The Unseen Work: Stewart Brand on Maintenance and Civilization

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4.7 • 4.4K Ratings

🗓️ 6 April 2026

⏱️ 87 minutes

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Summary

What does a lone sailor circling the globe have to do with the fall of empires, the Model T, and the rise of AI? Everything--because maintenance, the quiet act of keeping things going, turns out to be the hidden force behind success and failure in nearly every domain of human endeavor. EconTalk's Russ Roberts speaks with Stewart Brand --creator of the Whole Earth Catalog, founder of the Long Now Foundation, and one of the great connective thinkers of the last half-century--to explore why some people and civilizations thrive while others collapse. From the 1968 Golden Globe Race, where three sailors' radically different attitudes toward maintenance determined their fates, to the M-16's deadly design flaws in Vietnam, to the cultural reasons Israel excels at crisis response but struggles with prevention, Brand ranges across history, warfare, technology, and philosophy. Along the way, they discuss John Deere's war against its own farmers, the Model T as democratic revolution, and what AI might mean for human vigilance and connection. A wide-ranging, endlessly surprising conversation about the unglamorous work that holds everything together.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to Econ Talk, Conversations for the Curious, part of the Library of Economics and Liberty.
0:07.9	I'm your host, Russ Roberts, of Sholem College in Jerusalem and Stanford University's Hoover Institution.
0:13.8	Go to EconTalk.org, where you can subscribe, comment on this episode, and find links and other information related to today's conversation.
0:21.2	You'll also find our archives with every episode we've done going back to 2006.
0:26.7	Our email address is mail at econTalk.org. We'd love to hear from you.
0:36.6	Today is February 26, 2026, and my guest is Stuart Brand.
0:41.4	He was the co-founder and editor of the Whole Earth Catalog.
0:44.3	He founded the Well, the Global Business Network, and the Long Now Foundation.
0:49.1	His latest book and the subject of today's conversation is Maintenance of Everything Part 1.
0:56.4	Stuart, welcome to Econ Talk.
0:58.6	Well, thank you.
0:59.6	Nice to be here.
1:01.2	Now, I have to confess, I loved your book.
1:03.3	It's incredibly wide-ranging and fascinating.
1:07.3	Every page has something interesting on it.
1:09.8	But the subject matter of maintenance is something I have to confess I have little in my life.
1:15.4	I live in Jerusalem.
1:17.1	We don't own a car, which used to be a part of my American maintenance life.
1:22.0	I brush my teeth in the morning and in the evening.
1:25.5	And I recently started going to the gym and I work out three times a week. But I have no tools. I have no, other than my toothbrush, I have no tools and my computer. I have no tools that I use regularly. I have a feeling you of a different life. So I'm curious about the things in your life that you maintain regularly and the tools that you use regularly.
1:51.1	When you get to be 87 like I am, I think you'll find that the biggest maintenance item is your health.
2:00.5	Sure. And when I was a young hippie, we all lived in the moment.
	...

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