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See the new Climate Action Forum which we have started as a Yahoo Group, via the Links page, originally to generate slogans and messages that connect War, Oil and Climate Change. All exchanges of view on the subject are now invited. |
Recently Happened
Please note: For an explanation of Contraction & Convergence, which is mentioned in a number of the following reports, please visit the Global Projects page, on the Global site.
3 June 2006 Climate Conference at
London School of Economics (LSE), London, arranged by Campaign against
Climate Change.
Several hundred people came to this
free, informal, but well-organised event. And it was a great decision
to hold the workshops before hearing the
main speakers at the plenary session.
One attended by our members was: 'What can we do in our own lives
and collectively at grass roots level?'. Duncan Law was very emphatic
about the problems of CC, illustrating his message with the graphs
he prepared for our Roadshows and Shows in schools (see
UK site Local Projects page). He then offered very good practical
advice.
Duncan was followed by Jules Wagstaff, who presented a picture of
simple low-impact rural living on Buddhist principles, to the background
of a silent film on horse-drawn ploughing, building and living in
yurts, reviving the ancient craft of tree coppicing, and training
others in rural skills. Jules implied we will all need these skills
to feed ourselves, when major economic systems collapse, and act
early before natural resources run out.
Mark Brown, from London Rising Tide, then exposed 'green consumerism'
as a disguised form of capitalism, and proposed that we confront
the present system with confrontation, compassion and love. He upheld
the value of 'energy dissent', pointing out that quality of life
increases as energy consumption reduces, and invited us to take
part in a direct-action camp in August. Controversially, he opposed
the Kyoto protocol and carbon trading as being grounded in despicable
deceit.
Another member attended the morning session
on 'How bad will the climate crisis get?' and heard Mark Lynas warn
on the unavoidable effects of a 1 degree and the dire consequences
of greater global warming. In the afternoon he heard how easily
domestic emissions can be reduced with solar power, the advantages
of Concentrated Solar Power over the nuclear option, and the case
for decentralised energy systems.
Another workshop attended was 'Climate change, faith and spirituality'.
This was introduced and facilitated jointly by representatives from
Christian Ecology Link (CEL), the Islamic Foundation for Ecology
and the Environmental Sciences (IFEES), and Derek Wall, giving a
Zen Buddhist perspective.
For the first organisation, Jonathan Essex advocated the greater
collective good in place of domination, quality of life in place
of corporate profit, and the holy spirit/spirituality in place of
forceful power. For IFEES, Muzammal Hussain introduced teachings
from the Koran that: disasters have occurred because people have
deviated from their natural state of goodness, and that we need
to learn to live in harmony with the universe, through transforming
ourselves inwardly and in our outer lives. Derek Wall said Zen is
not based on words, like most other religions, but on practice,
being in the present moment and being prosperous by minimising our
wants and desires (the opposite of consumerism). A set of three
questions were presented for answering in groups of five participants,
which Jim Scott, from SoW, found very rewarding.
Jim had previously
been in communication with the convenors about offering the perspective
of the New Movement for Survival (see
Challenge page), which he also shared in the following Q&A
session. Later, after the plenary session, he insisted that there
has to be ideological transformation as well as political action
to avert dangerous climate change.
At the plenary session
itself, Michael Meacher described as disgraceful the lack of action
following from rhetoric by the UK government, and said it has to:
stop cow-towing to the US administration; get aviation included
within the Kyoto agreement at the next international meeting, and
abandon nuclear power. Norman Baker (Liberal Democrat) said we have
to limit the effects of climate change to horrendous but not fatal
and use fiscal instruments strongly to reward sustainable practices.
Both he and Caroline Lucas (Green) urged the adoption of Contraction
& Convergence (see below),
the latter regarding its stand for equity as a moral issue, in light
of people in poorer countries paying with their lives for our western
lifestyles. She regarded Tony Blair's personal support for the corporate
agenda on climate change as a crime against humanity, but urged
those present to view and present a low-carbon future positively.
18 May 2006 'Kyoto and Beyond: a Global
Strategy' Conference, Commonwealth Club, London
Contributions
were made by distinguished speakers: Tom Spencer (Institute of Environmental
Security); Sir Crispin Tickell (former UK permanent representative
at the UN); Andrew Simms (Policy Director, New Economics Foundation);
Elliot Morley MP (former Minister of State for Climate Change & Environment); Lord Redesdale (Vice-chair Parliamentary Group on
Climate Change); Ritu Kumar (Director of TERI-Europe); John Gummer
MP (former Secretary of State for Environment); and Aubrey Meyer
(Director of Global Commons Institute).
Key
points included the following. The arguments on climate change are
not now technological but political, with the US administration
doing all it can to avoid the evidence for it until time runs out.
There are a number of tipping points into irreversible climate change,
which will shortly be examined in the UN Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change's fourth report. CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere
are now higher than they have been for the last 650,000 years! No
solution to stabilising CO2 concentrations is possible without contraction
and convergence in some form.
A lot of pressure is needed from members of the public in order
to bring about a major change of mind about economics and true costs,
replacing the 'consumer society' with the 'well-rounded society'.
The Chinese political system can no longer guarantee delivery of
top-level government policy, because of the power of liberalised
markets. No attempt is being made currently to live within our economic
limits. There are enormous barriers to changing economic tenets,
despite the economic and environmental consequences of climate change
having been clear for the last 30 years. Little work has been done
by governments on the economics of climate change because of the
belief that it will destroy their economies. But averting climate
change together with continuing economic growth is not credible.
The consequences of non-sustainable activities have to be costed
within economic modelling.
All the UN's Millennium Development Goals will fail as a result
of global warming and climate change. Some other countries (than
the UK) are very resistant to taking action on climate change, but
some US companies and individual States want action to be taken.
International progress is snail-like, unlikely to avert tipping
points, but will be progressively more difficult the longer it is
left. Tony Blair's support for nuclear energy is pernicious, because
it bypasses the real problem: first address what energy reductions
and efficiencies are necessary before deciding energy solutions.
We need a new ideology in society, for people are prepared to do
the easy things to support the environment but not the hard ones
like changing habits about car and air travel. The change we seek
has to be ideological as well as political, addressing what truly
matters most. Since CO2 in tonnes is impossible to visualise, carbon
'units' could be more acceptable, just like a £, without having
to think what it represents. There is a big potential for decentralised
renewables in countries like India.
13 May 2006 State of London Debate, Queen Elizabeth II Conference
Centre, London.
The following notes
apply just to climate change issues that were discussed.
Ken Livingstone (Mayor of London) said Contraction and Convergence
is needed to make the government's commitment to reductions in carbon
emissions meaningful worldwide, and that nuclear energy is a non-starter.
Nicky Gavron (Deputy Mayor) backed 'tri-generation' (heating, cooling
and electrical power), requiring small-scale decentralised generation.
She said London's congestion charge system has reduced vehicle use
in London by 30%, and announced the 'C20' initiative of the 20 largest
cities sharing ways to reduce carbon emissions by 44% - though whether
this included air-transport emissions was questioned in the Q&A
session but not effectively answered.
Vandana Shiva (see other report)
said one million people have already been impacted by climate change
since 1990, and that cc is being driven by undemocratic institutions.
The latter are 'exporting drought'. Every person reducing their
carbon footprint leaves more land available for poor peasants. Stephen
Tindale (CEO for Greenpeace UK) said decentralisation of energy
provision plays to the strength of renewable sources, and also helps
minimise waste from fossil fuels. He also said that nuclear energy
is challengeable on the grounds of centralisation alone.
6 May 2006 Lectures by Deepak Chopra, Friends
Meeting House, London
The inclusion of these lectures here breaks new ground,
for the topic was entitled 'The Seven Spiritual laws of Love', and
not centred on environmental matters as such. However, he addresses
life priorities and values which are becoming increasingly relevant
to our challenge for a New Movement for Survival, and to our overall
profile as an organisation. In this summary references are also
made to a workshop given by Neale Walsch in October 2005, which
was of a similar nature, and who inspired our rallying cry to Love
Life Itself Above all Else!!!
Deepak Chopra
said we now have the means to answer profound questions about our
existence, through building on the 'wisdom traditions' and counter-balancing
materialistic interpretations of the world. Our personal transformation
can change the world, by taking us to the next stage of evolution,
from survival of the fittest to self awareness and survival of the
wisest. The awakening of the collective soul is needed now, in the
crisis we face, in which we have to change in ten years or risk
extinction within 50 years.
His words echoed those of Neale Walsch, who had said we are on the
verge of the second great reformation, similar in scale to the Renaissance
in Europe, but much faster. It is 'jump time', which is made unavoidable
by humanity having to deal with a series of insuperable crises,
which can only be surmounted by entirely new understanding. We have
to ask ourselves: is the world we have the one we want to perpetuate?
or a different one? If we do not answer these questions, life as
we know it will disappear. The question is not when will we hear
the truth, but when will we live it?
4 May 2006 Climate Change: the challenge
for education. Conference at London South Bank University.
Dr
Mae-Wan Ho, Director of the Institute of Science in Society, concluded
a resume of the evidence for climate change by saying that mutualism
and reciprocity are truer of nature than 'tooth and claw' competition.
She then demonstrated how populations could become self-sufficient
in energy and food through integrated food and energy farming.
Alan Simpson MP, long-term Labour radical, said it has never been
so important as now to reclaim the intellectual agenda from the
culture of exploiting future generations, in which builders put
up gas-guzzling buildings and pass them off as sustainable. His
own eco-house, filmed by Independent Television, generates 50% more
energy than it consumes. He is against the culture of individualism
and global liberalisation and pro-interdependency, citing reducing
incomes in developing countries with the rise of corporate power.
Anne Finlayson, Education Commissioner for the Sustainable Development
Commission, said sustainability is an end point, but we do not know
what it is like. So a teaching team has also to become a learning
one, in which people do not learn what you teach. Do not presume
you have the answers, and telling people what to do does not change
their behaviour. Social change is not just about behaviour but also
about social systems and values.
Emma Smith is a teenager, who had lobbied Parliament with other
young people about the government's response to climate change,
said her secondary school had not been interested in climate change.
She met politicians who were interested but not doing much about
it. Most of her friends were ignorant about it, even at advanced
level in Geography. Not put off by them, she had lots of ideas for
'greening your school', particularly through practical rather than
classroom work, and had worked with RSPB in Costa Rica. She said
teenagers care much more about the environment than was generally
believed.
3 May 2006 Debate on balance: living within
our means, Institution of Civil Engineers, London
This
was the third of the 'Edge Energy Debates - supply, demand and balance'.
Lord Oxburgh, former chairman of Shell Transport and Trading, who
hit the headlines in June 2004, for admitting that the threat of
climate change made a person in his position "really worried
for the planet", spoke first. He said our present industrial
infrastructure mistakenly assumes energy is cheap and can easily
be wasted, so we are working on the wrong basis. He believed that
energy demand will continue to increase and there is little that
we can do about it, travel being a basic need and aspiration. The
only way he could see real cuts being made in carbon emissions was
by the co-production of food and fuel, utilising forestry and agricultural
residues.
Aubrey Meyer, the other invited speaker, prefaced his introduction
to his Contraction & Convergence framework for stabilising carbon
concentrations in the atmosphere, by stating that the world's economic
development is highly asymmetric. 2/3 of the world's population
have only 6% of its purchasing power, with the remaining 1/3 having
94%. This is 'expansion and divergence' on a huge scale, apartheid
at a global scale. What is more, the environmental damage caused
by climate change is growing at twice the rate of global economic
growth. [The Contraction & Convergence framework is incorporated
in our Boiling Point issue for May 2002 and fully described at www.gci.org.uk]
In discussion,
Jim Scott asserted both speakers' viewpoints are connected by the
necessity for global carbon targets, but the demands for more energy
and travel are incompatible with the resources of the planet. Colin
Challen MP, who has introduced a number of environmental Bills in
Parliament, said Lord Oxburgh's solutions have to be subjected to
the C&C framework and the culture of economic growth has to
be challenged. Others agreed with Save our World's position by saying
that the 'parties involved have to employ enlightened self-interest,
and that the whole debate is about values and ethics.
4 April 2006 Conference on community
engagement with climate change, Oxford. Organised by Climate Outreach
and Information Network (COIN).
Attended by well over
a hundred people with loads of ideas to share in 21 discussion groups
on self-chosen topics. It was a very productive day. Our representatives
took part in and led groups on Education & Climate Change, Motivation
and Values & Priorities. The recommendations from all the groups
are posted on the COIN website:
www.coinet.org.uk/conference and
three Next Steps were agreed:
Produce a snap-shot directory of organisations and individuals who
took part;
Establish an 'announcements' e-mail list; and
Investigate the establishment of a 'resource bank' for community
engagement on climate change.
6 March 2006 'The Weather Makers -
How Climate Change Shapes our World' discussion in St Paul's Cathedral,
London
Participants in the discussion were
Tim Flannery, author of the new book 'The Weather Makers', David
Attenborough and Claire Foster.
Among the many points made, Tim Flannery said that
climate change is the first great test of our civilisation. 60%
of all species may become extinct this century, and sea levels rise
four metres over the coming century. And yet the actions required
are not too onerous for humankind to take.
Claire Foster said we have become a rogue species; the natural world
is our kin, and to make it too toxic is to reject our kin. Contrary
to popular belief, the original Hebrew (version of the Christian
Bible) reveals we are all interconnected. Wisdom shows all of life
hangs together exquisitely, even though every blade of grass is
different. We abuse wisdom in following the mistaken theology that
we dominate nature. Repentance derives from the word 'metanoia'
which means 'change of mind'. We all have to make this change of
perception; then we can call upon governments to change.
Sir David Attenborough
had no doubt at all that we are changing the climate, for changes
in the atmosphere over the last thousand years mirrors the rise
in human population, almost identically. He said he is horrified
by the changes he finds when revisiting parts of the world; over
the past two years he has found it difficult to find untouched areas.
Forests have been cut down for replacement by palm oil plantations
which then failed and left only wasteland. Grass is now growing
on the Antarctic continent.
He went on to agree that the domestic lifestyle changes people can
make are small, but they change the way you see your life. It is
a moral question, sinful to be wasteful, and one about which you
have to face your grandchildren. Desertification results from over-development.
The earth cannot support unlimited population growth; either we
choose to limit our population size or it will be limited by famine,
as is already happening.
1 March 2006 'Carbon dating' of UK
Members of Parliament organised by Stop Climate Chaos, Central Hall,
Westminster
As a member organisation of SCC, Save
our World was represented by seven of its members, taking part in
a huge gathering of around 700 volunteers from all the member organisations.
In fact the volunteer 'interviewers' outnumbered the politicians
by about 10-1 at their circular tables, meeting an average of only
two politicians during the whole period of 2-5 p.m.
The meetings with the
politicians were aimed to extract from them commitments to: limit
the effects of greenhouse gas emissions to produce a maximum temperature
rise of 2 degrees C globally; agree a UK reduction of emissions
of 3% annually; and support action for environmental justice worldwide.
SoW's own demands went further: to Support carbon concentration
limit globally of 450 parts per million and the Contraction and
Convergence approach for reducing global emissions on an equitable
basis; to support three proposed Parliamentary Bills on averting
climate change; and make the case for transforming global values
and priorities, replacing exploitative capitalistic ones with holistic
ones that value life itself above all else - as promoted by our
New Movement for Survival.
The experiences of our members meeting their respective politicians
varied greatly, but it was quite an eye-opener to most of us to
find out how differently the politicians ticked, how widely they
varied in making the commitments sought and the bizarre attitudes
of a number of them. The leaders of the Liberal Democrat and Conservative
parties took part, and the SCC organisers held a prior meeting with
Gordon Brown and Tony Blair. The last was reported to have agreed,
at Prime Minister's Question Time that day, seriously to consider
our limits to carbon emissions.
20 February 2006 'Earth Democracy'
talk by Vandana Shiva for the Alternatives programme at St. James's
Church, Piccadilly, London
She said globalisation has
produced the global supermarket, and deprives people of their livelihoods.
She believes that citizens have the right to protest and remove
genetically modified crops if all avenues are closed to them by
state policy supporting the corporate control of agriculture. She
said 40,000 'suicides' among Indian farmers who are forced into
debt by corporations actually constitute 'genocide', as would any
group of human beings who are deliberately targeted by another trying
to harm them. Corporations are even recruiting Indian saints to
say farmers will become millionaires by buying their products.
She started an Indian organic movement for farmers to protect their
own seeds from the predation of corporations, for their own future
and for their animals, to maintain their own food sovereignty, and
to maintain adequate water supplies. It has created networks of
organic production, whereby farmers can support themselves on less
than ½ acre of land, making money by not trying to make money.
The movement managed to fight off corporate attempts to patent natural
products, including Bhasmati rice and the Neem tree.
She said those who claim we need more biotechnology to feed the
world are lying - it destroys through monoculture, producing poor
quality food and soil, in place of amazing biodiversity. The Green
Revolution did not feed India but enslaved peasants and destroyed
the earth. Commercial agriculture uses ten times more water than
organic. With organic agriculture we can feed everyone in the spirit
of giving, not getting.
11 February 2006 'Climate Change:
What can Christians Do?' Conference in Oxford
Dr Paula Clifford,
of Christian Aid, said we cannot expect our governments to do what
we do not do ourselves. Asked whether the climate change warnings
we have been given have scared enough people to do anything, however,
she said no - for fear is not the right motivator for action.
One workshop
utilised a map of the world to illustrate the stages of human settlement,
the onset of industrialisation, and the effects of pollution, loss
of biodiversity and exhaustion of natural resources. The participants
were asked what they thought God would say about this, but Jim Scott
no longer believed God stands apart from creation, and was wary
of the thinking that He might rescue human beings from their folly,
however they treated the earth. Later he suggested God is neither
vengeful nor a rescuer to bail us out, but works through us.
George Marshall said he had had a moment of enlightenment when his
experience of the hottest October month ever recorded made him realise
climate change is really happening! Most people separate ever growing
evidence of it from how they live: compromise by guilty travel habits;
ignore unwelcome evidence, and what is not immediate or 'not happening
here'; disassociate perpetrators and victims. He said transformative
belief does not come from data alone; it does not come easily; one
has to meditate on it, discuss it and explore it together. Some
Christian fundamentalists in the USA are getting the message; and
Buddhists meditate on paradox.
26 January 2006 'Planning for Climate
Change' Town & Country Planning Association (TCPA) Conference,
London.
The view was magnificent from the conference
on the top floor of the Greater London Authority's all-glass headquarters
near Tower Bridge, but unfortunately the speakers could hardly be
seen against the light from the back of the hall. That said, it
was great that the TCPA had arranged the conference on this subject.
There was no lack of urgency here, from Hugh Ellis,
Senior Planning Advisor for Friends of the Earth. He said there
is a desperate need to act on climate change. He claimed there is
no technical barrier to zero carbon emitting buildings and whole
communities. However, Climate Change Minister Elliot Morley and
Baroness Andrews, from the Office of Deputy prime Minister, were
less forthcoming about supporting such action. Concern was expressed
from the floor that little action is being taken on averting floods
around the country, while the Dutch are able to do so. Ellis said
this is the last opportunity to give guidance on planning before
we face our own catastrophe.
Pat Castledene, from the Royal Town Planning Institute, said there
was little government guidance on targets for reducing carbon emissions,
especially on cross-cutting transport issues. He said renewable
energy was required in only 17% of projects because of the fear
of projects being relocated in adjoining areas, were it to be insisted
upon, and as much of 23% of projects gained planning approval despite
being contrary to guidance on flooding. Jim Green said most green
buildings in the UK cost far too much, but they need not cost more
and are associated with much less absenteeism among staff working
in them.
In launching the guide 'Sustainable Energy by Design', Robert Shaw
made the case for decentralised and localised energy supply, and
said that revenue streams from energy efficiency can help to fund
more renewable energy services.
13 December 2005 UK Launch Conference
for the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development, Institute
of Education, London.
Without a great deal of support
from the UK government for such education, the conference could
only explore the UNESCO strategy and consider what the UK might
do to support it. Questions from the floor were revealing: why ESD
is not assessed in government's Ofsted reports on schools; how to
take pressure off schools to enable them to teach ESD properly;
and the need for consistency between the government's key departments.
Jim Scott, acting for both SoW and the Stakeholder Forum, questioned
in what sense the private sector is considered to be 'both participative
and the target for ESD'
In the afternoon session, William Scott, a more forthright speaker,
questioned how serious is the environmental crisis, what we have
to do about it, and how? He questioned the contradiction of placing
economic growth ahead of carbon reduction, and claimed much of the
content of the Department of Education's Strategy consisted of much
that schools are doing already, neither addressing global priorities
nor recognising controversial topics. His call for small-scale innovation
seemed to favour our Climate Change Shows in primary schools (see
Local Projects page).
Jim was shocked
by the suggestion for teaching climate change in schools that 'no
one has the answers yet', and one should therefore teach it only
through collective learning; by lack of urgency - given the point
of no return by the time that the Decade is complete; and that his
call for a crash programme on climate change needs to be given in
schools across the land - was not even mentioned in the report back
from the climate change workshop to the main conference.
Saturday 3 December 2005, Climate Change Demonstration and March from Lincoln's Inn Fields to Grosvenor Square, London.
Organised by Campaign against Climate Change as one among many concurrent international demonstrations which are timed to coincide with UN Climate Conference in Montreal, Canada.
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This was the largest arranged so far by Campaign
against Climate Change, whose founder is a member of SoW and from
which other members have joined us. This March was held in 31 locations
around the world, and the one in London attracted a reported 10,000
people. We offered our own message on banners we made and painted
in the days beforehand: 'VALUE LIFE ABOVE ALL ELSE !!! Emission
Limits NOW'. The March ended at the US Embassy where some powerful
speeches were presented. That by Guardian writer George Monbiot
was so complementary to our New Movement for Survival that one of
us travelled specially to a talk of his in Oxford on the following
Wednesday, so as to elicit his support.
1 December 2005 Launch of UK Government's Climate Change Communications
Initiative
This took place in an atrium, newly created
within the offices of the UK government's Department of Environment,
Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), in Westminster.
The main speaker was Margaret Beckett, Environment Secretary, who
said that public understanding of climate change is typically very
weak, and so we have to increase it as well as raising awareness
and changing attitudes. Climate Change Minister Elliot Morley followed
her, saying we have to engage people closer to home - 'bottom up
instead of top down', in partnership, through trusted and recognised
channels. He said this generation has to act now together to tackle
climate change, and introduced the slogan for the campaign: "Tomorrow's
Climate, Today's Challenge". Of the resources he announced
to support the Initiative, the one of greatest interest to Save
our World was naturally a new Climate Challenge Fund.
Jim Scott was the first to ask an open
question from the floor, firstly stating appreciation for the opportunity
provided by the Fund to support our programme of professionally
acted Shows on climate change in primary schools. He then asked
how the government proposed to counter the contradictory messages
that reach the public, encouraging: cheap air flights, airport and
runway expansion, road-building programmes and more car sales and
usage. Elliot Morley responded with pleasure about supporting education
in schools, but had no answer to the main question except advice
to buy low emission cars!
Tuesday 29 November 2005, 6.30 pm onwards, Stroll across Tower Bridge, London, organised by HACAN ClearSkies.
This was aimed to demonstrate opposition to the proposed expansion of the UK air industry (see our Petition on the Challenge page of this site). The stroll was timed to co-incide with a gala dinner in the restaurant on the high-level walkways above the bridge crossing. The dinner is being given for the delegates to a major international conference on promoting the expansion of the industry. We took part with SoW flags to voice our concerns and exasperation directly to those responsible. As they arrived there were cries of "Shame on you", condemning their attempts to fatten their wallets while ignoring the massive harm being inflicted on our planet. There was an atmosphere of camaraderie and resolve among the protesters, but also an element of frustration as the huge police presence and restrictive barriers meant that we could be ignored all too easily, comfortably out of the way of the big business leaders.
23 May 2005, Demonstration organised by HACAN ClearSkies to protest against a new industry-backed body promoting the expansion of Heathrow airport.
We were represented at this demonstration at Centre Point outside the CBI headquarters in London to protest at the launch of Future Heathrow, and challenge the arguments made by Future Heathrow that a 3rd runway and a 6th terminal are required for economic reasons. HACAN ClearSkies has issued a report which shows that, of the 22 million additional passengers who used Heathrow in 2004 compared with 1992, 19 million were transfer or transit passengers, just passing through the airport, thus contributing very little to the UK economy.
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9 May 2005, Joanna Macy Lecture, Oxford
This was a most uplifting evening in the company
of about two hundred people. She started by describing the sudden
onset of climate change, but the lack of urgency about it among
ordinary people in the USA, being remote from its effects - and
the suppression of action on it by government.
Regarding fear and guilt as 'lousy motivators for change', she questioned
how effective it is to march in order to keep things the same. She
then described her own approach to social change, through enthusiastic
creativity, in which uncertainty is welcomed, and feeling an erotic
connection with the earth and with life itself. She said 'love is
the nervous system of the universe'.
She said it is time for the third revolution in human activity,
the 'Great Turning' to ecological sustainability, in succession
to the agricultural and industrial ones. First we need 'holding
actions', regulatory in order to prevent perpetual profits that
go beyond the point of 'no return' with respect to depletion of
resources and the creation of waste. Next we need new structures,
methods and understanding, rooted in values. Thirdly, we need a
profound shift in consciousness, involving resurgence of the spiritual
traditions of interdependence, the wisdom of the ancients and the
goddess traditions, deep ecology, and the all-inclusive expanded
Self.
She exhorted those present to act immediately themselves, in their families and organisations - not measuring their effectiveness just by their actions but also by their interdependence, committing to a longer time span than their own lives - ushering in a thousand years of healing.
(page updated 9 June 2006)
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