Conversations with Courageous Leaders

This Month: The iconic Frances Moore Lappé

Frances Moore Lappé has her heroes—and is a hero to many more of us.

Fifty-three years ago, she published Diet for a Small Planet, which started a revolution in how we eat. Today, at 80, she’s working on her 21st book and her most ambitious yet.

Called Hidden Hope: Tough Truths and Promising Possibilities, it takes a look at things she initially found shocking: how low America ranks on what many think we’re among the best at, from health, justice, and the environment to the more recently dubious state of our democracy.

But that’s just the starting point. Most of the book is focused on the Promising Possibilities part—namely, how we can learn from the many nations that are doing better than the United States.

She recently joined me for a conversation, the second in this series of Conversations with Courageous Leaders. We spoke about all the good, meaty stuff I love talking about and was happy to discover she does, too: power, hope, connecting with others, and, of course, courage—and how it all plays out in today’s world.

Highlights of our conversation are below. But when you have the time, you might like to watch the conversation here.

Why are we creating a world none of us would choose—and how do we create the one we want?

Lisa Bennett: You’ve accomplished so much in your life, being one of the handful of people who have changed how we eat, fought to protect democracy, and written 20 books—soon your 21st. So, there's a great deal that we can talk about. What I'd love to focus on in this conversation is the underlying question you put this way: Why are we creating a world that none of us as individuals would ever choose, and how do we create the world that we would choose? 

Frances Moore Lappé: I should say that no one gets up in the morning and says, ‘Yeah, it's a great idea to make sure another child dies today of hunger.’ Nobody wants more suffering except for a pathological handful. So why are we together creating a world that, as individuals, we would never choose? I realized that the only thing that could explain it is that we humans see the world not as it is but as we are, through filters that we create. 

One of the filters is the idea that there is such a thing as a free market and that if we just let this free market do its thing, people will get what they deserve. If you're hungry, that's what the free market determined. And so, I came early to see that the idea of a free market is false. Every market has rules.

Our primary rule is to do what brings the highest return to existing wealth. So, wealth accrues to wealth accrues to wealth until we end up not in the middle class. The majority of Americans still think it's a middle-class country. No, no, no, no. We have greater income inequality in this country than in over 120 countries.

 But we're blinded by this filter that we're the best, and therefore, how discouraging is it that if we're the best—and we're such a high greenhouse gas emitter, and we have so many suffering from poverty—then, boy, no wonder, you want to duck your head under the closest rock. So that's been the theme of my life: What can I do to alter the filters we see through, not just give people new information? 

Bennett: How’s it gone? 

Lappé: Well, the world is still in big trouble. But I do think you’re right. When I started, there was no one questioning the scarcity frame. So now, at least, we've progressed to understand hunger is not inevitable. And some of us see how much built-in waste every day to our system, and that there's this, this vast capacity to feed all of us well, and yet we've chosen because we bought this myth that we needed, that we needed meat to survive and specific kind of this grain-fed meat that so much of our agricultural lands. 

Our actions have an impact, whether deliberate or not.

Bennett:  One of the filters you've written about is powerlessness. I’m exploring that in the book I'm writing now, too. And here’s something I’d like your thoughts about: I once spoke with Emeritus Professor Philip Zimbardo and asked him, ‘Why do you think people aren't doing more to address the climate crisis?’ And he had a very simple answer: ‘Everybody is told that they can make a difference, and nobody believes it.’ That might be a slight overstatement, but I'm curious about why you think some of us don't believe we can impact things. 

Lappé: Well, one of the things that I love to remind us about from an ecological worldview is that everything is connected. So, every act we take or do not take ripples out. So, our silence and inaction keep a certain train moving. And our willingness to change our choices in the marketplace also ripples out. Whether we recognize it or not, we have power we're exerting. If we just fall in line, we're supporting what is. So, the only choice we don't have is whether to change the world because our actions have an effect every day.

That's the other thing I often think about, whether at the grocery store or wherever I am: Who might be watching? That's true for all of us, including our families, closest friends, and people listening to a conversation on a bus. You never know who listens in this interconnected world, so no one is utterly powerless. 

We think of power as typically power over and that you’ve got to have somebody who you're bossing around to have power. But actually, the root of the word power is simply poser, which means to be able. Power is just our capacity to act. So, we all have poser. We all have that power, and we must trust that maybe the smallest act we've taken, or one of the smaller ones, has had the most impact because somebody watched us, and it changed their life. 

There’s another thing I’d like to bring in here: What is hope? Do you want to hold onto that for later?

Bennett: Oh, no, please. You're the hope-monger!

Hope is not for wimps.

Lappé: Yes. I’m the hope-monger. People think of hope as soft and nice. I say that hope is power—the hope that gets us up in the morning. Hope is what moves us. Hope is not for wimps because if you have hope, you want to go for it. And so, yeah, hope is what we all need—to continue to be in hope because how can we believe others will act if we don't ourselves act? 

Bennett: Where does that kind of conviction and belief in hope come from in you? 

Lappé: Hmm. Nobody asked me that before. But I grew up in Texas during the McCarthy era. My parents founded a Unitarian Church and integrated it when the whole city was segregated. My mom’s best friend was Black. The FBI came to our door when I was nine years old because of the integration of our church. They thought that integration was communism. Looking back, I realize my parents were superheroes to me. I think they were really brave in their way. 

Another thing is that when I was nine, my dad took a job as a weather forecaster on Wake Island, a tiny island in the Pacific Ocean. There were about 12 nationalities on that little island, and I became an internationalist overnight. 

Find a friend gutsier than you.

Bennett: If you talk to people who can't tap that kind of early experience and modeling but are worried about the state of the world now and want to make a difference, what would you say?

Lappé: I would say find a friend, one friend who you hope is gutsier than you but at least as gutsy as you because we all need buddies. Some of us are really gutsy and can do it on our own, but most of us need a buddy. And if you find one person, say, ‘OK, let's go to that meeting.’ ‘Let’s read this book together and figure out what we will do.’ ‘Let's do something that we've never done before and do it together,’ we'll have more courage. 

Bennett: When I think about how we all relate to the state of the world at the moment, it seems that we respond along a continuum not unrelated to the fight-or-flight dynamic. On the one hand, Some people see what's going on, get in there, and do everything they can, and a subsection of them are at risk of burnout because they're not taking care of themselves along the way. On the other hand, people feel it is too much, so they check out and disengage. But, there is a healthy place in the middle. I am curious about your thoughts and how you take care of yourself. 

 Lappé: I’ve been fortunate to find allies in my life, so I never felt overwhelmed. I felt like I was part of a community that supported me. That's the key because we are social creatures. Most of us need community. That’s the main thing. And then I say, find your question. Find something that grabs you, and it will lead you to the next thing. 

On the wall in our office and my wall at home is a quote from a Chinese philosopher [Lu Xun] who said,

‘Hope cannot be said to exist, nor can it be said not to exist. It is just like roads across the earth. For actually, the earth had no roads to begin with,
but when many men pass one way, a road is made.’

And if you have a buddy, you are beginning your little road, and that's how we sustain ourselves.  

The importance of teaching courage in organizations and schools.

Bennett: Let’s talk a bit more about courage. You wrote a book about it almost 15 years ago. And when I look at the state of courage in our culture now, I think we need to be more deliberate in developing courage in schools, organizations, and our culture. I'd love to hear what you think about that. 

Lappé: I love that you brought up education. I've written about the service-learning movement, and I remember talking with young students in middle school and junior high in Maine who had a venue to go out into the community and work and feel like they were making a difference, whether it was tutoring a younger student or helping create a bike path. And I interviewed this one youngster who was around ten years old, who said, ‘Do you know that I actually helped somebody today, and it might even save a life because I was teaching them about bike safety?’ That sense of empowerment is so important to get from an early age. You don't have to be an elected official or some big hotshot to contribute to your community. 

Bennett: How about for people who are no longer in school, such as young parents who are concerned about the state of the world and have their hands full but are wrestling with how to show up? You spoke about the importance of finding a buddy. What else can help people develop courage? 

Lappé: Certainly, we all need models. I just watched “Eleanor, First Lady of the World.” And here's Eleanor, who was humiliated and called nasty nicknames as a child, and yet she moved as a woman in a world dominated by males and led what became the Universal Declaration for Human Rights. We can find our heroes like. She's the one who said,

‘Do one thing every day that scares you.’

Bennett: I have that on my desk.  

There is arguably no greater adventure now than addressing the life-threatening developments on our planet.

Lappé: Good for you. Also, we all want adventure. We don't want to end our days thinking, ‘Oh, well, that was nice. My grandkids are nice, and I had a nice life.’ No, we want adventure. That's who we are. And what is more adventurous than addressing the life-threatening developments on our very, very challenged planet? 

Bennett: In my book, I've been thinking about it in terms of the hero's journey. And I know we can say lots of things about that, but there is a basic truth to this what life is about: We choose an adventure, deal with the obstacles that come up, and see what lessons are to be learned that we can share with others. 

Lappé: Absolutely. I also want to underscore how rewarding it is. 

Bennett: You said something else that I love: We humans need purpose and meaning. We don't have to be certain of the outcome. But we do have to have a sense of possibility. Would you say more about that? 

Lappé: Yes, I’m glad you brought that up. We don't require certainty. Or if we did, we could hardly get up in the morning. So, I'm not an optimist. I call myself a ‘possibilist,’ and that's all that's required. Beyond our physical needs, human beings need a sense of agency or power, meaning, and connection. People will give up their lives to achieve that. And if it's not met positively, then it's met negatively.

Bennett: As we wrap up, I want to ask about your 21st book, which you’re working on now.  You said it is one of the more complicated, ambitious, and important books. I’d love to hear more about that. 

The hope hidden in bad news

Lappé: The title is Hidden Hope: Tough Truths and Promising Possibilities. The idea is that there is hope hidden in the bad news. I thought I had a realistic view of where the U.S. stood in the world on things from democracy to health to justice to the environment. I was shocked at how low we rank. We're something like 59th in democracy, not even up near our peers.

But then I thought, wait, if we were the best, that would be terrible news. What is encouraging is that we can learn from all these countries. I take all these dimensions and show where we stand. But then the bulk of the book is about how the number ones achieve that status.

Bennett: There's a lot there.

Lappé: Yeah, and I love it because I get to get inspired every day about other countries.

Bennett: What a wonderful premise. I can't wait to read it. And I am so grateful for your time. Talk about being a superhero role model! Thank you. 

Lappé: Thank you. You made my day. These are the questions that I like to discuss, the big ones you are pursuing, and I honor you for that. 

Bennett: Thank you so much.