Our little group of a dozen families was running out of time. After meeting every weekend for three years to plan our hoped-for cohousing community, and after investing much of our savings to acquire a few acres of land, it looked as though our dream would fail. We...

The four founders of Idle No More didn't start out famous. Until flash-mob round dances, prayer circles, and blockades spread across Canada, few people knew Jessica Gordon, Sylvia McAdam, Sheelah McLean, and Nina Wilson.

But today, Idle No More is emerging as a powerful movement for the rights...

That the president put climate change so high on his second-term agenda surprised many. But action must follow words.

President Barack Obama included a call to action on climate change in his inaugural speech on January 21, surprising those who thought gun violence and immigration reform would take top billing.

While the Earth didn't end on December 21, 2012, the year's end was marked by a new awareness of the urgency of the climate crisis. Americans are becoming increasingly aware of the preciousness and fragility of life on Earth. That and other cultural shifts are setting the stage for significant...

Feeling panicked about the so-called "fiscal cliff?" Don't be. At worst, if would be more of a "ramp" than a cliff, since effects would be spread out over time.

More importantly, the crisis atmosphere is a fabrication created by Congress. The cuts in spending and the end to tax breaks...

It's 3 a.m. and the wind is howling. Do you know who your neighbors are?

This may well be remembered as the year the climate crisis got real.

Superstorm Sandy followed a summer of record-breaking heat, wildfires, and droughts, during which more than half of U.S. counties were declared...

Cutting through the campaign rhetoric and attack ads, here are five issues that should be at the center of the 2012 election, plus one that has no place in the public sphere.

Every election year, the two parties choose the agendas and issues to highlight and ballyhoo. Often it...

The oil-dependent economy Romney supports is a step toward an unstable, costly future. Renewables and energy efficiency offer a stronger economy and a stable climate.

Mitt Romney's new energy platform calls for more fossil fuel production and less regulation. It's a vision of an energy future that is dirtier...

The extreme heat, storms and drought sweeping most of the nation are finally convincing a large majority of Americans that climate change is upon us. According to Bloomberg News, 70 percent of Americans now believe the climate is changing.

It's late to be getting to solutions, but now,...

Would returning to a speculative, boom-and-bust housing market help poor and middle-class Americans? Or is there a better way?

A Minneapolis family's fight to save their home has become a national struggle after police arrested 13 protesters, including hip-hop artist Brother Ali. Earlier police raids resulted in dozens more arrests...

If the mainstream media was confused about Occupy Wall Street in its early days in Zuccotti Park, they're bound to be completely befuddled this May Day.

May Day already has a lot piled on it. In pre-Christian Europe, May Day was a time to dance, light bonfires,...

What happens if the Supreme Court strikes down the "individual mandate" in the health care reform law?

Commentators ranging from former Labor Secretary Robert Reich to Forbes Magazine columnist Rick Ungar agree: Such a decision could open the door to single-payer health care -- perhaps even...

What can be done to stop racially motivated violence?

For far too long, violence targeting young people of color has been tolerated, even condoned, in the United States. The killing of Trayvon Martin is part of a horrific history -- one that can only be stopped if all of us,...

7 signs the corporatocracy is losing its legitimacy ... and 7 populist tools to help shut it down.

You may remember that there was a time when apartheid in South Africa seemed unstoppable.

Sure, there were international boycotts of South African businesses, banks, and tourist attractions. There were heroic activists...

2011 was full of surprises, many of them the good kind. But which ones will matter in the coming year? Here are the YES! Magazine pick of trends to watch.

Who would have thought that some young people camped out in lower Manhattan with cardboard signs, a few...

The police raids of the past week are raising questions about the future of Occupy Wall Street. Without the Zuccotti Park encampment that was at the heart of the movement, will it fade away? Will harsh weather or police violence drive people away?

Not likely. It will almost certainly...

Many question whether this movement can really make a difference. The truth is that it is already changing everything. Here's how.

By Sarah van Gelder, David Korten, and Steve Piersanti

Before the Occupy Wall Street movement, there was little discussion of the outsized power of Wall Street and the...

The #OccupyWallStreet movement continues to spread with more than 1,500 sites. More and more people are speaking up for a society that works for the 99 percent, not just the 1 percent.

Here are 10 recommendations for ways to build the power and momentum of this movement. Only...

Young people locking arms, facing arrest on a cold, wet Seattle street -- it could have been the WTO protests that rocked the city more than ten years ago. Only this time, Seattle is just one of dozens of places where the movement for the 99 percent is...

A majority of U.S. Supreme Court justices and some politicians like to refer to corporations as "persons." Few actual people, though, could get away with years of lawless behavior resulting in injuries and deaths, and the destruction of entire communities and ways of life. To do that takes the protection...