: Vandana Shiva, Ernst Ulrich von Weizsäcker, Alexandra Wandel
: VISIONS FOR OUR FUTURE Jakob von Uexkull and the World Future Council
: CEP Europäische Verlagsanstalt
: 9783863936600
: 1
: CHF 11.70
:
: Politik, Gesellschaft, Wirtschaft
: English
: 182
: Wasserzeichen
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: ePUB
Visions for our Future: Jakob von Uexkull and the World Future Council present solutions to the pressing issues humanity faces. Recipients of the Right Livelihood Award, also known as the 'Alternative Nobel Prize', and representatives of the World Future Council offer visions and solutions on topics that include the future of nature, food, energy, regenerative cities, the economy, the rights and well-being of children and future generations, and how to combat climate change and enhance peace and disarmament. Jakob von Uexkull founded the Right Livelihood Award and the World Future Council and has been working for decades to ensure we pass on a healthy and peaceful planet with just societies to current and future generations. Von Uexkull liked to quote the following Asian proverb: 'A falling tree makes more noise than a growing forest.' This book is an appeal to focus on the growing forest and to ensure that it continues to grow.

Jakob von Uexkull is the Founder of the World Future Council (2007) and the Right Livelihood Award (1980), often referred to as the 'Alternative Nobel Prize', as well as Co-Founder (1984) of The Other Economic Summit. As a past Member of the European Parliament (1987-1989) he served on the Political Affairs Committee and later on the UNESCO Commission on Human Duties and Responsibilities (1998-2000). Jakob has also served on the Board of Greenpeace, Germany, as well as the Council of Governance of Transparency International. He is a patron of Friends of the Earth International and lectures widely on environment, justice and peace issues. Jakob von Uexkull received the Future Research Prize of the State of Salzburg, Austria (1999), the Order of the Cross of Terra Mariana of the Republic of Estonia (2001), the Binding-Prize (Liechtenstein) for the protection of nature and the environment (2006) and the Order of Merit First Class of the Federal Republic of Germany (2009). In 2005, he was honoured by Time Magazine as a European Hero and in 2008 he received the Erich-Fromm-Prize in Stuttgart, Germany. He is also a recognised philatelic expert with publications including 'The Early Postal History of Saudi Arabia' (London, 2001).

Earth Democracy
Dr. Vandana Shiva


Thank you, Jakob!

I feel grateful to have known Jakob von Uexkull – a practical visionary, who thinks big visions. More significantly, he makes his visions real by creating visionary institutions that magnify his own vision by drawing other visionaries together.

Rich men use their money to grow richer; Jakob von Uexkull has invested his personal wealth in creating the Right Livelihood foundation to recognise and honour courageous warriors that are defending the earth, social justice and human rights.

I am honoured to have received the Right Livelihood Award in 1993 for “placing women and ecology at the heart of modern development discourse”. I used the award money to strengthen my work with rural women through Navdanya. Being part of the Right Livelihood family is being part of a network of activists whom I respect, admire and work closely with on the most important issues of our times. The recognition that makes me part of this community is a major source of strength.

The vision of creating an alternative prize like the Right Livelihood Award would have been a significant contribution in the lifetime of anyone else …

… but Jakob von Uexkull did not stop there.

He went on to create the World Future Council (WFC), an important institution at the international level for a collective response in our troubled times to ensure that the voice of the earth and of future generations is not silenced. I am pleased to have served as a Councillor since the founding of the WFC. I feel satisfied that I was able to make my small contribution to keeping the integrity of Jakob von Uexkull’s vision alive.

Jakob von Uexkull has seamlessly woven concerns for the Earth and concerns for humanity into one whole; and he has brought us together to weave the vision of one humanity on one planet. This vision of unity in diversity is held in Earth democracy.

The Earth is living, Mother Earth has rights

Across history and across cultures, Earth has been seen as a living entity, as our Mother. Mother Earth is Terra Madre, Gaia, Pachmama, Erde, maa, terra, Erde, cré, umhlaba, 地球 [dìqiú] duniya, Prithvi, Vasundhara, Bhoomi, Prithivi …

In Indian culture, we see ourselves as children of Mother Earth, related to all other beings who are part of the Earth family:

“The Earth is my mother and I am her child.”

Atharva Veda (12)

While ancient cultures sustained themselves by seeing the earth as the source of life, the contemporary movement to recognise the rights of Mother Earth began after the failure of the Copenhagen Climate Summit.

In 2009, US President Barack Obama flew to Copenhagen, where he proposed a dismantling of the legal framework and its substitution with voluntary commitments together with a small group of countries. Outside the conference negotiations, he held a press meeting, and then flew out. Which is why President Evo Morales of Bolivia stood up in the negotiating hall and said, “We are here to protect the rights of Mother Earth, not the rights of polluters.” Evo Morales took the initiative of mobilising citizens of the world. He organised a People’s Summit, which grew theDraft Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth, to supplement and complement the Universal Declaration of Human Rights – and whose drafting process I have been a part of. This Draft Declaration reignited the movement for the recognition for the rights of Mother Earth.

Nature is living, and has rights

Nature is living, and has rights: recognising the rights of nature helps humanity overcome the arrogance of anthropocentrism and the violence of eco apartheid.

The Earth is living – we are not separate from the Earth, we are a strand in the web of life, we are members of one Earth family. Recognition of the rights of nature corrects the arrogance and imbalance of anthropocentrism. Biodiversi