Robert Ashford to Visit VT

I’m pleased to announce that Prof. Robert Ashford will be visiting Virginia Tech in November, during which he will take part in a series of events related to the concept of Binary Economics. The first of these events will be a SPIA seminar on November 6, during which Robert will make the case for “democratizing capital acquisition” by broadening competitive market opportunities to acquire capital with the earnings of capital – see the flyer below for more information about this talk.

Over the past several years, I have had the opportunity to work with Robert, leading to the two papers below published in the European Financial Review.

Ashford, N. A., Hall, R. P., and Ashford, R. (2012) Addressing the Crisis in Employment and Consumer Demand: Reconciliation with Environmental and Financial Sustainability. The European Financial Review, October-November, 2012, pp. 63-68.
Ashford, R., Hall, R. P., and Ashford, N. A. (2012) Broadening Capital Acquisition with the Earnings of Capital as a Means of Sustainable Growth and Environmental Sustainability. The European Financial Review, October-November, 2012, pp. 70-74.

I first became aware of binary economics when searching for alternative, transformational models of development. The importance of identifying new development pathways has only intensified following the recent global financial crisis that has deepened economic inequality both within and between nations. Robert’s ideas relating to binary economic growth hold great potential to transform and reignite the economy. My interest in this subject, and reason for bringing Robert to VT with the assistance of an AdvanceVT grant, stems from the need to ensure that any surge in economic growth does not also create a surge in negative environmental and social externalities. My hope is that we can find ways to stimulate binary growth while transforming industrial systems towards inherently sustainable practices.

Global Forum on Urban and Regional Resilience

Today, Virginia Tech formally announced the new Global Forum on Urban and Regional Resilience. The forum has been created to bridge research, policy, and practice in order to address risk and build resiliency at regional and urban scales in a global context. The formal description of the forum’s objectives and activities is provided in the document to the left.

Last week, I had the pleasure of learning more about this new Presidential Initiative while attending the 4th Conference on Community Resilience in Davos, Switzerland. During the conference, I was able to ask President Charles W. Steger a few questions about the Global Forum and witness the signing of a memorandum of understanding between Virginia Tech and the Global Risk Forum. I captured these events using Google Glass, and with the help of Tonya Pruitt developed the video below.

At the conference, I spoke on a panel focused on “Approaches to Infrastructure Resiliency in Different National Contexts.” In my presentation (below), I described the activities of the IITK-VT Partnership, and how they contribute towards the partnership’s vision of creating sustainable and resilient infrastructure services.