Be the Change Bookclub

Mercy Corps has launched the One Table campaign to fight hunger by investing in women.

Why?

Because when women succeed in school, farming or business, they provide food, education and healthcare to their families. Their own health and well-being improve, their household becomes stronger and the entire community benefits.



The One Table campaign aims to raise US$3 million, help bring about substantive changes to U.S. global hunger policy, and make a significant contribution to the growing global movement to eliminate world hunger.

At Be the Change Bookclub we want to help . . . so for every new member that signs up between now and November 30th we will donate 10 cents to Mercy Corps (up to a total of $50).

Please join up today and help make a difference for women and their families and communities in developing countries!

In November we'll be reading Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide by Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn.

William Petrocelli at the Huffington Post is calling it The Most Important Book of the year.

Opportunity International have selected it as their book of choice for this quarter.

Melinda Gates calls it  “a brutal awakening and an unmistakable call to action”

Join with us to read 'Half the Sky' this November and share what you think of the book!

Imagine you can have greater happiness...

...Better health

...More wealth
 
These can be yours. And they will come to you from a surprising source!

Scientific research shows that “giving” can bring you each of these gifts and much more.

Do you want to improve your relationships? Your work situation? Or reduce stress?

The Power of Giving  will show you how to improve your life- and in the process improve the lives of others. That’s why...

     Wayne Dyer calls it: “Very inspiring”

     Jack Canfield says “Give it to everyone you love”

     Seth Godin says: “This book could change everything”

The Power of Giving will show you how you can live your life so you have the greatest impact, the greatest happiness and the greatest satisfaction. Get your book now: http://powerofgiving.org/paperback and receive dozens of free partner giveaways immediately.

When you buy the Power of Giving: How Giving back enriches us all....

·        You’ll start your giving- becauHere se 100% of author royalties go to charities

·        You get a personal money back guarantee from the authors.

·        You get dozens of valuable free downloads.

Best of all, you’ll discover how to improve your own life, as well as the lives of others.

This is a book about you.

The Power of Giving is about you and your potential.  About how you can improve your life. The surprise is that you can improve every part of your own life by giving.

Virtually all successful- and certainly all happy people- have discovered the joys of giving. Now you can too.  You’ll learn dozens of easy ways to give. You’ll learn how you can reap the greatest reward.

You’ll see how to give more effectively.  You’ll discover the strategies and secrets of people who possess true wealth and happiness.

Your Money Back Guarantee

This book will inspire you.  That’s why the authors make you this promise: when you buy The Power of Giving during this campaign, they will refund your purchase price if you are not inspired. That’s how confident they are that you’ll love this book.

Get your book now: http://powerofgiving.org/paperback

When you buy this book, you’ll help it to become a bestseller. And that will also spread the message of giving.  Already published in 9 languages, The Power of Giving won a 2009 Nautilus Gold Award (previous winners include his Holiness the Dalai Lama, Deepak Chopra and Eckert Tolle).  

The Power of Giving will help you to achieve more of what you want in your life. After you buy the book, online or in a bookstore, come back to our site, and receive dozens of downloadable valuable giveaways. Details here: http://powerofgiving.org/paperback

-        Azim Jamal  and Harvey McKinnon (co-authors).

P.S.  In the spirit of giving, 100% of author royalties will be donated to charity.  So your giving actually starts when you buy the book. Please get your copy today. And thank you for all you do to improve the world.

Make Extreme Wealth History from Peter Gerard on Vimeo.

I loved Lyle Estill's "Small is Possible: Life in a Local Economy".  It's a fun, inspiring collection of stories from Chatham County, the author's home town.  It chronicles the successes and failures of the resident's attempts to build a sustainable, local economy and thriving community.

Its large collection of characters at times seemed to rival War and Peace in complexity.  I occasionally had to flick back to remind myself who was who, which interrupted the flow a little.

I am involved in my own town's attempts to build community and rebuild our local economy.   I find it both fascinating and disturbing that for many people here the idea of a thriving town means 'growth' and the idea of a local economy, supporting and supported by a local community is swept aside in the quest for bigness, progress and outside intervention (from big government or big business).

The book hinted at times that there was another side of the community in Chatham County that is perhaps less interested in the possibilities of small and I would loved to have heard more about the context into which the attempts at local sustainability fit.

All in all, a compelling read for anyone interested in sustainable, local living and building community!

In October we'll be reading Peter Singer's book "The Life You Can Save: Acting Now to End World Poverty".

Editorial Reviews (thanks Amazon.com!)
“Part plea, part manifesto, part handbook, this short and surprisingly compelling book sets out to answer two difficult questions: why people in affluent countries should donate money to fight global poverty and how much each should give. . . . Singer doesn’t ask readers to choose between asceticism and self-indulgence; his solution can be found in the middle, and it is reasonable and rewarding for all.”
–Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“If you think you can’t afford to give money to the needy, I urge you to read this book. If you think you’re already giving enough, and to the right places, still I urge you to read this book. In The Life You Can Save, Peter Singer makes a strong case–logical and factual, but also emotional–for why each of us should be doing more for the world’s impoverished. This book will challenge you to be a better person.”
–Holden Karnofsky, co-founder, GiveWell

“In The Life You Can Save, Peter Singer challenges each of us to ask: Am I willing to make poverty history? Skillfully weaving together parable, philosophy, and hard statistics, he tackles the most familiar moral, ethical, and ideological obstacles to building a global culture of philanthropy, and sets the bar for how we as citizens might do our part to empower the world’s poor.”
–Raymond C. Offenheiser, president, Oxfam America

Grab a copy today and join us in our October discussions!

If you'd like to win a copy of our November read, Half the Sky, I'll be giving one away this month so you'll have it in time for November's discussions. 

Its easy to enter, all you have to do is join up and log in between now and October 16th and leave a comment in our forums.  Introduce yourself, share an opinion, talk about a book that inspires you to be the change . . . Every forum post gives you an entry to the draw.  And if you tweet about Be the Change Bookclub (include @bethechangebook in your tweet) I'll give you another entry (once a day only).

Giveaway closes Saturday 17^th October 2009.

"I believe the notion of financing ourselves is where we receive the lowest marks as a community - as perhaps it is the most difficult thing to do."

". . . we have allowed our financing to go global, which means our debt and our premiums are traded half way around the world, and we have largely lost our ability to influence them."
- From "Small is Possible: Life in a Local Economy " by Lyle Estill

I love the idea of communities financing themselves. The rise of big global banks and financial institutions has rendered money abstract, mysterious and impersonal.

What could be more real, open and personal than financing each other? Whether its with a local currency, barter, time banking or a community bank . . . there are so many ways that communities can take back some control over their local economy.

Check out these ideas for funding your community:

• Start a neighbourhood home maintenance fund to help homeowners keep their homes in tip-top condition
• Start a community bank which returns all profit to projects that benefit the community
• Encourage local businesses to start a workplace giving programme to fund local charities and non-profit groups
• Set up a community cultural foundation that encourages locals to contribute to help develop arts and culture in the community
• Establish a local currency
• Set up a time bank
• Encourage locals to shop locally and support local businesses

Got more ideas?  Share them here in our forums

At the heart of our market thinking is the idea that consumers will always act in their economic self interest, and will always procure goods from the lowest cost producer.  In our current world, that can leave our local economy in shambles.
. . .
Although we can put up protectionist trade barriers and cry foul over working conditions and lax environmental regulations in our competitors lands, the reality is that this is how we like it.  The free hand of the market is working great.  It is in our best interest to get cheaper goods, and voila, we are awash with cheap stuff.
- From "Small is Possible: Life in a Local Economy " by Lyle Estill

Surely food must be at the very heart of sustainable living.  What we eat, how we produce our food and where we get it from affects ourselves, the environment and our communities. 

Our food choices affect everything from deforestation in the Amazon, to the accumulation of fast-food litter in our streets, to our individual health and wellbeing.  And it isn't just the food itself we need to think about, but how it is transported, packaged, prepared, and sold.  When you take all that into consideration, the true cost of your groceries could be well above the price you pay at the supermarket.

Here's just a few reasons why going out of your way to eat local is worth doing:

1. It tastes better
   What could possibly be more delicious than freshly picked fruit and vegetables?  When you buy locally you know that your produce hasn't been sitting in a warehouse for months or endured kilometres of travel to reach you.
2. Its healthier
   Food produced locally is fresher, more nutritious, less likely to contain additives and preservatives.  Not only that, but you can make sure you are buying food that isn't grown using unhealthy chemicals that also damage the environment.
   
3. It helps you stay in touch with the seasons
   Believe it or not apples don't grow all year round, strawberries only grow in summer, and leeks are best in the late autumn and early spring (at least where I come from they are!).  Eating local food helps keep you in tune with nature's cycles.
4. It helps you support your local economy
   By buying from local producers you keep your money in your community longer.  You create local jobs and a stronger sense of community.
5. It helps you get to know your neighbours
   Buying local helps you get to know your neighbours, and your neighbourhood.  You get to experience new flavours, meet new people, and see new places.

"Chatham Couny's economic development has been characterized by chasing smoke stacks around.  And its a shame that we don't tend to catch that many.
. . .
We did manage to land 3M.  It is the last plant that 3M will operate in America, and it came here.  Whew, I am  fortunate enough to live across the road from the 3M lands, and am pleased to report that all it cost us was our night sky and our silence.  Now when we weed our gardens we do so against a constant background rumble.  The sales of white noise machines must have plummeted at the Jordan Dam Mini Mart after 3M came to town."
- From "Small is Possible: Life in a Local Economy " by Lyle Estill

Where I live we have recently been blessed with a 24hr McDonalds.  It has created 60 more jobs, more late night 'disturbances' in the area for the Police to attend to, more traffic, more litter and one more junk food outlet.

My town sits on top of New Zealand's largest lignite deposit.  There was great rejoicing when Solid Energy moved in.  They have brought a lot of land, have increased employment, and will be digging huge ugly scars in the landscape to extract one of the dirtiest possible fuels out of our ground.

Surely there have to be better development models then this for our communities?