David W. Orr
Resolution of the great ecological challenges of the next century will require us to reconsider the substance, process, and purposes of education at all levels.
About
David W. Orr is the Paul Sears Distinguished Professor of Environmental Studies and Politics emeritus at Oberlin College and currently serves as a Professor of Practice at Arizona State University. With a prolific career, David has authored eight influential books and over 250 articles, making him a leading voice for sustainability in higher education. His groundbreaking work includes designing the Adam Joseph Lewis Center, recognized as “the most important green building of the past thirty years” by an AIA panel. David’s leadership extends to co-founding significant initiatives like The Oberlin Project and the Climate/Democracy Initiative. His contributions have earned him numerous awards.
He has authored Dangerous Years: Climate Change, the Long Emergency, and the Way Forward (Yale, 2017), Down to the Wire: Confronting Climate Collapse (Oxford, 2009), and Design with Nature (Oxford, 2002). He is the co-editor of five others including Democracy Unchained (The New Press, 2020) and Democracy in a Hotter Time (MIT Press, 2023). He was a regular columnist for Conservation Biology for twenty years. He has also written over 250 articles, reviews, book chapters, and professional publications.
He has served as a board member or adviser to eight foundations and on the Boards of the Rocky Mountain Institute, the Aldo Leopold Foundation, Bioneers, the Alliance for Sustainable Colorado, and the Children and Nature Network.
He has been awarded nine honorary degrees and a dozen other awards including a Lyndhurst Prize, a National Achievement Award from the National Wildlife Federation, a “Visionary Leadership Award” from Second Nature, a National Leadership award from the U.S. Green Building Council, a Lifetime Achievement Award from the North American Association for Environmental Education, the 2018 Leadership Award from the American Renewable Energy Institute, and a Lifetime Achievement Award from Green Energy Ohio.
He has lectured at hundreds of colleges and universities throughout the U.S., Europe, and Asia. He headed the effort to design, fund, and build the Hotel at Oberlin (Platinum rated), and the Adam Joseph Lewis Center, which was named by an AIA panel in 2010 as “the most important green building of the past thirty years;” . . . “one of thirty milestone buildings of the twentieth century” by the U.S. Department of Energy, and selected as one of “52 game changing buildings of the past 170 years” by the editors of Building Design + Construction Magazine (2016). He was the co-founder of The Atlanta Environmental Symposium (1973-1975), the Meadowcreek Project (1979-1900), the Oberlin Project 2007-2017; and the Climate/Democracy Initiative (2021-present).
This keynote talk by David Orr, delivered at the 2019 Bioneers Conference, addresses the critical challenges facing American democracy today. Orr, a leading environmental and political thought leader, explores the urgent need to repair and update our institutions in the face of accelerating global threats. Drawing from his book, Democracy Unchained, Orr offers insights on how we can return to the better angels of our collective nature and steer toward a more just and sustainable future.
