Thought Leader Interview: Rebecca Henderson
The title of your book [Reimagining Capitalism in a World on Fire] indicates that the world is on fire. Please explain what you meant by that.
At the most basic level, I meant that the world was literally on fire. When I finished the manuscript in early 2020, both Australia and California were burning and many of our societies were on fire with rage, anger and indignation. Months later people said to me, ‘How did you know?’ — but it has seemed to me fairly clear for at least the last 10 years that, unless we start to focus on our environmental and social problems, the situation will become increasingly dire.
Sadly, many business leaders still view issues like climate change, inequality and institutional collapse as things that have nothing to do with them. What is your message to these leaders?
My hope is that every leader will recognize that these are things they have to address in order for their business to thrive. Period. For many years, the business community has been able to think about the great social and environmental problems of our time as ‘someone else’s problem’ — as externalities. But the fact is, as our governments and societies have proved increasingly unable to deal with these ‘wicked problems’, they have begun to threaten the long-term viability of our planet’s support system, the long-term health of our societies — and the long term
