The Issue

The principal framing document for this Thinkers gathering was Welcome to the Great Unraveling: Navigating the Polycrisis of Environmental and Social Breakdown (by Asher Miller and Richard Heinberg), published by the Post Carbon Institute and released in June 2023.  It is available for download as a PDF. 

The Great Unraveling describes three stages – destabilization, breakdown and collapse.   It points out that we are already well into the destabilization phase. 

First part of the book focuses on environmental unraveling, ranging through climate, biodiversity, soil, water, pollution and resource issues.  The second part on social unraveling, including poverty, inequality, racism, authoritarianism and tech impacts.   Understanding the interaction of all these is essential for ‘weaving a new tapestry’ of response.

In addition, a video by Joanna Macy describes the Great Turning. Joanna Macy, in the Work that Reconnects, describes how we need to face our grief and move through it.  Only then are we effective with what to do. 

It is recommended that these resources be made available to a viewing audience prior to a screening of the documentary film.

“The only way out is through. To dance with the way things are moving. To watch the great fall, accept its reality, and then get on with our work.”  Paul Kingsnorth