Inaugural Lecture, The Wayne Morse Center For Law And Politics 2011-2013 Inquiry on the theme “From Wall Street to Main Street: Capitalism and the Common Good,” University Of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon, October 5, 2011
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It is an honor and a privilege to be the inaugural speaker for this important and timely University of Oregon inquiry sponsored by the Wayne Morse Center for Law and Politics. The theme—“From Wall Street to Main Street: Capitalism and the Common Good” frames exactly the inquiry we must engage as a nation—and as a species at this defining historical moment.
As we meet, citizens are mobilizing all around American in support of the Occupy Wall Street protest that provides a focal point for coalescing public anger at Wall Street’s unrelenting and unrepentant greed and corruption into an agenda for sweeping economic transformation. The protest is still small, but growing fast with an energy that might be beyond the power of imperial institutions to contain.
My assignment tonight is to outline my thinking on the nature and substance of the needed transformation based on my work of the past thirty years. We have only 50 minutes to cover a great deal of ground, so I’ll be painting with broad strokes.
I’ll not take your time this evening assaulting you with the usual endless statistics documenting how grim our situation is. I assume you have come this evening because you are already quite aware that we are in deep trouble and your interest is in solutions.
A quick overview of the symptoms of system failure will suffice to frame the problem.
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