October 2023

Social Ecology and Me

By Jason van Tol|2024-01-06T04:18:32+00:002023-10-23|Ecology, Human Well-Being|

Social Ecology and Me

I recently had a paper accepted in The Journal of Environmental Education, that develops an original model of education based on Murray Bookchin’s theory of social ecology. During the peer-review process, I came into contact with the work of Stuart Hill, who was the Foundation Chair of Social Ecology at the University of Western Sydney. Under his leadership, social ecology has four inter-related domains: the personal, social, ecological, and spiritual/unknown, of which, according to Hill, the personal is the most important. My original manuscript only made reference to the social and ecological domains, […]

How Big Should the Economy Be?

By Jason van Tol|2023-12-14T23:07:10+00:002022-11-08|Ecology, Economics|

How Big Should The Economy Be?

This article was originally published in January 2020 in the Echo here.

Anyone who has never studied economics would be excused for the common-sense belief that the economy cannot grow forever, but those who have been indoctrinated with an economics education know otherwise. The standard model of economic growth that they learn is independent of resources, so, they believe, there is no limit to an economy’s size. Sound strange? The key point to toppling this dogma is knowing that the economy is a real thing, requiring real resources to increase the […]

Brick Walls or Rubber Bands? On the Nature of Ecological Limits

By Jason van Tol|2023-12-14T23:03:18+00:002022-11-08|Ecology|

Brick Walls or Rubber Bands? On the Nature of Ecological Limits

This article was originally published in May 2020 in the Echo here.

The concept of a limit can invoke the image of a brick wall; when driving at high speeds, sudden death can occur with one small error in steering. The brick wall metaphor of a limit has characteristics of immediacy and finality. Herman Daly has suggested that a more appropriate model for ecological limits is a rubber band. A stretched rubber band pushes back to a position of equilibrium, and the more it is stretched the harder […]

Students are not Citizens – Australia’s New Educational Policy

By Jason van Tol|2023-12-14T23:54:33+00:002022-11-08|Ecology, Education, Politics|

Students are not Citizens – Australia’s New Educational Policy

This article was originally published in February 2020 with slight editorial modifications in the Echo here.

Last December the Education Council of the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) adopted a new educational policy – the Alice Springs Education Declaration – in which reference to climate change and the inclusion of sustainability as a cross-curriculum priority were removed, and students were reconceived, no longer as citizens, but as apolitical ‘members of the community’. To understand the significance of this new policy it’s necessary to describe the history of its […]

A Lithium Coup d’Etat

By Jason van Tol|2023-12-14T23:54:51+00:002022-11-08|Ecology, Politics|

A Lithium Coup d’Etat

This article was originally published in January 2020 in the Echo with slight editorial modifications here.

You’re all set to buy to the latest iPhone or its Android equivalent, the last thing on your mind is the recent overthrow of Bolivia’s government. Why should it be?

Your phone, like power tools, electric cars, and many other battery-powered technologies, depend on lithium for their energy supply. Being the lightest metal and highly reactive makes lithium a prime candidate for batteries, which are needed to help carry forth the renewable energy revolution now under […]

October 2023