This week’s mentor is Van Jones, who hails from Oakland and brings his message of building green collar jobs to Washington D.C. as recently appointed green jobs advisor for the Obama administration.  VJ is not only a local hero, aiming to bring men and women out of poverty through the creation of green jobs, but he’s also a wonderful example of how people can leverage the power of social technology to amplify their message and escalate it to the national stage.

A quick bio:

• 1993: Jones graduates from Yale Law School
• 1996: he founds the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, which advocates for juvenile justice reform, police reform, youth violence prevention and green-collar jobs
• In 2007, Van helped the City of Oakland pass a “Green Jobs Corps” proposal. Also helped pass the “Green Jobs Act” of 2007 through congress.
• In 2008 he is showered with awards from various youth, African-American, urban, and green companies and publications

Van Jones has been a tireless advocate for putting green jobs and green issues at the forefront of our economic and social discussions.  What makes this man great is that he is a cultural mediator: his work is translating the theoretical in the practical, making green ideas accessible to those who can put them into action,  and providing a working man’s guide to the green revolution.

As he puts it, he’d like to facilitate the discussion between the Ph.Ds and the Ph.Do’s — the farmers, laborers, and builders, to create a populist green movement.   He describes the current niche-status of the green economy in a way that displays both his affinity for the working man and his attitude towards the status quo.

VJ: Well, I did have a eureka moment. I’ve been working in urban communities for a long time, working with kids in trouble trying to reform, police departments and juvenile justice systems, and I just burned out and started going from Oakland to Marin County, where there’s a lot of meditation centers, and just discovered a whole new world.,You know, a lot of stuff over there they don’t have in Oakland, like salads and, you know, stuff like that. Tofu and hybrid cars, and I said, “Jeez, all this beautiful green stuff, services, products, new industries that are rising, the solar industry. You know, we should have that, some of that stuff in urban America — people who are disadvantaged, poor people in rural America, Appalachia. How do we get this green economy to be expanded to include more people, get it strong enough so it can lift people out of poverty and create jobs for people?” And it was in that inquiry that I wound up writing this book.

Although using a different rhetoric than Obama (President Obama would probably not talk about urban youths needing more salad as high priority), the message is the same: economic opportunity for more people, not just those who can afford it.  Jones points to the fact that the green economy has too long been a niche market populated by affluent Prius-drivers or hemp & dreads-sporting vegan counter-cultural renegades.  He seeks to extend the green movement to people beyond those with surplus cultural and economic capital.  He is hoping that more people can participate, not only in green buying but green building.  He sees green as a moral imperative that must not be devoted not only to products but average joe services and job opportunities.

There is little I can say about this man that he hasn’t once said himself or someone else has said about him (you can see some of his interviews on the web: @GreenBiz.com & @ Treehugger) His public relations staff has executed flawlessly in employing social technology for getting his ideas out there.

Van Jones’s relevance and the reason he is my mentor is not only his message, but in his delivery of that message.  VJ’s ideas have spread virally through blogs, twitter, and viral video.  His book scaled the NYT bestseller’s list through a faithful following in the blogosphere, including Arrianna Huffington.  Perhaps because these personal successes with social media, he has recently acted as an advocate and proponent of social technology, preaching its power to create a greener and better world.

You can check out Van Jones videos all over the internet for more insight into this potent figure.  One in particular caught my attention: a powerful talk he gave at the Personal Democracy Forum — a must see http://personaldemocracy.blip.tv/file/1050990/.  In this talk he praises social media as a tool for bridging the idea makers to those who can execute the ideas and build up the infrastructure. VJ sees a communication gap that’s preventing wonderful ideas from reaching fruition.  The gap exists between progressive idealists (users of social technology) and those who can execute the ideas but have not been brought up in the niche culture of the green economy.  Van Jones advocates expanding these social technologies to those who have not yet adopted them, and passionately believes social media has the power to connect idea and action, bringing about the fundamental changes we need to survive our economic and climate crises.  For this reason, he is our Monday mentor.

Follow him on twitter: @greenforall
Or check out a conversation between him and David Gottfried (March 31, 2009): http://bit.ly/I5X1R