“Remembering Our Future – Moving Beyond Sustainability”
Dr. Gregory Chun, Bishop Holdings Corporation
View the accompanying Powerpoint presentation (1.7 MB).
“The Kohala Center is privileged to work with Dr. Greg Chun, who is the president of a development company which is putting environment and culture at the very center of its business strategy.” – Matt Hamabata, The Kohala Center
In honor of Spirit, in honor of those who have come before us, and in honor of all of us who are here now engaged in a conversation about the future of our island and of our world, I mahalo The Kohala Center for inviting me to speak today on this very important topic. The planet is on an unsustainable course that will leave future generations in peril if there isn’t a fundamental shift in our values and our thinking. How can we continue to live this way, in light of the fact that all species, humans and animals, are threatened by a system that is unsustainable? “Remembering our future” is a process that can take us beyond sustainability because the goal of sustainability itself is no longer sufficient.
A major challenge is how to define sustainability. What does it look like, and what are the ultimate objectives of our collective work? Science and politics have shaped the conversation so far, and now we need to include the voices of others, including those who live on the margins of our society, namely the native peoples, kūpuna (elders), and the socially and economically disadvantaged. All of these voices have something to contribute to the conversation, and all people must benefit from our choices. In particular, we must recognize the power of indigenous voices for they knew how to live sustainably because their very existence and legacy depended on it. Our Hawaiian ancestors knew much about living sustainably. Living on an island, they had to.
The following is a short synopsis of the sustainability movement. The sustainability movement was initially fueled by the conservation movement. In the 1960s the movement began generating regulations to prevent harm to the environment. Now we talk a great deal about resource management, consumption management, and waste management. The goal of these discussions is to stem depletion and use no more than what can be resourced – in short, to do no more harm. Imagine if the goal of all your relationships was to do no harm. I don’t think many relationships could thrive in this state of stasis.
The great work of our time consists of a dynamic interweaving of many movements in a way that provides justice for all, preservation of the wealth of the planet, and a fundamental reimagining of our relationship with the Earth and with each other.
In 2005 green business placed number six on a list of the world’s biggest businesses. In 2007 green business placed number one on this list. Green businesses are a 170 billion dollar a year industry, and if you include businesses which promote healthy lifestyles, this sector generates up to 230 billion dollars annually. And this sector is still growing, despite a bleak economic picture in other sectors of the global economy.
I believe that the ecological movement will never be successful unless those on the margins of society are included. Van Jones writes about an “eco-apocalypse” – which is the status quo taken to a suicidal extreme. The way of our current economic system involves taking a bunch of beautiful resources, processing them through industry, shrink wrapping and selling them, and then repeating this process faster and faster until there are no resources left. Van Jones also refers to “eco apartheid,” or the gap between the eco haves and have-nots. He cites the example of Marin County versus neighboring Oakland. In Marin County progressive rules promote an environmentally sensitive lifestyle, while just 20 minutes away in inner city Oakland, people are scraping the bottom of the barrel trying to find their next meal. The current movement is just a speed bump on the way to apocalypse. Van Jones asserts that “if only the eco-elite participate, the environmental movement will fail.” We must, therefore, build a social justice agenda into the movement.
We must heed the voices of indigenous peoples throughout the world. There are interesting commonalities across cultures. For example, indigenous peoples tend to have deep and intimate relationships with, and understandings of, the natural world. These peoples know the cycles and rhythms of the environment which are important to their survival, and they understand what it means to live in unity with these patterns. Indigenous peoples are systems thinkers who focus on the whole system, rather than on individual discrete factors within the system. There is a scientific basis to this kind of systemic knowledge. It makes a lot of sense.
Indigenous governance systems are typically based on a deep understanding of the natural world and the value of honor. There are many lessons we can draw from the ahupuaʻa (traditional Hawaiian land division) system, for example. This was, in fact, a system of systems in which our ancestors’ understanding of their relationship to nature influenced everything they did: their religious and spiritual beliefs, their activities, and their preservation of the environment were based on their interconnectedness to the land they lived on. What they did on the land affected what happened in the ocean.
The Hawaiian kapu (taboo) system was a social governance system based on deeply held beliefs about man, nature, and their relationships. The kapu system governed our ancestors’ life, and it enabled them to live sustainably in this place. We may not agree with their consequences, but the system was based on a deep understanding of place.
After the overthrow of the kapu system, golf courses and hotels were built on sacred lands in Keauhou. Maybe some of that should not have been done. However, for the past six years we have been working on a model for development in Keauhou where culture and education are our value proposition and where we are exploring how to integrate indigenous perspectives into our development planning decisions.
When we place ourselves into the framework of a particular theory or a particular time, this allows us to expand our own pedagogy, or our own framework. The fact is that as you see things differently, you begin to make different choices. We are now working on rediscovering the Hawaiian worldview, called Papakū Makawalu. This worldview is derived from our cosmological story (the Kumulipo) and it provides a framework that helps us to understand how our ancestors organized their knowledge of the universe into three papa (foundations): the elements and phenomena of the Earth, the elements and phenomena of the sky and heavens, and of all things born. We begin to see that this is a very holistic way of looking at the world.
The Hawaiians don’t train their navigators to look only at the stars, they also must know ocean science, the principles of canoe construction, how to grow the trees from which the canoes are made, and astronomy. All of this knowledge connects people to place and rebuilds community. The papa provide the foundation for living in a place with pride and respect. I believe we must engage the people who live on the land one pohaku (stone) at a time. At Keauhou our ancient heiau (temples) are rising out of the sea. The restoration of our wahi pana (sacred places) provides a platform for regaining the wisdom of the land. Our Hawaiian kūpuna have become engaged in this process and they have become our teachers. Through them we are rebuilding our families.
The Kohala Center’s Citizen Science project is building community through the involvement of people in sustainable community practices right in their own backyards. Over 800 volunteers have been trained to date, and these volunteers reach 90-100 visitors per day. The volunteers are now doing water quality monitoring at Kahaluʻu Bay two times per week. This is critical because we need to understand how our activities on the land are affecting the quality of the resources in the bay. And we know this project works because we can see changes in the behavior of those who are taught proper reef etiquette when compared to those who have not been taught.
In closing, our solutions for the future need to be shaped by the spiritual, cultural, natural, and political dynamics of this place. When you work on sacred land, your work becomes sacred. Hawaiʻi Island is a sacred place, and so your work here is also sacred. This is the way of the universe – you cannot fight it or you will be fighting yourself. Honoring place is very important. Sustainability is actually an honor system. If we don’t honor ourselves, the place, and each other, we cannot create a sustainable world.
The root word of kuleana (responsibility) is kulea or competency. When you have a competency, you have an obligation to use it for the betterment of society. It is our watch now.