Last Exploration

Berry is very expressive about the nation's economy in his essay, "The Idea of a Local Economy." He seems very disgusted with the current state of the economy and the different mechanisms in place to keep it going in this downward spiral. One of the things I find interesting in this essay are his explanations of sentimental communism and sentimental capitalism. He says "Sentimental communism holds in effect that everybody and everything should suffer for the good of 'the many.'" His definition of sentimental capitalism is not much different, only sacrificing everything for the 'free market' instead of 'the many'. I think he is connecting these two things in a way we are not used to. I think that most Americans think of communism as an enemy and capitalism as a friend. Berry links these by their common goal: the sacrifices of many for one.

The speech I read was about The Green Belt Movement and was given byWangari Maathai. She began this movement with the intention of bettering people's lives in Africa. To do this, they began by planting trees. I personally would never think of this as a solution so this surprised me, but as she explained they provided fuel, food, shelter and income to families. The people of this area, and me alike, had no idea the role their environment played in their life. A program that had started off to help people at the most basic level had grown to educate those people about their role in helping not only themselves but the environment they were apart of. Maathai says, "Although initially the Green Belt Movement's tree planting activities did not address issues of democracy and peace, it soon became clear that responsible governance of the environment was impossible without democratic space. Therefore, the tree became a symbol for the democratic struggle in Kenya." I think it is amazing that this organization became what is and that is helped so many people simply by starting to plant trees.