Ultimately it is up to the individual, people need to take responsibility for their own actions and not rely on the government, or any other institution, to take the lead. As the man said, ‘Be the change that you want to see in the world’.

At some point we will have to realise that we cannot continue to live like this. The sooner people start to make changes to their own lives the easier the change will be on them. Leave it too long and the change will come regardless and you may find yourself facing a very different, difficult way of life.

Taking the financial crisis, I don’t think there could have been a bigger signal that our economic system needs radical reform, but to me it looks exactly the same as it ever did, still based on flawed ideology of the free market and the utter fallacy of constant growth – a model so obviously and demonstratably wrong it is to my eyes indefensible.

At least Gordon Brown is now talking about electoral reform, a positive move but one that I doubt was generated for the right motives, more in desperation to cling to power. There is at least a glimmer of hope here for more radical, by radical I mean in relation to the current political system not that I believe the views to radical per-se, views to get a say in parliament.

A lot of what needs to happen is very long-term but our political system, in fact most systems in which we operate, do so on a very short term basis, short term thinking is encouraged.

Even when countries get together to try and do something co-ordinated, like at Copenhagen, any sort of deal gets so watered down it’s as good as useless. You can argue it’s a step in the right direction but if the step is so small that its impact is minimal is it worth it all?

Talking particularly environmentally I’m sure that something significant will happen, but not until it is far too late, not until there are no other options left, societies will fail, government will fail and both will be rebuilt but in a time of chaos and desperation.

How do you think we would best go about change? What organisations are leading the charge? Can real change happen outside of the political system and if not how do we really get our voices heard within it?

Their articles are often lengthier than I am willing to read. I appreciate that all of their arguments are very soundly referenced and that is very important. I think it would also help if they introduced each article with an abstract explaining the key points and gist of the article, if you are really interested in the topic then you can read on.

Much of what you have said is echoed by Tom Hodgkinson in his books ‘How to be Idle’ and ‘How to be free’. If you’ve not read them I suggest you add them to your Christmas list “(if you have one this year…) “!

And http://idler.co.uk/ is worth a butchers too.

Just think, houses may become affordable again in the future! Your average Joe able to buy a modest house for his family to LIVE in without having to mortgage yourself up to the eye-balls and consign yourself to 40 years of hard labour just to keep up with the repayments, lest should you fall behind and Mr Gleeful Bank will come and take it back from you.

Good to hear from you again. As you point out it seems the whole shabbang is accelerating towards unprecedented crisis and subsequent change (for the better, I am determined to hope). I feel really good about it in some ways – I tend to function best in a crisis and its very nice to be proven right about something so huge that so many people have accused me (and you no doubt) of being wrong and/or paranoid about. Bring on the smugfest! On the other hand, and this is the big news from our end, we’ve got a little one on the way within about 5 weeks! The world into which he or she (unknown until day one) will be born is not the world I would have chosen for him or her but I can only do my best to make it work. I think its really important to pass on the good stuff and endeavor to make things better.

On that note I did manage to forsake the private sector for good and I am now the web producer for the RHS (this mysterious title means in effect either senior web designer or online creative director depending on how you look at it). I’ve only been here for about 5 weeks and am in the process of redesigning the site – which it has been in desperate need of. After all those years of being a tool in the private sector it is a profound breath of fresh air.

Hope to hear from you soon.

All the best.