Welcome to the Home Page of Wayne Hayes, Ph.D.

Summary: Home page for ProfWork 11.4 site now in development by Wayne Hayes, Professor Emeritus of Sustainability at Ramapo College of New Jersey. This project reflects a shift from course delivery to an outline of material to support visitors who are interested in sustainability. The transition is in its early stages, but I hope that you find the material of use to you. Contact me if I may assist your learning about sustainability. Please consider the entire web site as dedicated to the Creative Commons.

Welcome to the home page of the legacy ProfWork web site created and maintained by Wayne Hayes, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus of Sustainability at Ramapo College of New Jersey. I retired in July, 2015, after serving the Environmental Studies major, the Masters in Sustainability Studies, and founding the Public policy minority. I worked at Ramapo College from 1972 to 2015. An outline of my farewell address, delivered on December 5, 2015, provides you with some context and an overview.

Current Interests

Since me retirement in July, 2015, my concerns about the creation of a just and sustainable world have increased. Four projects continue my ProfWork project, both arisen since my retirement:

  1. Aporia 2045: Economic Growth presents the inherent mandate of global capitalism (a.k.a., globalization or neoliberalism) to ceaselessly expand at the expense of labor (populations inhabiting communities and creating cultures) and Nature (resource endowments to be plundered or subsidized by puplic policy). My Statement of Concern, first articulated in 2007, presents my misgivings about global capitalism. I recognize that concrete economic needs such as adequate nutrition, shelter, and water exist, especially in Asia and Africa, but doubt that commodification through capitalist markets will adquately deliver those needs.
  2. Strategic Sustainability: The election of Donald Trump as President of the USA. Since I never believed that either public policy or nation-states would ever mount a sufficient effort to forestall global catastrophe (see my Statement of Concern), the demise of any hope of responsible public policy led by the USA was not my primary disappointment. Rather, the shift to states, regions, and communities that might come about can be encouraging. Indeed, the curriculum within which I worked at Ramapo College emphasized local and personal sources that might promote sustainability. To paraphrase Rene Dubos: "Think globally, act locally and strategically." Contrast this with the business plan of the Medici that creates the Aporia 2045: "Money for power. Power for money."
  3. Laudato Si': The release of the Laudato Si' Encyclical by Pope Francis in June, 2015, just as I retired. Laudato Si' provided a robust spiritual and moral imperative to address the same themes as World Sustainability. I embraced the Encyclical and am currently involved in an effort to inject the Encyclical into the proceedings of the Archdiocese of Newark in partnership with a friend familiar with the Archdiocese.
  4. A blog presenting miscellaneous current aspects of World Sustainability that do not fit within the themes depicted above. The blog uses Google Sites.

Aporia 2045

Economic Growth is the dominant mandate of capitalism and globalization, typically in its most virulent form, neoliberalism.

The election of Donald Trump confirms my long standing belied that the institutional regimes within the capitalist political economy will never relinquish dominance over the world's labor or resources. Growth Regimes will persist within the business plan of the Medici: "Money for power. Power for money." The wicked dilemma thus posed what motivated Aristotle's monumental Metaphysics: an Aporia, meaning no path through it.

Strategic Sustainability

Given the Aporia presented by persistent economic growth and the Growth Regimes that control the institutions and resist movements countering the harms of growth, a strategic response is contemplated. Aspects would be a softening of corporate attitude, coming, say, the re-insurance industry or proponents of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), or possibly a shift by consumers toward more responsible companies. The soft spots in the dialectic of global capitalism can be identified and observed.

Visitors to this site will by now recognize that the conceptual challenges involved in unpacking the growth dynamics in generational time and on a global scale provides a daunting challenge but that devising a feasible systemic response demands even more. However, for those so concerned, whom I will dub sustainers, must not only discover the high ground, the path through the Aporia, but also begin to hack away on the underbrush of reistance and deception. The ethical and intellectual challenge invites the exercise.

Laudato Si', Social Ecology, and Sustainability

With the release of the Papal Encyclical, Laudato Si', Social Ecology has been revived by Pope Francis around the core concept from St. Francis of Assisi, Integral Ecology. I have loaded in a separate page some remarks, notes, and links for the Environmental Studies and Masters in Sustainability Studies Reunion at Ramapo College, December 5, 2015.

Upon re-building for a general audience as an intended Primer on World Sustainability, I will infuse spiritual and ethical aspects based on Laudato Si', the Papal Encyclical (July 2015). The new synoptic model will feature Economics ==> Ecology ==> Spirituality, informed by the work of Niconar Perlas, Shaping Globalization: Civil Society, Cultural Power and Threefolding (2003: New Society Publishers). The themes here are consistent with my academic mission, but will expand as I transcend the prior curricular constraints. However, without the support of my colleagues and the innovative potential of Ramapo College, the entire effort would be more specialized. I am grateful for the opportunity to continue my mission.

Legacy ProfWork Website

The original ProfWork site supported my classes, so were shaped by the delivery of my curriculum. These courses are therefore built into the ProfWork site:

Please use this site as you see fit under the Creative Commons guidelines. Please contact me if you use the site or about any matter related to this content.

ProfWork Home Page | © Wayne Hayes, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus of Sustainability, Ramapo College | ™ ProfWork | wkhayes@gmail.com
Initialized: October 12, 2002 | Last Update: 02/02/2018 | V. 13.1, Build #50
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License.