cradle to...?

Wow.

These guys GET IT.

I was completely impressed with the philosophy laid down by McDonough and Braungart in "Cradle to Cradle". They take sound science and environmental consciousness and attach them to a firm foundation of economic salience and money sense. Here are environmentalists who have removed themselves from the martyrdom of the movement, and are relishing the chance to get rich by getting green, and help other people do the same thing. These are the environmentalists the world will listen to: the ones who offer cooperative solutions instead of harping condescension and moral imperatives.

Their "Products plus" concept of the customer getting more than they bargained for by buying dangerous and unsustainable manufactured goods is a perfect example of how to use market forces to better environmental ends: it represents a monetization of environmental costs, and works in great concert with a natural services approach to quantify the value of a healthy environment and introduce it to the bottom line.

Their basic premise of design mirroring intent is a solid foundation for sound stewardship, and their ambition for a designed industrial revolution provides a lofty goal, the path to which is marked with incremental and tangible progress.

They sum it up best when they talk about their cooperation with large corporations. "How can you work with them?" their critics ask, and they respond just as they should "How can you not work with them?" The economy is the driving force of our society. Instead of viewing environmentalism as a drag on the economy, let's reinvent it as a way to incorporate perpetual growth and prosperity for our species, to make ourselves "native" to the planet again.

This is all the romanticism of environmentalism's past, wed to the pragmatism of its future. These guys have it right.