What we see today is a world movement represented by the World Social Forum, involving all sorts of interactions across cultures, not to create some new "ism," but to learn as we walk and to create more democratic forms of social organization that re-embed economic life in community.

What we do in the book my daughter Anna and I wrote, Hope's Edge, is to give people a glimpse of food as a source of nourishment, health, and community, rather than a threat. That means reconnecting with food as it comes from the Earth and with those who produce food.

In the late 1960s, there were alarming predictions that worldwide famine was around the corner. I wondered if humans had already lost the race, overrun the Earth's capacity. I let one question lead to the next, and unearthed information that would forever change my life: Not only is there enough food in the world to feed every man, woman, and child on Earth, there is enough to make us all chubby.

I've grown certain that the root of all fear is that we've been forced to deny who we are.

For me, just showing up for the traveling and writing gave me the power to overcome my fear of fear.

Hope is a stance, not an assessment.

I had left graduate school, determined that I wasn't going to do anything else to "save the world" until I understood how I could get at the underlying causes of deepening suffering. To do that, I had to start by admitting that I didn't know.