Message-ID: <19970110223224082.AAA131@smtp.persocom.com.br> Date: Fri, 10 Jan 1997 22:32:25 +0000 From: Joaquim Moura <mailto:joaquim.moura@PERSOCOM.COM.BR> Subject: Appropriate development theory To: Multiple recipients of list DEVEL-L <mailto:DEVEL-L@AMERICAN.EDU>
Dear, let's be brief: Jon asks (below) about what to do to make future viable. And he asks Jay if the only solution would be let (or make) a huge parcel of world population dies. Or if Jay would prefer that Dr. Lisse stop trying to save lives in Namibia. (Jon, this is not a serious way to conduct a discussion... :-)) But let me explain, in very few lines, some ideas that should usually deserve many pages more... (I am sorry if this is again a conceptual discourse, but - from where I am - I cannot communicate with you in a more concrete way, and now I know that there are at least many people interested in pushing further this discussion...)*My* appropriate development theory
1. population shall reduce its growth to reduce impact over the biosphere (maybe it is reducing already, is not it?). Near (or sharp) ZPG is a basic vector of our long range development model. We don't need to eliminate anybody and Dr. Lisse of course may be supported in his efforts. We just need more education, social fairness and income generation opportunities (these are other basic vectors of our model);
2. education of young and adults must stress issues as ethics and the relationship between ecology, agriculture, nutrition, health and social harmony, discussions about the future, about what effects TV and the advertising industries are promoting among the populations, etc. In Brazil, the youth spend many years going every day to the schools, to learn about things they don't care and will forget very soon. Why not educate them, since children, to be wise and skillful agents of social transformation and self-salvation? Also, educative concerns will need to be present in the publicity and entertainment industry - which will be completely reformulated. And very important: we will organize a movement gathering the artists who want to collaborate, to call the youngsters to change their attitude: stop annoying us and themselves and start to work to save their future. Cooperate, not dispute. Learn and teach the democratic arts of need assessment, coalition building, problem solving, creative meetings, critical thinking, communicative skills etc...
3. consumption reeducation: it is obvious that if we want to raise the consumption level of the poor (from the undeveloped and the developed worlds) without overstress the world resources, that minority that consumes 50 times more than the poorest, largest parcel will have to reduce their consumption. This also demands a lot of education (or reeducation) but it will be indispensable. We have been witnessing such a trend, among the youth, in the early seventies, in the USA and Europe, I remember also in Brazil, and maybe elsewhere. What did happen to that trend of voluntary frugality and reduced consumism, of selfmade clothes and homes, organic gardening, preventive health and soft healing, inner development, peace and love and fulfilment? Who did make this trend flow back, during the 80s and then? Here again you see the importance of reeducating the mass media, show business and ad industry. Humanity and the planet cannot afford any more these giant communication vectors working always against our more legitimate interests...
4. another indispensable vector is the governmental action, and also the action of the NGOs, universities and international collaboration agencies, which must learn how to work together, inside a comprehensible strategic framework. Today all of the actions of these organizations are developed at random, without any integrated system that could produce a result greater than the unarticulated sum of the effects of the many projects being developed now throughout the world. At national level, or - after and gradually - at global level, the projects, the agencies, the organizations, the academy, will need to learn to integrate their visions, need assessments and programs, and collaborate with the educational vector described above.
5. all these vectors would make possible the diffusion of appropriate technologies of living (housing), working (and generating income), eating, healing, learning that would be far better than the conditions lived by most of the world population. These technologies would include cooperativism, microcredit systems, local currency, young entrepreneurial development etc., paired with that education vector that would alert people that it is better for them to buy a shoe made by a local cooperative where their relatives work, than to buy a Nike made by a machine. I know that this is possible - if there is knowledge enough - because I and my friends and family live this way.
Sorry, but these are some points which my experience showed me that are very important, but that seldomly I see discussed anywhere (I hope here is not the wrong local to start). Yours, Joaquim. _____________________________________________________________________
At 10:57 10/01/97 -0500, you wrote: >Dear Jay,
>I'll make this very brief. You say
>>Capitalism is unsustainable because it depletes "nonrenewable" resources
>and corrupts renewable resources so badly that they become nonrenewable.
>These properties are not unique to capitalism. Nevertheless, capitalism
>belongs to a class of economic systems (so do all existing modern economic
>systems), that have these properties.
>
>I think this is an accurate statement of the problem. The issue is not one of
>capitalism but of modern economic systems that seek to raise the living
>standards and consumption levels of large numbers of people. Your would
>prefer, I gather, that the world population shrink down to the point where
it will >not strain the existing environment and resource base. This is one solution.
>Of course, it is one that presumes a major die-off of much of the exiting world
>population, since no steps would be taken to provide the wherewithall to
>support and sustain them. Do you have a preferred means by which this
>dying should be effected? Let the poor die? Let the genetically inferior die?
>Let the believers in inferior ideas die? Would you suggest that Dr. Lisse
stop >trying to save lives in Namibia? What is your development theory?
>
>Jon Sanford
>
_______________________________________________________________ Joaquim MouraCompanheiros das Americas / Partners of the Americas Comite Brasilia - Washington D.C. / Committee Comissao de Desenvolvimento da Juventude e da Cidadania / Youth and Citizenship Development Commission ** todas as opinioes controversas sao apenas pessoais ** ** all the controversial opinions are just personal **
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