Paul Hawken

Paul Hawken is an environmentalist, entrepreneur, journalist, and best-selling author. At age 20, he dedicated his life to changing the relationship between business and the environment, and between human and living systems in order to create a more just and sustainable world. His work includes starting and running ecological businesses, writing and teaching about the impact of commerce upon the environment, and consulting with governments and corporations on economic development, industrial ecology, and environmental policy.

Contents
1 Writing
2 Business
3 Activism
4 Awards
5 External links

Writing

He is author and co-author of dozens of articles, op-eds, papers, as well as six books including The Next Economy (Ballantine 1983) wherein he coined the term the "restoration economy", Growing a Business (Simon and Schuster 1987), and The Ecology of Commerce (HarperCollins 1993). The Ecology of Commerce was voted in 1998 as the #1 college text on business and the environment by professors in 67 business schools. His latest book, Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution (Little, Brown. September 1999) with Amory Lovins, has been referred to by several heads of state including President Bill Clinton who calls it one of the five most important books in the world today. His books have been published in over 50 countries in 27 languages and have sold over 2 million copies.

Growing a Business became the basis of a 17-part PBS series, which Mr. Hawken hosted and produced. The program, which explored the challenges and pitfalls of starting and operating socially responsive companies, was shown on television in 115 countries and watched by over 100 million people. His piece on Seattle and the WTO entitled N30 was published on over 100 websites and by 13 magazines. He is writing a book to be published by Viking entitled Blessed Unrest about the growing worldwide movement resisting neo-liberal economic policies and corporatization of the commons.

Business

Companies he has founded or co-founded include Metacode, a software company specializing in proprietary content management tools; Groxis, a graphic information delivery provider for search engines, libraries, scientific repositories, and databases; Smith & Hawken, the garden and catalog retailer; and several of the first natural food companies in the U.S. that relied solely on sustainable agricultural methods. He presently heads the Pax Group, which includes PaxIT, PaxTurbine, and PaxFan, three companies associated with Pax Scientific a California-based research and development corporation focused on proprietary technologies involving fluid dynamics and convection and flow form geometry. The firm applies geometries found in nature with its primary focus on industrial fans, turbines, and electronic thermal management.

Activism

Mr Hawken also heads the Natural Capital Institute (NCI), a research oriented NGO located in Sausalito, California. NCI is has conducted a large research project on the subject of socially responsible investing (SRI) and corporate social responsibility (CSR) and creating the first database most SRI funds in the world. The research and subsequent report [1] describe the current state of SRI, and present a counter set of criteria for determining businesses appropriate for portfolio inclusion. To emphasize the need and viability of an alternate approach to SRI and CSR, NCI is making up a list of the 100 best companies, which will be published in a book entitled Greenworld. NCI is now creating the first database of sustainable civil society which will be published at [2].

He has served on the board of many public organizations including Point Foundation (publisher of the Whole Earth Catalogs), Center for Plant Conservation, Conservation International, Trust for Public Land, Friends of the Earth, and National Audubon Society. He was the founder and Chair of The Natural Step in the United States as well as The Natural Step International in Stockholm.

Awards

Among recognition and awards received are:

External links

See also: Paul Hawken, 1983, 1987, 1993, 1998, 1999, Bill Clinton, California, Civil society, Commons