Author, Lecturer, Engaged Citizen
Selected Articles by David Korten
Beyond the Bailout: Agenda for a New Economy
YES!, Winter 2009 issue on "Happiness." Outlines an essential five-part policy framework to facilitate the work of responsible businesses, investors, civic organizations, and local governments engaged in growing a 21st century economy from the bottom up. PDF. See also the new YES! magazine web page featuring a number of YES! articles on the New Economy. YES! magazine is planning to devote its Summer 2009 issue to this theme.
YES!, Fall 2008 issue on "Purple America." We're taught that ruthless competition and fear are the natural state of humanity. New science shows we evolved to cooperate, and that opens up possibilities for a whole new way of organizing our economies and our politics.
The U.S. faces no conventional military security threat and the use of conventional military force to address unconventional military threats like terrorism is counterproductive. Our real security threats are social and environmental. A smart security policy would dismantle the machinery of war and reallocate those resources to meeting real needs.
The New Politics of Earth Community
The U.S. election of 2008 is a defining moment for the United States and the world. Yet no matter who wins, the leadership in addressing the deeper issues facing the human species will necessarily fall to those who are not constrained by their positions in and loyalties to the institutions of Empire responsible for the current human crisis. Written for and published in A Matter of Spirit, the newsletter of the Intercommunity Peace & Justice Center, Seattle.
Only One Reason to Grant a Corporate Charter
Expanded version of a presentation to the Summit on the Future of the Corporation, in historic Faneuil Hall, Boston, November 13, 2007. There is a distinction between private benefit corporations chartered solely to serve purely private interests and public benefit corporations chartered to serve a larger public purpose. Most private benefit corporations are devoted to increasing aggregate consumption and inequality in a world facing the imperative to reduce both. The only reason for government to issue a corporate charter granting special privileges to a group of private investors is to serve a public purpose.
Living Wealth: Better than Money
YES! magazine, Fall 2007 issue on "Stand Up to Corporate Power. Taming corporate power is essential, but insufficient to heal our relationships with one another and Earth. We need a new prosperity story that gives priority to investing in the living wealth of healthy children, families, and communities and recognizes the essential role of government in maintaining the essential conditions of socially efficient markets, in particular the need for an equitable distribution of income and ownership.
Everybody Wants to Rule the World
Arnie Cooper interviews David Korten in The Sun magazine, September 2007 on "Putting An End to Global Competition." The story of how Korten came to write The Great Turning From Empire to Earth Community and his current thoughts on the path ahead.
The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community 
YES! magazine, Summer 2006 issue on "5,000 Years of Empire." Humanity faces a choice between two contrasting models for organizing human affairs. How we choose will determine our future course. A summary of key themes from Korten's book of the same name with a companion discussion guide to facilitate a group discussion. pdf file
Social Health: Time to Make New Choices
Interview with David C. Korten in Lilipoh: The Spirit in Life magazine #35, Spring 2004 on what is required for human societies to move beyond the self-limiting violence of 5,000 years of Empire.
Global Civil Society: The Path Ahead, with Nicanor Perlas and Vandana Shiva, December 2002. This paper builds on the foundation of the IFG report Alternatives to Economic Globalization to place the discourse on globalization in a larger historical context, update the IFG analysis and recommendations to address the implications of the consolidation of right-wing extremism post-September 11, and suggest a strategic framework for global civil society in the work ahead. This paper launched the writing of The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community and framed its themes.
Economies for Life
YES! A Journal of Positive Futures, Fall 2002. This is the lead article for a landmark YES! issue on "Living Economies." Across America and throughout the world people are rising to the challenge of creating local living economies based on human-scale locally owned and accountable enterprises. This work is the key to democracy, equity, sustainability, and a better life for all.
Worse Off Today Than Before?
Ethix Bulletin, 25, September-October 2002 Interview. Ethix Bulletin is written for top level corporate executives by a professor of business ethics and a former top executive of the Boeing corporation. The interview explores and tests the thesis that the institution of the publicly traded corporation bears major responsibility for downward social and environmental trends.
Defining Struggle of the 21st Century
An essay written in 2000 following the historic Seattle WTO protest in 1999 presenting a vision of what the emerging global civil society might accomplish by the year 2050 for publication in a book let produced by Kohouteck, a British media collected concerned with education about economic globalization.