#1 Common Wealth

The article, Common Wealth, discusses the topic on why we have yet to solve the impending environmental crisis. It starts off by comparing the previous century's changes with this current century's. While the former is more on shiftment of power between the european countries and America, the latter focuses not only on the rising powers, but also the need to allocate our resources and work together, not as a nation, but as a world to solve the environmental crisis.

The article also brings to attention the fact that we, humans share a common planet, and would all suffer the same fate in the event of an environment crisis- destruction.

The fact that in human history, countries are often in some kind of rivalry with each other has led to us being used to the idea that the world is all about competition between countries for resources, markets and power. Yet, if we all share a common fate, even if one country gains dominance, what good would it be if the world is on the path to destruction?

Hence, countries should work together, as one to solve the environmental and population crisis. Examples of countries using large amounts of money on worthless wars such as the U.S-Iraq war has proven that we humans do have the fundings required, it is just a matter of whether we are willing to. The article also mentioned some success stories when the world worked together and succeeded in producing the desired outcomes. The key element is to have a clear objective, an effective technology, a clear implementation strategy and a source of financing.

In our current age, we do possess the level of technology required to bring about the required changes, for example green technology such as hybrid automobiles and solar energy. If we can share our resources, we can definitely solve the environmental crisis. We just have to make the right investments.

Another key idea stated in the article is the idea that political leaders are the leaders. As a result, people would just wait for the government to initiate ideas. However, in the current world where democracy rules, the leaders are in fact, just followers who follow the will of the people. If the people ask for change, a change must be implemented. With the right technology and sufficient wealth required, what we need is to take action to start the ball rolling. Only then will we be able to work as one and solve the environmental crisis.