A Change In Thinking To Achieve Sustainable Development
Dr. Franklin Richard Schneider
Chief Executive Officer
Institute of Global Education
Presented to the National Convention on Sustainable Development at Gandhi Darshan, Rajghat, New Delhi, India, December 15, 2011
The need for sustainable development grows more imperative every day. To move forward, a number of challenges must be overcome, challenges which grow more difficult every day. Consequently, delay grows ever more dangerous and ever more costly. What is fundamentally needed, above all else, is an attitude of cooperative interdependence. We are interdependent - to heal the world we must heal ourselves and to heal ourselves we must heal the world. With an attitude of cooperative interdependence we can develop a mutually designed approach, cooperative actions and shared determination.
Be aware of what we know from experience: (1) Nature has the purifying ability to organize and correct itself to produce balanced optimums of life, diversity and cooperation. (2) Nature achieves its perfection without producing garbage or our excessive pollution, abusiveness, isolation and disorders. (3) We inherit the ability to do what nature does because our body, mind and spirit are part of nature. Helping our living planet helps to heal us. We can, we must, create moments that let Earth teach us what we need to know.
There are definite steps to achieving sustainable development. One is limiting population competition for land and resources. Another is taking advantage of available technologies, e.g., permaculture that maximizes productivity and reduces environmental impact. Both must be done with an enlightened attitude of mutual goodwill and by putting our higher interest above our vested interests. Another requirement for sustainable development is the continued development and extensive use of renewable energy resources.
Education for Change
Here, in India, where tradition is powerful, how can the benefits of such approaches be made clear to community leaders and elders? I think the answer is a definite yes. Unfortunately, Gandhi is not physically present to motivate us. Thankfully, our experience is that children are the key.
If we educate children, connect them to the global community, and give them tools to share their new perspectives with parents and elders, we have a chance of getting new technologies adopted. Fortunately, these tools are inexpensive and readily available today in India; photography, media and the internet, among others. Further, the educated elders, along with the children, can be extraordinarily effective ambassadors to other communities as they become examples.
In Mucherla, near Khammam in Andhra Pradesh, our children put on plays that dealt with parental drunkenness and wife beating. Our school garden had a major impact on changing diets toward healthy vegetables. Our support for girls’ education changed the way young women were treated. Children are brilliant, they have the ability to create an amazing world that we have only dreamed of and it can be golden for them. We have to give them the tools and the freedom to create responsibly. They have to know how incredibly amazing they are, and that the world does not have to be a dark and damaged place.
Tagore said “The highest education is that which does not merely give us information but makes our life in harmony with all existence”. The fact is that education, both formal and non-formal, is a continuous lifelong adventure for each of us, regardless of our age or circumstance.
Equality and the Environment
Working for climate change and changing inequalities into opportunities is a key to progress. Environmental trends threaten global progress for everyone, particularly for the poor. Development progress for the poorest countries could be halted or even reversed unless bold steps are taken now to slow climate change, prevent further environmental damage, and reduce deep inequalities within and among nations.
The 2011 Human Development Report of the United Nations argues that environmental sustainability can be most fairly and effectively achieved by addressing health, education, income, and gender disparities, together with the need for global action on energy production and ecosystem protection. There must be broader efforts to foster equitable human development by reducing gender imbalances and expanding opportunities for those among each country’s marginalized communities. Achieving truly sustainable development will require bold action on internal inequalities and environmental hazards. The urgent global challenges of sustainability and equity must be addressed, together, at the global level in order to spur progress towards these interlinked goals.
A key is to build strong foundations that heal core dysfunctions and allow peace to happen. Sustainable, long-term development can only occur in a peaceful environment. Without healing, peace is very illusive and transitory. A grassroots approach is very powerful and humanizing, and we know it can be replicated with lots of caring individuals and hard work. Anything that does not work in a way that honours the individual seed as well as the whole tree will not work. Society is full of successful experiments. The right tools must be available to the right hands. If each of us make a commitment t to work together, both inside ourselves and out in the world, and inspire others to do the same, we will change our collective direction and create a better future.
One of the results of resolving trauma, be it personal or environmental, is feeling more secure with primary attachments. “Secure attachment provides the base for a healthy life with healthy relationships.”
A new book here in India is titled Empower Women, An Awakening by Leena Chawla Rajan, It opens with a quote from Mahatma Gandhi: “Be the change you want to see in the world.”
“The laws of physics tell us we can’t build a rocket that will travel faster than the speed of light, that gravity governs objects on Earth, and that perpetual motion machines are not possible. In chemistry, diffusion constants, reaction rates, and atomic properties set the limits of chemical reactions and types of molecules that can be synthesized. Biology dictates our absolute need for clean air, clean water, clean soil, clean energy, and biodiversity for our survival and health”.
These are laws of nature and we must learn to live within their boundaries. Capitalism, free enterprise, the economy, corporations, currency, markets, and regional borders are not forces of nature. We invented them and we can and must improve them.
Often, we try to alter nature to fit our priorities. Look at what happened at the Copenhagen Climate Summit in December 2009. We saw 192 nations gathered to deal with the atmosphere that belongs to no one - 192 national borders, 192 economic priorities, trying to shoehorn nature to fit our creations! We should be looking for ways to make our systems work with nature, not the other way around.
A glowing example of what can be done by enlightened leadership and grassroots participation is Curitiba, Brazil, a city of more than two million. The residents literally overhauled the city with a new transportation system, one thousand plazas, recycling, environmental education and numerous services available to everyone. It was the people’s vision that made Curitiba a place where people work, play, and enjoy their lives together.
Globalization does not always encourage the highest standards for workers, communities, or ecosystems. Instead, corporations often go for the lowest standards of medical care, wages, and environmental regulations because it’s all about maximizing profit. The global economy means garbage and toxic effluents are shared with the world, dumped into the air, water, and land. We can, we must, change this and together do it now.
Summary
We need to put decisions and democracy back into the hands of people. We need democracy for people, not corporations. We want greater equity and deeper on going cooperation and commitment. We demand social justice; and we want to recognize and protect our most fundamental needs - clean air, clean water, clean soil, clean energy, biological diversity, and communities that support our children with love and care.
We must align our beliefs and our involvement with each other into sustainable development that meets the needs of all of humanity while protecting and cooperating with the gifts of our environment, both natural and human. We are either part of the solution or part of the problem. In fact, we can see our world, not as a problem, but rather a vast and indisputable opportunity to use our deepest love, our greatest energies, our best thinking, our sense of oneness and rise above our own self-interests and narrow beliefs to incorporate all things, living and non living.
These are all grains of sand that will create the sandbar of a peaceful and sustainable world.
As Gandhji said:
“Your beliefs become your thoughts
Your thoughts become your words
Your words become your actions
Your actions become your habits
Your habits become your values
Your values become your destiny”
