DJALCHEMI

RSA 250th anniversary event

The RSA has been going for 250 years. I joined it because it seemed to be one of those Establishment institutions that had license to promote dangerous and subversive ideas without being pilloried by conservative forces.

The RSA has now revisited its 01754 mission mission to focus on social and economic challenges such as sustainability and global citizenship. The announcement of their international conference in October provide links to these challenges and the distinctly mixed bag of 21st century visionaries they're assembling for it. I will go... probably.

There's been some moaning on the RSA Forum in the last couple of days about how consistent the RSA's goals are with its partnership with Starbucks. Here's the 'anti' and here's the 'pro' (with acknowledgement to Starbucks' UK Corporate Social Responsibility Manager — the job title speaks volumes — for the latter). I'm less concerned about the RSA's faustian side-deals than with a worrying trend towards corporate blandness in the RSA's pronouncements on it's 'mission' and so on.