Adonis Diaries

Global Resolutions of World problems; (June 28, 2009)

            This essay intends to offer viable global resolutions to the global problems that I posted previously.  I developed on the eight main global problems:

Fact one:  Climate and environment quickly deteriorating.

Fact two:  Birth control is not efficient in the mostly under-developed States

Fact three:  Potable water and water for irrigation are dwindling fast.

Fact four:  The middle classes in China and India are expanding alarmingly.

Fact five:  The world economy is experiencing serious deflationary period.

Fact six:  The world is going through deep financial crisis and recession.

Fact seven:  Effective military spending should decrease but it didn’t.

Fact eight:  The identity crisis around the world is destabilizing order and security.

            At this junction of human development, the global problems we have to face attest to the successes and accomplishments of man, his mental scientific genius, his legitimate ambitions for acquiring what he can afford to, his quest for liberty and the reward for a comfortable life after a hard day work.  The global problems we have to resolve attest to man ethical and moral failures to catching up to his mental agility.  Man has proven his individual instinct capability for survival in a sustainable earth; man has now to prove that he developed enough collective instinct to survive an earth on the way to depletion.

            The eight main problems cannot be solved separately; not a single problem can be solved by one nation.  The interactions among these problems mesh tightly and resolutions should be studied and analyzed as an entity, a complete package, by a world forum, meeting regularly, and then assigned to a central executive power.  The United Nation is firmly established and has a wide data base, current and on global scale.  The first step would reasonably be to re-organize the UN with fresh competence, specialized departments, and actual executive power but the State superpowers are not showing signs of investing time on re-structuring the UN potentials.

            Veto power by a single State (one of the G5) to shut down resolutions by the other 194 States is troubling.  More States are entitled politically and economically to be assigned permanent seats so that political decisions results from equitable balance in power.  In all Parliaments there are committees for specific issues; I don’t see why State representatives in the UN are not allocated in committees so that the world community feels that it has a share in the well being of earth’s citizens.

            Globalization after the fall of the Berlin Wall exacerbated many of these problems and added a few more serious problems: it belittled culture and replaced serious reflections with information; it pressured many States to organize into economic blocks to face up to a unipolar world power; it generated identity issues and radicalization of religious extremism under the guise of autonomous and independent tiny States; and it eradicated local based civilizations and traditions that had power to participate effectively in social progress and management.  The new ideologies of civilization clash, the death of history, the only valid political system of conservative capitalism, and the dominance of the American language and way of life were meant to confirm the new unipolar political system.  The world was to become a village governed by a central power and the financial crisis proved the danger of globalization “US style” or State ideology circumventing and crushing other viable ideologies. The US Defense Minister Rumsfeld went as far as cursing Europe as “senile old Europe” because it adhered to legitimate ethical standards.

            Environmental re-habilitation and climate management and control are political in essence.  This problem is linked to increased urbanization and over-production and competition on world market in order to boost GNPs and secure higher political ranking among the G20.  Containing CO2 emissions and stabilizing them to current levels is feasible at the expense of erecting nuclear power plants because the “clean” alternatives of elonean and hydraulic power generations are limited in production commensurate to the exorbitant cost.  China and India must convert any new car put on the highway into much cleaner energy efficient vehicles or any solution for stabilization of CO2 production will fail.

            The major worry is the emission of methane gas, worse 20 times than CO2 for the warming up process, which oceans have started to spew. Earth regeneration is a slow process and for the Arctic to recover is not foreseeable in the medium term.  Reforestation is also feasible but younger trees are no supplement to efficient old trees that are dying and decomposing.  Until the tropical forests resume their natural function of absorbing more CO2 than emitting then earth environment is in serious trouble.

            Birth rate control is plagued by superstition, ignorance, oligarchy systems, and extremism in many societies; these deficiencies are increasing and worsening in under-developed States.  Birth control must be a decentralized enterprise and tailored made to customs and traditions to be successful in the long term.  Only higher rate in education, exposure to other civilizations, active dissemination of female rights and enforcing them, and increased local facilities to generating job opportunities can stabilize birth rate to manageable level.

World finance currency has to be stabilized in order to avoid desastrous fluctuations not based on sound economic output and real trade exchange.  I suggest the following steps:

            First, the developed States have to agree on another tangible standard for currencies.  Gold would not do because the US has abolished it in 1967 because all the gold in the world could not sustain the huge amount of paper dollars circulating or intended to circulate around the world.  Gold extraction, even if practically depleted on ground of economic feasiblity, can always be re-used and circulated but has no industrial value.  The alternative is a basket of depleting minerals that are essentials for manufacturing and production.  The processed minerals do not have to be rare but very essentials for development.  The US can agree to this idea since it has huge reserves in many important minerals.

            Second, all the States that can account for at least 3% of all curency circulation should join an “International Money Printing Council” with tight control and monitoring creteria.  The first States in ranking with combined shares of over 50% of cash money in circulation on the global market should have a veto power.

            There are serious dangers that can wreck havoc to any global resolutions if politics succumb to one of Three Global Temptations.  It is appropriate to consider the example of a team of rock climbers.  The team has the appropriate equipments that are tested scientifically and the members have the proper physical training.  There are three main risks for the team to fail in his mission of reaching the top.

            The first temptation is that a member of the team going berserk and taking a dive: this member can carry down the rest of the team with him. A few people have this urgent temptation to dive, and when available, they would try dangerous acrobatics.  Luckily, the two populous nations of China and India have taken off; they have the tools, the technology, and the means to care for their over 2 billion citizens; the main worry is that they are trying to catch up in a few decades what took centuries for the USA, Europe, and Japan to reach in stable governments, and legitimate desires for comfort. The accelerated trends in China and India for over production are a dangerous temptation that needs to be tampered by political sharing at an equal footing.  

            There are many more millions who have been humiliated for centuries and robbed of their basic dignity; they have not gone berserk because of poverty in means for survival as individual; they are dangerous because of a collective sense of insignificance and desperation toward the policies of the colonial powers of resuming this process of humiliation and denying them even diplomatic respect as recognized States.  Not all Moslem States feel this desperation: Iran, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Turkey have taken their destinies in their hand.  What the European Union and the USA have to focus on, right now, is to salvage the remnant of dignity among the Arab populations.

            The second temptation facing the team of climbers is the wall, the rock face. Most team members might have the techniques of sheltering from falling rocks, slippery sections, brittle portions, and blowing winds.  Human kind has learned to take shelter until the danger passes over.  Most of us have developed the instinct of prudence, such as not interference and keeping low levels. We are at a junction where danger is not to pass over on its own volition and no sheltering behavior can protect us for survival.

            Human kind has to move as a team of bold activists and turn out heavily to put their words and opinions at work.  If we hold to our tribal customs, our illusory identities, our comfortable life styles, our chimerical convictions then all is lost.  The team has to support the weakest member as difficulties surge and be confronted collectively.  The best means is to include the weakest members in the resolution programs so that they acquire the ropes, skills, and confidence to share in the task.

            The third temptation braving the team is deciding on the target of the mission and it has to be a collective goal. There are no tops to reach in human progress but there are defining phases.  We are at the dawn of Prehistory and a new kind of history has to be achieved and written. Tribal history has done its function but it is of no use for our current global problems. National wars, religious wars disguised as ethical values, ideological wars, cultural wars, or war of “civilization” have been tried and they all failed to bring reprieve and salvation. A new adventure for human kind is facing us boldly and we have to invent a new kind of history more appropriate to our survival. The new history should be focused on resuming our medical successes, eliminating pain and diseases, eradicating weapons of mass destruction, keeping us functional in old age, overcoming illiteracy, investing on continuing education, creating opportunities for various skills, desires, and achievements, preserving local languages and literature, managing human rights, and salvaging the dignity of every human being.

            Frankly, The European Union is actually the main laboratory for confirming that “Tribal History” is exhaling its last breath; that human dignity is not measured by fictitious apartheid scales based on color, religious affiliation or ethnic origins; that humiliating man is not a point of view or can generate any temporary benefit. If God has been angry for millennia then man has an opportunity to prove that he can harness collective instinct for survival to reverse that anger and make God feels proud of his Creation.