David Korten is a leading critic of corporate globalization and a visionary proponent of a planetary system of local living economies. His international best seller When Corporations Rule the World, sometimes referred to as the bible of the historic Seattle WTO protest, helped frame the global resistance against corporate globalization. The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Communityilluminates the significance of this resistance by placing it in the historical context of 5,000 years of Empire and the organization of human relationships by dominator hierarchy. His most recent book, Agenda for a New Economy: From Phantom Wealth to Real Wealth issues a bold call to replace Wall Street’s phantom wealth machine with a new financial system devoted to the needs of real wealth Main Street economies.
David is co-founder and board chair of YES! Magazine, founder and president of the People-Centered Development Forum, co-chair of the New Economy Working Group,and a board member of the Business Alliance for Local Living Economies (BALLE).
David has MBA and Ph.D. degrees from the Stanford Business School, and in his earlier career served as a captain in the US Air Force, a Harvard Business School professor, a Ford Foundation project specialist, and Asia regional adviser on development management to the U.S. Agency for International Development. Thirty years working as a development professional in Asia, Africa, and Latin America opened his eyes to the devastating consequences of an economic system that drives inequality, social conflict, and environmental collapse everywhere it touches. He has since become an advocate of a planetary system of life-centered, community based living economies.