S7 E9: At the Tipping Point

Scene on Radio: Capitalism

Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University

Society & Culture, Audiodoc, Radio, Documentary, Stories

4.9 • 11K Ratings

🗓️ 14 August 2024

⏱️ 64 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In 1972, a team of young scientists at MIT published a study exploring what would happen to human civilization if people kept pursuing endless economic growth on a finite planet. They weren’t just disbelieved, they were ridiculed. The story of Donella Meadows and The Limits to Growth.

Reported and produced by Katy Shields and Vegard Beyer, with co-hosts John Biewen and Ellen McGirt. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Archival audio of Donella Meadows, Dennis Meadows, Aurelio Peccei, Jay Forrester, and others. Interviewee: John Fullerton.Original music by Nora Beyer. Additional music by Michelle Osis and Lili Haydn. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. "Capitalism” is a production of the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University, in partnership with Imperative 21.

Transcript

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0:00.0	I'm David Remnickin each week on the New Yorker radio hour. My colleagues and I
0:04.8	unpack what's happening in a very complicated world. You'll hear from the New
0:09.2	Yorker's award-winning reporters and thinkers,
0:11.7	Gilani Cobb on race and justice,
0:14.0	Jill Lepore on American history,
0:16.0	Vincent Cunningham and Gia Tolantino on culture,
0:19.0	Bill McKibbon on climate change and many more.
0:22.0	To get the context behind events in the news, climate change and many more.
0:22.5	To get the context behind events in the news,
0:25.3	listen to the New Yorker radio hour,
0:27.5	wherever you get your podcast.
0:31.3	Ellen, remember John Fullerton, from the very top of episode one.
0:36.0	Oh, who could forget? The one time, Rising Star at J.P. Morgan, who had a complete change of heart about capitalism as we know it.
0:44.6	That guy. You know, it wasn't like a single shock event. It was this like rolling
0:51.1	awareness that, oh my God you know everything that I believed in is is
0:58.9	actually you know profoundly destructive you may remember this to
1:04.4	fullerton talking about one of the things that led to that realization
1:08.5	after the shock of the 9-11 attacks. That got me reading books that, as I always say,
1:14.4	bankers don't read.
1:15.9	We didn't get to this in episode one,
1:18.2	but here's what John said next.
1:20.3	Probably the most single most impactful book was this book called Limits to Growth
	...

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