Another Worldview Is Possible: Grassroots Social Movements and the 'Great Work'.

Korten, David; Berry, Thomas, 1914-2009

Observers such as Thomas Berry and David Korten have proposed that the contemporary 'Great Work' is to tell new stories, embodied in practical new politics and economics, to navigate the deep cultural and institutional transformations necessary for human communities to survive and fiourish. Herein I argue that grassroots movements of excluded and impoverished people from around the globe are critical agents of this contemporary Great Work. Examining the cosmological, spiritual, and ethical concerns that emerged in the 2005 World Social Forum, I demonstrate that grassroots social movements are engaged in epistemic struggle over the meanings of development and globalization. They are telling alternative stories of human betterment, rooted in an alternative and emergent worldview. Movements are bringing forth notions of radical complexity, transformative and transforming religion and spiritualities, participatory and deliberative democracy in all spheres of life, and the understanding of the living Earth as sacred and as an ecumenical reference for the sacred. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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