aspects and issues ever since 1985. A short list of our previous work on
aspects and issues.
aspects and issues read the following table.
| Month/year |
Theme and Author |
Read contents |
| November 29, 2007 |
Labor Goes to Bali: Unions Ready to Take on Global Warming
by Brendan Smith and Jeremy Brecher and Tim Costello, Global Labor Strategies
AlterNet, The Mix is the Message, ForeignPolicy
The devastating realities of climate change, and the scientific consensus around its cause and cure, are shifting the global political climate.
Some people might say you are anti-business. Is that the case?
This week trade unionists from around the world will travel to Bali for the December 3rd launch of negotiations for a successor to the Kyoto Protocol limiting greenhouse
gasses. It will include delegates from such U.S unions as the Electrical Workers (IUE), Mine Workers, Service Employees, Boilermakers, Steelworkers, Communication Workers,
Transport Workers (TWU), and UNITE HERE garment and textile workers. It will also include the AFL-CIO Industrial Union Council as well as such labor-oriented groups as the
Blue-Green Alliance, the Cornell Global Labor Institute, and the Labor Research Association. The Kyoto Protocol was signed by 172 countries - not including the U.S. The AFL-CIO, which then represented the great majority of all U.S. unions, opposed the
Kyoto protocol. What will be the stance of American labor toward an even stronger version for the future?
As trade unionists, we are confident that Bali will mark the beginning of a new and more ambitious process of social change, where our collective hearts and minds must
aspire to save our planet, on the basis of solidarity and mutual respect. |
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| November 14, 2007 |
Palm oil: Cooking the Climate Once you pop, you can't stop
by Greenpeace Canada http://www.greenpeace.org/canada/en/
Indonesia — If, as you read this, you're tucking into a KitKat or dipping into a tube of Pringles, you might be interested
to know that these products contain palm oil that is linked to the destruction of forests and peatlands in Indonesia. As our new report "How the palm oil industry
is cooking the climate" shows, it's a recipe for disaster. The manufacturers of these products - Nestlé, Procter & Gamble, and Unilever - are sourcing their palm oil from suppliers who aren't picky about where they site their
plantations. As the volunteers at the Forest Defenders Camp in Sumatra have seen, this includes tearing up areas of pristine forest then draining and burning the
peatlands. Indonesia's peatlands act as huge carbon stores so replacing them with plantations them not only threatens the amazing biodiversity, including the rare Sumatran tiger,
it also releases huge volumes of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. They only cover 0.1 per cent of the land on Earth, but thanks in part to the activities of the palm
oil industry they contribute 4 per cent to global emissions. If expansion of the palm oil industry continues unabated, that figure can only rise.
What's to be done? The Indonesian government should urgently introduce a moratorium on forest and peatland destruction, which will provide a chance to develop long-term
solutions and prevent further emissions from deforestation. And our eyes are fixed firmly on the UN climate meeting in Bali next month, where the next phase of the Kyoto
Protocol will be discussed. With deforestation accounting for up to a fifth of global emissions, including financing for forest protection as a core part of the plan to
tackle climate change is essential. | Read  |
| November 27, 2007 |
UNDP wants climate justice through trade
by ASHOK B SHARMA
published by Indian Society For Sustainable Agriculture and by Indian Express Newspapers (Mumbai) Ltd.
The UN Development Programme (UNDP) for the first time in its human development report has analysed the impact of climate
change. The Human Development Report 2007-08 – Fighting climate change : Human solidarity in a divided world is released at a time when the climate change agenda is
slowly gaining its entry in the WTO negotiations and the discussions on the review of the work under Kyoto Protocol is slated to take place in Bali in Indonesia in
December, this year.
The report documented the impact of climate change across the world also projected the likely scenario for the future. Making out a case for alternative sources of
energy and fuels like bio-fuels, the UNDP report said that global trade has a major role to play. It said :International trade could play a much larger role in
the expanding Markets for alternative fuels. Brazil is more efficient than either the European Union or the United States in producing ethanol, Moreover, sugar-based
ethanol is more efficient in cutting carbon emissions. The problem is that imports of Brazilian ethanol are restricted by high import tariffs. Removing these tariffs
would generate gains not just for Brazil, but for climate change mitigation.
Negotiations on emissions limits for the post-2012 Kyoto Protocol commitment period can – and must – frame the global carbon budget.
Saying so it noted most developed countries like Canada fell short of the targets. Though the European Union and UK have both embraced their targets, they are likely to
fall far short of the goals set unless they move rapidly to put climate mitigation at the center of energy policy reform. Two major OECD countries like US and Australia
are not bound by Kyoto Protocol.
The report suggested two ways to mitigate climate change, one is to directly tax carbon dioxide emission and the other is cap-and-trade. Under cap-and-trade system,
the government sets an overall emissions cap and issues tradable allowances that grant business the right to emit a set amount. Those who can reduce emissions more cheaply
are able to sell allowances. One potential disadvantage of cap-and-trade is energy price instability while the potential advantage is environmental certainty, it noted.
While the transition to climate protecting energy and life styles will have short-term costs, there may be economic benefits beyond what what is to be achieved by
stabilizing temperatures. These benefits are likely to be realized through Keynesian and Schumpeterian mechanisms with new incentives for massive investment stimulating
overall demand and creative destruction leading to innovation and productivity jumps in a wide array of sectors, the foreward to the report said.
While government leadership is going to be essential in correcting the huge externality that is climate change, Markets and prices will have to be put to work so that
private sector decisions can lead more naturally to optimal investment and production decisions.
| Read
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| November 11, 2007 |
Deal climate injustice at home: Greenpeace India
by ASHOK B SHARMA
published by Indian Society For Sustainable Agriculture and by Indian Express Newspapers (Mumbai) Ltd.
More than 800 million poor people in India are bearing the burnt of climate change. This is partly due to the emissions caused by
the few privileged rich people in the country, said a report released by Greenpeace India Society. The report on climate injustice entitled `Hiding Behind the Poor’
urged the government to apply the principle of “common but differentiated responsibilities” in the country to deal with the situation arising out of climate change.
The study authored by G Ananathpadmanabhan, K Srinivas and Vinuta Gopal, however advocated India’s right to seek common but differentiated responsibilities at the global level.
Referring to the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities, it said that India claims its right to development and thus its right to consume more energy from
fossil fuels, asking developed nations to create the carbon space. Implicit in this is the notion that the developed countries need to decrease their carbon dioxide emissions
drastically so that developing countries can still increase theirs without pushing the planet in the direction of climate change.”
However, the study pointed out that over the last few decades, emissions of rapidly developing countries like India and China have surged. In fact, rankings by the WRI of
top GHG emitters has US on top and developing countries such as China and India are ranked at No 2 and 5 respectively, making them amongst the world’s biggest emitters.
The Greepeace India made an urgent plea to the government to consider the situation especially when the next round of negotiations for the second phase of Kyoto Protocol
is scheduled to take place in Bali in Indonesia in December, this year.
The Greenpeace India report further said that India was faced with two sharply contradictory realities. On the one hand there was a rapidly growing rich consumer class
which has made the country the 12.
The largest luxury market in the world and on the other hand India has become the home to more than 800 million poor people on the planet who are extremely vulnerable to
the impacts of climate change. India’s per capita carbon dioxide emission has averaged to 1.67 tonne.
| Read
|
| November 19, 2007 |
A World Dying, But Can We Unite To Save It?
by Geoffrey Lean , Countercurrents.org, The Independent
Humanity is rapidly turning the seas acid through the same pollution that causes global warming, the world’s governments and top scientists agreed yesterday. The process — thought to be the most profound
change in the chemistry of the oceans for 20 million years — is expected both to disrupt the entire web of life of the oceans and to make climate change worse.
The warning is just one of a whole series of alarming conclusions in a new report published by the official Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
Scientists add that, as the seas become more acidic, they will be less able to absorb carbon dioxide, causing more of it to stay in the atmosphere to speed up global warming. Research is already uncovering some signs that the oceans’ ability to mop up the gas is diminishing. Environmentalists point out that the increasing acidification of the oceans would in itself provide ample reason to curb
emissions of carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels and felling forests even if the dwindling band of skeptics were right and the gas was not warming up the planet.
Getting agreement on a new treaty to tackle climate change hangs on resolving an “after you, Claude” impasse between the United States and China, the two biggest emitters of carbon dioxide, the main cause of global warming.
China insists - with other key developing countries like India and South Africa — that the United States must move first to clean up. It points out that, because of the disparity in populations, every American is responsible for emitting much more of the gas than each Chinese. But the US refuses to join any new treaty unless China also accepts restrictions. |
Read |
| November 19, 2007 |
Globalisation Or Militarist Imperialism? India Must Choose: the Indo-US nuclear deal
by Rohini Hensman, Countercurrents.org,
If India wishes to be a respected member of
the international community, it would need to uphold
international law. This would entail working with
other countries to outlaw weapons of mass destruction
(chemical, biological and nuclear weapons, including
Depleted Uranium weapons), as well as weapons that
target civilians, such as land mines and cluster
bombs, all of which violate international law by
failing to confine their effects to military targets.
Obviously this would imply halting the nuclear
weaponisation programme in India.
It is easy to understand why the current US
administration is so desperate to seal a strategic
alliance with India, at a time when Pakistan, its
traditional ally in South Asia, appears to be
faltering. For India, however, the deal would be a
disaster. Backing out of it under pressure from public
opinion may be embarrassing, but not shameful; on the
contrary, it is the only democratic option. Going
through with it, on the other hand, would be
detrimental to India in the multifarious ways outlined
above. Clearly, the democratic option is both the
wisest and the only honourable one. |
Read |
| November 6, 2007 |
When the system doesn't allow people to protect themselves from corporate harm to their communities, it is time to change the system.
Can you tell us about "democracy"? It's a word used by everyone and can mean so many things.
Some people might say you are anti-business. Is that the case?
Many people in this country don't understand that corporations have personhood rights. Why does this come as such a surprise to some people?
Speak about the regulatory system. It's supposed to keep corporations from doing harm, but everywhere you look -- the water, the land, the air -- everything is polluted.
Some believe that laws such as anti-corporate personhood ordinances are a waste of time because they will be challenged and shot down, so why bother? What is
the logic behind civil disobedience to the law?
Do you believe it's possible to change the role of corporations in our society?
|
Read |
| October 31, 2007 |
Here are 11 solutions already being put into practice by innovative communities around the world.
You probably don't need to be told that the threat of climate change is real. If you're concerned about the issue, it's fairly easy to conjure the apocalyptic scenes of widespread drought, frequent deadly storms, mass hunger, and wars over natural resources like oil and water. Much harder to come by are examples of positive actions that can avert these disasters and ease the crisis in places where they are already in play. So let's skip the litany of catastrophes that await if global warming is not controlled. Instead, why not focus on some solutions? None are perfect or complete, but each offers a model of positive change that is more than theoretically possible -- it is already happening.
Many of these examples are small-scale and local. That's instructive because our best hope for sustainability -- in agriculture, industry, energy, community design, and government -- may lie in local, small-scale models like some of those presented here. It may seem as though large-scale problems require large-scale solutions. But most big institutions and processes are driven by the very people and ideas that have generated our global crisis. It's in the local and the small that the majority of people can exercise agency and decision-making power.
|
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| October 28, 2007 |
Uncommon Grace: Biology And Economic Theory
by Charles Sullivan, csullivan@phreego.com Countercurrents.org
In a society that holds sacred the private ownership of property and economic self interest, it may seem strange that neither my wife nor I consider
ourselves property owners. At best, we are squatters or temporary guardians of something that has inherent value; an evolving biological entity that exists far beyond
the realm of economic self interest and monetary valuation systems.
In an ownership society, the land is valued not as an evolved living biological entity with inherent value and rights, including the
fulfillment of its own evolutionary destiny, but as a commodity — a natural resource. Ecological integrity is the foundation of planetary health. It is the
organizing principle of life. Undermining that integrity for short term profits is to limit all future options in perpetuity, the ultimate
incarnation of insensate greed and selfishness. Like all economic systems that are not based upon real science, or an appropriate land ethic, the concept of property rights and private ownership are misguided and ultimately self-destructive constructs. The public welfare and the ecological integrity of the earth exceed all economic self interests in importance. Economics are based upon self-serving, false premises, whereas ecology is real.
The most precious things in life are those that cannot be commodified, and hence, owned. |
Read |
| October 5, 2007 |
Economic Sharing: A Shift In Global Values
by Rajesh Makwana, Countercurrents.org Rajesh Makwana is the Director of Share The World's Resources (STWR), an NGO campaigning for global economic and social justice.
He can be contacted at rajesh@stwr.net
A growing body of progressives within the global justice movement, including environmentalists, economists and policy makers, broadly agree that a significant overhaul of the world’s economic and political systems is long overdue, and that without significant restructuring our most pressing problems will never be tackled.
It is time for a significant re-evaluation of global economic and political values and the creation of an economy that serves the needs of the global community as a whole, within our environmental limitations.
In order to consider how the ownership and management of key resources could be organized, it is useful to group them according to type. There are three general categories:
-Naturally occurring resources – e.g. land, water, oil, gas and mineral ores
-Produced goods – e.g. agricultural produce, medicines, building materials and machinery
-Services – e.g. utilities, healthcare and education
|
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| October 22, 2007 |
Investigative report concerning the Northwest Passage, Canadian territory of Nunavut , and Canada Sovereignty
by Germain Dufour, Spiritual Leader of the Global Community
The creation of Nunavut was the outcome of the largest aboriginal land claims agreement between the Canadian government and the
native Inuit people. The Inuit is one of the first indigenous peoples in the Americas to achieve self-government. They have the right to participate in decisions regarding the land and water resources, and
rights to harvest wildlife on their lands.
Conservation, restoration, and management of the Earth resources
is about asking ourselves the question of " Who owns the Earth?"
The Global Community has proposed a democracy for the people based on the fact that land, the air, water, oil, minerals, and all other natural resources
rightly belong to the Global Community along with the local communities where those resources are found. The Earth is the birthright of all life.
To gain control of the Northwest Passage, Canada would have to show strong Earth management initiatives and the protection of its environment.
Without the fulfillment of the Global Community criteria for sovereignty no one can claim ownership - sovereignty - of both Nunavut and the Northwest Passage.
In Nunavut there is also a vast array of different life-form communities such as the polar bears, caribou, Arctic foxes, seals, beluga whales, northern fulmars, and those communities of organisms that inhabit the sea
floor like brittle stars, worms, zooplankton, microalgae, bivalves and some of the lesser known sea spiders.
And there are many more. Everyone of those global communities have an Earth right of ownership
of the North and of all its natural resources. It is their birthright. They dont express themselves in English, but we understand them. Human beings have a moral
obligation to protect and conserve the biodiversity of life on Earth.
Fot the protection of those global communities we will need to create a biodiversity zone in the North by way of Earth rights and taxation of natural resources.
We are all members of the Global Community. We all have the duty to protect the rights and welfare of all species and all people.
This letter may be a starting place for a group global discussion and roundtable on the issues of Canada sovereignty in the Nunavut and the control of the Northwest Passage.
If you wish to send a reply I will post it on the Global Community website at
http://globalcommunitywebnet.com/EmailDiscussions/
and
http://globalcommunitywebnet.com/GPA/2008discussionroundtables.htm
For now I started the process by researching and writing a paper concerned with the issues, and you will find the paper at
http://globalcommunitywebnet.com/GIMProceedings/gimLetterNP.htm
|
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| September 16, 2007 |
SCALE OF CONFLICTS BETWEEN FIRMS, COMMUNITIES, NEW SOCIAL MOVEMENTS AND THE ROLE OF GOVERNMENT , by Jose G. Vargas-Hernández,
Global Environment Minister,
Global file, 
jgvh0811@yahoo.com, jvargas08@berkeley.ed
Research Professor, Mexico
The role of the nation-state is to regulate conflicts between the essential elements, the nation-state, capitalists (firms), laborers and consumers, binding together disparate and conflicting interests.
This paper is aimed to review the different levels of scale of conflicts between firms, communities, New Social Movements and the role of government. |
Read or Download full WORD document of Research Paper by author  |
| September 9, 2007 |
Because humanity has developed jurisprudence systems by which various entities claim legal title to selected segments of the earth, the earth is owned by those entities, by John R. Ewbank,
johnewb@comcast.net
john.1916@yahoo.com
hmrl@libertynet.org , (part of our group discussion by email)
Because humanity has developed jurisprudence systems by which various entities claim legal title to selected segments of the earth, the earth is owned by those entities having, under the local jurisprudence,
the legal title to various areas. All systems invonving confiscation of such veted property rights can be attacked as "thievery".Rights of eminent domain have permitted government intervention for better use
of land, and this involves use not merely for government fbut also for rr and utilities,and other public interests. However, those asserting common ownership and or confiscation must be classified by at least
some analysts as thieves.
|
Read
see also |
| September 17, 2007 |
World - Grid Type, Continuously Under-development - System Dynamics. Why do we need it? , by Leslaw Michnowski,
Manage the Sustainable Development Global Information Society website.
kte@psl.org.pl, elmamba@poczta.onet.pl
Committee for Futures Studies "Poland 2000 Plus", Polish Academy of Sciences,
The main goal of the United Nations is realization of sustainable development world society
vision. Such society would need to integrate social development with economic development and
environmental protection. For this end it is necessary to enable sustained economic growth,
internalizing externalities and DECOUPLING the range of economic growth from the range of deficit
natural resources depletion growth and degradation of environment. It is necessary also to COUPLE
economic growth with popular life-quality growth.
To achieve sustainable development OF THE WORLD SOCIETY we have to build, a
commonly accessible WORLDWIDE SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT INFORMATION (SYSTEM DYNAMICS) SYSTEM for:
- dynamic monitoring,
- long range forecasting, and
- measurable evaluation,
of policy, economy, work, and other changes effects in life-conditions of human beings and nature in
general. I propose a research program aimed at describing conditions of creation such big, grid, multi
stage built, information system.
|
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| September 12, 2007 |
What Is Being Stolen From Us All
by Jeff Berg
Countercurrents.org
Once again, this time in Iraq, we see the natural resource wealth of an
entire nation enriching none but a criminal class and megacorporations. I
will assume a distinction. Once again this is only able to take place as a
result of the planned aggression and full cooperation of a government &
military that acts as if it is a wholly owned subsidiary of a monied elite.
Much the same thing is being done here in Canada but "thanks" to the
connivance of significant elements of our corporate and government
elite it is being achieved without the need for military force.
It should be noted however that to some in the corporate class the
missing military element is a major mistake even in Canada as it
seriously erodes the huge profit margins possible in war zones and
markedly reduces the amount of money that can be transferred from
citizens to shareholders in times of military conflict. (The quintessential
double dip) Admittedly this is a minority opinion but as Iraq will not be
the last to prove not an uninfluential one. Evidence of this influence here
in Canada can be seen by the massive increase in expenditures for our
military and security industrial complexes over the last few years.
NB. Before the Harper government's commitment to a $13 billion
increase in military spending Canada’s military spending was the 7th
highest in absolute terms in the OECD and 12th overall in the world.
If you are skeptical of the claim that Canadians are being all but
completely shut out of the benefits of their resource wealth go to the
Parkland Institute site and discover for yourself the pitiful fraction the
Albertan people receive of their resource wealth compared to the
people of Norway.
http://www.ualberta.ca/PARKLAND/
For we the Canadian people the situation is an even crueler joke as we
receive even less benefit while at the same time bearing more of the
brunt of the economic problems associated with being a resource
dollar. Aka. Dutch Disease
http://www.investopedia.com/terms/d/dutchdisease.asp
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_disease
And it is all Canadians and especially Albertans and even the rest of the
world that are at the same time forced to pick up the massive
environmental tab even as the profits flee the province and the country. |
Read |
| August 5, 2007 |
Who should own the Earth ?, by Norman Kurland thirdway@cesj.org
Email discussion with Norman Kurland and Garry Davis of the Global Justice Movement, and with John Watkins of the Alliance for Human Empowerment |
Read  |
