Riff on President JFK’s 1963 Peace Speech

I hope it is neither sacrileges nor arrogant to riff on President JFK’s 1963  Post-Cuban Missile Crisis Peace Address at American University[1]

[E]xamine our attitude towards sustainable development. [2] Too many of us think it is impossible. Too many think it is unreal.  But that is a dangerous, defeatist belief.  It leads to the conclusion that poverty and ecological collapse [3]are inevitable, that mankind is doomed, that we are gripped by forces we cannot control.  We need not accept that view.  Our problems are manmade; therefore, they can be solved by man.  And man can be as big as he wants.  No problem of human destiny is beyond human beings.  Man’s reason and spirit have often solved the seemingly unsolvable, and we believe they can do it again.  I am not referring to the absolute, infinite concept of completely decoupling economic growth from consumption of natural capital[4] of which some fantasies and fanatics dream.  I do not deny the value of hopes and dreams, but we merely invite discouragement and incredulity by making that our only and immediate goal.

Let us focus instead on a more practical, more attainable development trajectory,[5] based not on the sudden revolution in human nature but on a gradual evolution in human institutions—on a series of concert action and effective agreements which are in the interest of all concerned.  There is no single, simple key to this development trajectory[6]; no grand or magic formula to be adopted by one or two powers.  Genuine sustainable development[7] must be the product of many nations, the sum of many acts. It must be dynamic, not static, changing to meet the challenges of each new generation.  For sustainable development[8] is a process—a way of solving problems.