Interviewees

Medha Patkar

Medha Patkar is a social activist who has led the struggle for the people affected by the controversial Sardar Sarovar Project on the Narmada River in Gujarat, India. She founded the Narmada Bachoao Andolan and National Alliance of People's Movements and is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Goldman Environmental Prize, Amnesty International's Human Rights Defender's Award and the BBC's Green Ribbon Award.

Videos featuring Medha Patkar

  • A Threat to Living Communities

    Indian social activist Medha Patkar explains how the economic development model being imposed on India's farmers is neither inclusive nor sustainable. As natural resources become commodities and farming families lose the capacity to fulfill their own basic needs, Medha believes that the consumerist paradigm may end up destroying living communities.

    (5 min 37 sec)

  • What Would It Look Like?

    What if the world embodied our highest potential? What would it look like? As the structures of modern society crumble, is it enough to respond with the same tired solutions?

    Or are we being called to question a set of unexamined assumptions that form the very basis of our civilization?

    This 25-minute retrospective asks us to reflect on the state of the world and ourselves, and to listen more closely to what is being asked of us at this time of unprecedented global transformation.

    (24 min 54 sec)

  • No One Eats Dollar Notes

    Medha Patkar, Indian social activist and advocate, rejects the idea that indigenous peoples must assimilate to a market economy that is neither inclusive nor sustainable on a long-term basis.

    (1 min 33 sec)

  • Alternative Sources of Energy

    Medha Patkar, social activist and advocate for peoples vulnerable to massive dam projects in India, asks why India should follow a Western paradigm of development. She asks why disrupting traditions of land use in exchange for non-renewable resources that are unsuitable for India's population is acceptable—when alternative technologies that support local communities are available. Most importantly, says Medha, India must tap into the most remarkable form of power: the human power of democratic, cooperative action.

    (4 min 49 sec)
"So we are basically fighting this battle for an alternative economic and political perspective against the present development paradigm, which is being imposed on the people and the market."
From
A Threat to Living Communities
On the web