What would it look like? - A peaceful, just and sustainable world
worldshift 2012 is all about;
"co-creating the foundations of a peaceful, just and sustainable world by the end of 2012".
My question is what would it look like? how would we recognise it? what's the vision?how will we know when this is achieved? what will be the indicators of success?
I feel that a place is created first in the mind. And the indicators of success are simple. The foundations are not structures or systems, they are physiological - the critical mass of early mover people (5 to 20% of the western or modern populus) believing that a peaceful, just and sustainable world could exist.
Once that belief is installed the foundations have been created. Success!! What pre-empts the belief is the collective vision, which is routed in current inspirations and examples of systems, structures, projects, companies etc that work and that we know if scaled up would nourish all.
"co-creating the foundations of a peaceful, just and sustainable world by the end of 2012".
My question is what would it look like? how would we recognise it? what's the vision?how will we know when this is achieved? what will be the indicators of success?
I feel that a place is created first in the mind. And the indicators of success are simple. The foundations are not structures or systems, they are physiological - the critical mass of early mover people (5 to 20% of the western or modern populus) believing that a peaceful, just and sustainable world could exist.
Once that belief is installed the foundations have been created. Success!! What pre-empts the belief is the collective vision, which is routed in current inspirations and examples of systems, structures, projects, companies etc that work and that we know if scaled up would nourish all.
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Comment
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Comment by Shane Hughes on January 27, 2010 at 1:36pm -
YEAH!
HPI is by far and a way the most impressive sustainability indicator that i've seen, not least because it weighs ecological footprint against a unit of relevance - happiness. This added to the GPI is a great mix. I have no idea of any Justice related indicators?
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Comment by Gareth Strangemore-Jones on January 27, 2010 at 12:15pm -
Here's another way of looking at things ;)
The Happy Planet Index reveals the ecological efficiency with which human well-being is delivered...
The index combines environmental impact with human well-being to measure the environmental efficiency with which, country by country, people live long and happy lives.
From those very competent people at nef (New Economics Foundation)
http://www.happyplanetindex.org/
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Comment by Gareth Strangemore-Jones on January 21, 2010 at 4:18pm
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An example of the shift desired towards peace can be found in the first WorldShift Award-winning film, Soldiers of Peace (www.soldiersofpeacemovie.com).
The military are a *fantastic deliverer* of anything they seek to deliver...
When they are used to deliver *Peace* or as we are seeing in Haiti *Humanitarian Aid*, they are such a potential tool for change ;)
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Comment by Shane Hughes on January 20, 2010 at 6:29pm
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Hi Gareth, i see GPI measuring the bricks and mortar of a peaceful world. The foundations come earlier as a collective belief. i'd say you need a single indicator. it could be a likert scale and asking people "on a scale of 1 to 10 how much they belief a sustainable, just and peaceful world could exist"
Johannes, i agree with you on the idea that GPI and peace are largely a reflection on amounts of or lack of war.
With regard to a collective belief, i'd have it the other way round rather than being tricky it's essential. Pitirim Sorokin http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pitirim_A._Sorokin did a study (i think of 500 years) of social change and basically his findings were that what ever the majority believed soon after manifested in the future. The world we want to create would be impossible without some kind of collective belief. Also, the notion of supression is one of top down forced belief, what's happening all around us is more of a bottom up uprising of people from across the globe coming to the same or similar visions of the change that is needed and unlike an idealogy which is exclusionary and imposed, this is a growing mass of ideas far more porus, far more accepting of diversity.
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Comment by Gareth Strangemore-Jones on January 20, 2010 at 8:35am
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The clearest way to measure Peace is the Global Peace Index - "The results of the Global Peace Index for 2009 suggest that the world has become slightly less peaceful in the past year, which appears to reflect the intensification of violent conflict in some countries and the effects of both the rapidly rising food and fuel prices early in 2008 and the dramatic global economic downturn in the final quarter of the year. Rapidly rising unemployment, pay freezes and falls in the value of house prices, savings and pensions is causing popular resentment in many countries, with political repercussions that have been registered by the GPI through various indicators measuring safety and security in society."
Are any clear and trustworthy measurement systems for monitoring and assessing Justice and Sustainability?
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Comment by Shane Hughes on January 19, 2010 at 4:56am
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Hi Johannes, thanks for your response. You've picked up on the "Western" reference of my post. I have to say that i feel the collective vision of a "peaceful, just and sustainable" world will be communicated and created through the internet. That's where the western reference comes from. Although the pioneers of the vision will be without borders nor pigeon hole.
It's probably also important to say, given the elevated level of readership of this site, that when i say that a place "is created first in the mind" that's an oversimplification. A place (i.e. the peaceful, just and sustainable" world we aspire to) needs to be created as a collective belief before it can be created in practical terms.
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