that can be followed, not by top-down implementation, but by coordinated grassroots action by a fully empowered workforce.
