I quote Susan in my book, Sustainability Simplified. In it you'll see how much John Locke influenced my long-term vision for the US to understand and solve our environmental problems. Learning about the Thirteenth Amendment, which (mostly) banned slavery, and its improbable path to passage and ratification led me to think about solving our environmental problems similarly.

I learned that many people working to abolish slavery worked hard when drafting the US Constitution to make it able to support abolitionism and to disallow property in man. Slaveholders opposed them, so they accepted compromises. Still, they put enough into the Constitution to enable weakening the institution enough to eventually end it. I wondered if sustainability might have similar precedent, like some law or phrasing of the Constitution that might have disallowed polluting or depleting.

It turns out there was. It was in John Locke's Two Treatises on Government. The more I researched the man, his writings, and our Constitution, the more he seemed to apply to our environmental problems. That research led me to a paper by Susan Liebell, which I link to below.

My conversation with Susan explore the application of his work and theories.

• The paper that brought me to her: The Text and Context of "Enough and as Good": John Locke as the Foundation of an Environmental Liberalism

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I've been curious in what ways libertarian views on the environment and sustainability differ from conservative views. Travis worked at the Heritage Foundation, which is more conservative, and now works at the Cato Institute, which is more libertarian. Since I haven't spoken to many libertarians directly, I'm interested in this conversation to learn, so it's a conversation, not a debate.

Early in our conversation, he describes some of their differences and similarities, and why he chose Cato. He shares some of his training and background that led him to his views.

Then we talked about a few issues: the Inflation Reduction Act, regulation, how government funding of many programs results in industries growing without being profitable from its customers. We look at several moral hazards, including government gaining money and power from permitting polluting behavior and distributing funding evenly so everyone votes for something even if it doesn't help.

We recorded just before the election so talked about recording again after the election to talk about how its results affect the political, energy, and pollution landscape.

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Usually when someone does their commitment with the Spodek Method, they enjoy it. Nearly always they do more than they commit to. Sometimes someone really enjoys it.

Jan went to town on his commitment. You might wonder if there's any appeal to picking up litter. Is it worth the effort? Who cares, anyway? After all, more people litter than pick it up, as anyone can tell by how much litter there is and how much it's growing.

Yet the pattern I've discovered keeps happening. On the other side of working on sustainability is always community. I can't prove it always happens, but so far it does.

In Jan's case, he found community, in particular, people who had long wanted to act. They were just waiting for someone to lead them. When someone did, they embraced acting.

How many people around you are waiting for someone to activate them? How much community is waiting to form? How much easier do you think it will be than you probably expect, based on Jan's experience?

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