UBC Connects with Jeremy Rifkin: The Third Industrial Revolution
The global economy is in distress. Economists warn of another two decades of declining productivity, slow growth, steep unemployment, and increasing inequality. Around the world, the economic downturn is fueling growing discontent towards governments, and spawning extreme political movements. And now, after 200 years of industrial activity, scientists report that climate change is ravaging the planet and threatening to cause the sixth mass extinction of life on Earth. In this enlightening presentation, Jeremy Rifkin presents a new vision of a Smart Third Industrial Revolution that can take Canada and the world into a sustainable ecological civilization and a more equitable global economy over the next several decades. Moura Quayle, Director pro tem of the UBC School of Public Policy and Global Affairs, moderates a question and answer session with the audience.
Recorded Thursday, March 8, 2018 at the Robert H. Lee Alumni Centre, UBC's Vancouver campus.
Presented by Professor Santa J. Ono and the University of British Columbia, in partnership with alumni UBC. The UBC Connects series is made possible with the generous support of the R & J Stern Family Foundation.
Jeremy Rifkin is an American economic and social theorist, writer, public speaker, political adviser, and activist. He is an adviser to the leadership of the European Union and the People’s Republic of China, and a principal architect of their long-term economic development plans to usher in a Smart Internet Plus Third Industrial Revolution paradigm. Mr. Rifkin is much lauded for his influence on Europe’s ambitious climate and energy policy, and hailed by German Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel as "the economic and ecological worldwide ambassador of the energy transition". According to The Huffington Post, "Chinese Premier Li Keqiang has not only read Jeremy Rifkin’s book, The Third Industrial Revolution, and taken it to heart. He and his colleagues have also made it the core of the country’s 13th five-year plan". Rifkin has authored 20 best-selling books about the impact of scientific and technological changes on the economy, the workforce, society, and the environment. Mr. Rifkin also lectures in the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School’s Executive Education Program, where he instructs CEOs and other senior leadership in how to transition their business operations into sustainable economies.